Book description
Satirist, philosopher, elegist, aphorist, cultural historian - Peter
Porter is perhaps too singular a talent to be described as
‘representative’ of the age: an Australian whose easy familiarity with
the breadth of European culture puts most Europeans to shame, he has
long held the reputation of one of our most intellectually promiscuous
and culturally sophisticated writers. Porter uses the poem as a means
through which a thought can be pursued; this selection from fifty years’
work allows us the first opportunity to fully survey the quality and
breadth of that thought, and the unfailing intensity of its light. In
short, his Selected Poems is a one-volume education: Porter’s subtle and
profound sense of history permits him to read any event as a point in a
dynamic space where the forces of time and culture converge. From these
coordinates, he gives perspective, direction and bearing to our
contemporary life, and allows us to read the pattern of our ideas, art
and loves on the map of an ancient terrain. That he has done all this
with such immense good humour and human compassion is one of the
literary miracles of our time. Peter Porter arrived in Britain fifty
years ago and has lived here ever since. Since 1974, he has visited his
native Australia often and considers himself part of the present-day
poetical worlds of both nations. Since 1968 he has been a freelance
literary journalist and reviewer. He has published seventeen books of
poems, plus four further volumes with the Australian painter Arthur
Boyd. He has been married twice and has, with his second wife, nine
grandchildren.
