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Deadpan / James Norcliffe.

By: Material type: TextTextPublisher: Dunedin, New Zealand : Otago University Press, 2019Description: 98 pages ; 24 cmContent type:
  • text
Media type:
  • unmediated
Carrier type:
  • volume
ISBN:
  • 1988531756
  • 9781988531755
Other title:
  • Dead pan
Subject(s): Genre/Form: LOC classification:
  • PR9698.N827 D43 2019
Summary: The title of James Norcliffe's tenth poetry collection points deftly to the way it conveys big emotions without cracking a smile or shedding a tear. In Deadpan, Norcliffe writes in an alert, compassionate yet sceptical voic.
Holdings
Item type Current library Collection Call number Status Date due Barcode Item holds
Non-Fiction Davis (Central) Library Non-Fiction Non-Fiction 821 NOR Available T00823871
Total holds: 0

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

The title of James Norcliffe's tenth poetry collection points deftly to the way it conveys big emotions without cracking a smile or shedding a tear. In Deadpan, Norcliffe writes in an alert, compassionate yet sceptical voice. The book's first section, 'Poor Yorick', shares the thoughts of an introspective narrator as he contends with the travails of later life. 'In his hospital pyjamas', Yorick is by turns cheerful and beset by loss, laughing and weeping, comparing the stages of life (and death). The following sections - 'Scan', 'Trumpet Vine', 'Telegraph Road' and 'Travellers in a small Ford' - reach around to mine experience in a world where 'nothing lasts'; not childhood, place nor identity. An appropriate response to this ephemeral world is to embrace ambiguity, uncertainty, absurdity and surrealism. 'Deadpan,' writes the author in his introductory essay, 'is the porter in Macbeth pausing to take a piss while there is that urgent banging at the gate. It is Buster Keaton standing unmoved as the building crashes down on top of him. It is my poker-faced Yorkshire grandfather playing two little dicky birds sitting on the wall.' These poems are concise and contained, using supple, precise language and a gleam of dry and mordant wit. Deadpan is the work of a mature and technically astute poet who is one of New Zealand's leading writers.

The title of James Norcliffe's tenth poetry collection points deftly to the way it conveys big emotions without cracking a smile or shedding a tear. In Deadpan, Norcliffe writes in an alert, compassionate yet sceptical voic.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

  • Author's preface (p. 9)
  • Part 1 Poor Yorick
  • Poor Yorick (p. 15)
  • 1 Yorick's heart (p. 15)
  • 2 Yorick has a problem with personal freshness (p. 16)
  • 3 Yorick loses his gibes (p. 17)
  • 4 Yorick as beast of burden (p. 18)
  • 5 Yorick contemplates drinking straws for the future (p. 19)
  • 6 Yorick admires the spider lily (p. 20)
  • 7 Yorick laughs (p. 21)
  • 8 Yorick weeps (p. 22)
  • 9 Yorick considers the worm (p. 23)
  • 10 Yorick considers the prince (p. 24)
  • 11 Yorick considers the cat who may (p. 25)
  • 12 Yorick remembers gambolling (p. 26)
  • 13 Yorick considers Hamlet's skull (p. 27)
  • Part 2 Scan
  • Scan (p. 31)
  • Night watch (p. 32)
  • The last stop before Bethlehem (p. 33)
  • Black-faced sheep (p. 34)
  • Route 1003 (p. 35)
  • The poets at Makara (p. 36)
  • Hochstetter's frog (p. 37)
  • Naughty boys' island (p. 38)
  • Crabmeat on the fifteenth floor (p. 39)
  • Ziziphus (p. 40)
  • Mycroft (p. 41)
  • Other lives (p. 43)
  • The greengage man (p. 44)
  • Part 3 Trumpet Vine
  • Trumpet vine (p. 47)
  • Underwear (p. 48)
  • The tennis ball (p. 49)
  • There are times I feel like the egg (p. 50)
  • Three times upon a time (p. 51)
  • Precious McKenzie lifts himself (p. 52)
  • The madness of crowds (p. 53)
  • M. Hulot and the canary (p. 54)
  • Deadpan (p. 55)
  • Control tower (p. 56)
  • Pool (p. 57)
  • He had this thing (p. 58)
  • The confession (p. 59)
  • Pursued by crabs (p. 60)
  • Dear Messrs Smith & Wesson (p. 61)
  • Part 4 Telegraph Road
  • Telegraph Road (p. 65)
  • Wallet (p. 67)
  • Scrim (p. 68)
  • Site content (p. 69)
  • Geographies (p. 70)
  • Helios (p. 74)
  • Waiting for the mulberry (p. 75)
  • She moved through the silence (p. 76)
  • Leaves (p. 77)
  • Invasion (p. 78)
  • Part 5 Five Travellers in a Small Ford
  • Iron Heinrich (p. 81)
  • Five travellers in a small Ford (p. 82)
  • Nina Simonestraat in Nrjmegen (p. 83)
  • The muskrats at Versailles (p. 84)
  • Near the Bonner Münster (p. 86)
  • The Haribo factory (p. 87)
  • At Ravensbourne (p. 88)
  • Promenade (p. 89)
  • Wasp at the trattoria (p. 90)
  • At Andrés Came de Res (p. 91)
  • The knife (p. 92)
  • Reforestation in the living room (p. 93)
  • Notes to the poems (p. 95)
  • Acknowledgements (p. 97)

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