Popeye in Belgrade

This collection records a final detachment, in all senses of the word, from the author s country of origin. Often the poems are set in places where political and social upheaval has recently occurred. They record the aftershock of moral and spiritual earthquakes often in intimate contexts. Both life in the Balkans, Eastern Europe and elsewhere are juxtaposed next to private experience so that personal and public feeling overlap. Political and social concerns are seldom addressed head on, but form part of each poem s texture in the same way that these concerns might become part of an alert and sensitive individual s life. Consequently, there is a strong focus on how the social and political combine with or intrude into personal lives and the processes of nature. A strong thematic element is the presence of music, not as an emollient source of consolation, but as a yet unattained level of meaning and feeling, perhaps because music simply represents an elusive otherness. The collection maintains faith that the English language remains vital and capable of providing experience and insight located in places and concerns that still command the world s attention.