Looking Through Letterboxes
Caroline Bird first appears to be a traditional storyteller. But the stories she tells (or conceals) are suspended in a language charged with metaphor, and most of them are built upon foundations which are strangely familiar: fairy tale, fantasy and the bitter-sweet world of romance. The further one reads in her haunted tales, the more remarkable becomes the variety of forms, metres and rhythms she uses, and the clearer their appropriateness to her themes.
The poems can at first appear to be topical, "Year of the Woman", for example, "Gothic", "Dusk and Petrol" – yet the poets take on reality is informed by a paradoxically "knowing" innocence. Things are not ever as they seem, and the poems bring us closer to how the world "really" is. They work metaphorically through our expectations and prejudices, those that are encapsulated in cliche and aphorism, which she rearranges and reanimates ("with a step/ in your dance, a forecast for lightning"), or those that relate to the world of childhood ("I came to see if you were ok") where language itself has never quite got a grip. In the poems of Caroline Bird gender politics are starkly redefined, as are the languages with which generations communicate and fail to agree.
About the Author
Caroline Bird is an award-winning poet. She won a major Eric Gregory Award in 2002 and was short-listed for the Geoffrey Dearmer Prize in 2001. Her first collection, "Looking Through Letterboxes", was published by Carcanet Press in 2002, when she was just fifteen. She was short-listed for the Dylan Thomas Prize in 2008 and 2010 for her second and third collections, "Trouble Came To The Turnip", and "Watering Can", and was the youngest writer on the list both times. "Watering Can" achieved a "Poetry Book Society Recommendation". She was one of the five official poets at London Olympics 2012. Her poem, "The Fun Palace" which celebrates the life and work of Joan Littlewood, is now erected on the Olympic Site outside the main stadium. Her fourth poetry collection, "The Hat-stand Union", will be published in 2013. She is also a playwright: her children's musical, "The Trial of Dennis the Menace", was performed at the Southbank Centre in February 2012. This autumn, her bold new version of Euripides's "The Trojan Women" premiered at the Gate Theatre.
Reviews
"An astonishingly assured piece of work" – Ruth Padel, Financial Times
"Her poems burst with linguistic energy" – Stephen Knight, Times Literary Supplement
"quite magical" – Scotsman
"What a debut!" – Poetry London
