Great Escapes: Poems From the Cheshire Prize for Literature 2013

Great Escapes: Poems From the Cheshire Prize for Literature 2013

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Great Escapes: Poems From the Cheshire Prize for Literature 2013

There are moments’, reflects Rhoda, one of Virginia Woolf’s characters in The Waves, ‘when the walls of the mind grow thin; when nothing is unabsorbed, and I could fancy that we might blow so vast a bubble that the sun might set and rise in it and we might take the blue of midday and the black of midnight and be cast off and escape from here and now’. Poetry is like Rhoda’s bubble. From nothing, the poet fashions an entire world of meaning and sensation. Poets and readers enter that imaginary, frangible world to escape the ‘here and now’, and, since we must always return to the ‘here and now’, a good poem must equip us better to deal with, or understand, it. Whether it’s the music in which ice-cream-factory workers find sanctuary, as Philip Williams suggests in his prizewinning poem ‘The Elvis Shed’, or a painter’s quest for truth, as Andrew Rudd’s poem, ‘Hiroshige at Work’ shows, the poems in this collection provide many alternate ‘worlds’ into which we may escape.

The Cheshire Prize for Literature was inaugurated in 2003 as the High Sheriff’s Cheshire Prize for Literature. It is funded by the Bank of America and is administered by the University of Chester. The 2013 competition was for poetry, and this collection contains poems by 26 of the shortlisted poets, including those of the eventual winner and runners up. Details of the Prize are available at: www.chester.ac.uk/literatureprize

Copies can be purchased directly from the publisher using this ordering system and through booksellers and distributors. This ordering system is for print books only and these are despatched through the postal system. Other means of payment for the print version are institutional purchase orders and cheques made payable to the University of Chester. Please email any ordering queries or call +44(0)1244 513305. There is no charge for postage and packing in the UK for paperback books, but postal charges are applicable for overseas orders. Please note that for books sent overseas, there may be local taxes applied in the country of destination and customs delays. The e-book version (in PDF format) is currently available through Google Play and library collections such as EBSCO, Ebook Central and Gardners.

For more information on all University of Chester Press books, please visit: www.chester.ac.uk/university-press



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