Tony Harrison: Selected Poems - Tony Harrison

The work of Tony Harrison raises many interesting points about language, class and the very culture the receptive audience takes for granted. His work is complicated by his social dichotomy: Harrison bestrides working-class ethic (and education) and literary assimilation and accomplishment (with its middle-class assumptions). He is, within two lines of his work, both benefactor of literature and its destroyer. A cultural Colossus. An iconoclast. This collection comprises Harrison’s most celebrated works - from the beautiful but biting (certainly in its notorious language) “v.“ to two of my personal favourites: “Them & [uz]“ and ...  Read the complete review

I bought this book at a reading given by Tony Harrison. I had previously read several of the poems in other books and found them rather bland, but his reading was extraordinarily powerful. I'm not sure if this was because of or in spite of his enormous Poetic Presence. He's just what you would want a poet to be like - all clenched fists and Northern passion. How much of the clenching is cultivated is another question - and one you ask as you read 'V' for example. Sometimes it beats you so hard over the head with how clever and how very naughty it thinks it is that you want to swear at it in turn. But then there are lyrically beautiful poems too - ...  Read the complete review

'Selected Poems' includes some of Harrisons best, and best known, work. In this volume you will find the entertaining, explicit, and often written about 'V.', as well as his poems from 'The School of Eloquence' Selected Poems is a good selection of his work, and includes many greatly acclaimed poems, as well as his poignant, but less well known poems. 'V.' is by far Harrison's best known work, due in no small part to the attention it recieved from viewers, in the media, and even in Parliament, after it was aired by Channel 4. In it Harrison visits his family burial plot (in the Beeston, I think, area of Leeds), and speaks ...  Read the complete review