Carnival Edge: New& Selected Poems is Katherine Gallagher's third book from Arc, and draws together the best work from five of her previous collections, together with a substantial body of new work. Gallagher is a prolific and popular poet, and this comprehensive new collection will delight her many devotees, both in the UK and in her native Australia. 'Katherine Gallagher has an aesthetic purity which combines introspection with an outward focus... Her verse is sometimes simply beautiful, at other times tragically moving, but always technically brilliant.' Envoi 'Gallagher has always been a poet of quiet observation, meditating on her experiences as a traveler or watching small domestic moments... There can be no doubt that Gallagher's poetry has become more confident and complex over time. The early poems, usually no longer than a page, meditate on an observation or a memory, while her more recent work is more ambitious.' Australian Book Review 'No word is wasted in Katherine's poems; she effortlessly glides into metaphor, playful inversions and unexpected turns of thought. She has an artist's eye for colour and line, a musician's ear for rhythm, tone and key, and a poet's skill in selection of the best word.' Anna Avebury 'Carnival Edge not only withstands repeated reading, it invites it. It is a work that demands that it be taken up by poets and explored, so that it can reveal its richnesses, and show further ways in which poetry can be explored... having read Carnival Edge a number of times, I can only say that these prospects excite me enormously.' The Australian Reader Katherine Gallagher is a widely-acclaimed poet with six books published as well as four chapbooks. Born in Australia, Gallagher has lived and worked in London since 1979. She has been an active force in the community, giving poetry readings, running workshops (for adults and children), judging poetry competitions, and participating in poetry festivals. Her work has been widely reviewed. Gallagher also translates from the French and her own poetry has been translated into French, German, Italian, Romanian, and Serbian. Her two previous collections are Tigers on a Silk Road and Circus-Apprentice. This book is also available as a eBook. Buy it from Amazon here.
Katherine Gallagher was born in 1935 in Australia, graduating from the University of Melbourne and teaching in Melbourne before moving to Europe in 1969. Living first in London, then in Paris, she moved back to London, where she worked as a secondary school teacher and as a poetry tutor for the Open College of the Arts, Jackson's Lane, Barnet College and Torriano. During this time she co-edited Poetry London. In 1978, she was awarded a New Writer's Fellowship from the Literature Board, Australia Council, and in 1981, she won the Brisbane Warana Poetry Prize. Her book Passengers to the City (1985) was shortlisted for the 1986 Adelaide Festival John Bray National Poetry Award and in 1987, she was one of five poets representing Australia at the Struga Poetry Festival. Her second book, Fish-rings on Water, introduced by Peter Porter, appeared in 1989 and in 2000, her third full collection, Tigers on the Silk Road was published by Arc. Three further collections followed from Arc: Circus-Apprentice (2006), Carnival Edge (2010) and Acres of Light (2016). Her translation of Jean-Jacques Celly's poetry collection, Le Somnambule Aux Yeux d'Argile (The Sleepwalker with Eyes of Clay) was published in 1994 Katherine has received, among other accolades, a Royal Literary Fund Award in 2000 and two London Society of Authors' Foundation Awards, in 2008 and 2021 respectively. She has read her poetry at festivals and universities in the UK, Australia, Ireland, Germany, Italy and France and her poems have been translated into French, German, Hebrew, Italian, Romanian and Serbo-Croat. |
