By Gerry Murphy

Muse

2015 collection from a poet whose distinctive, provocative, left-of-centre poems have made him one of the most popular Irish poets of his generation

Description

‘The joker of his own tristesse’ is how one critic described Gerry Murphy, a poet whose distinctive, provocative, left-of-centre poems have made him one of the most popular Irish poets of his generation. In this new collection, Murphy continues to explore – and indeed to play havoc with – his perennial subjects of political and religious influence; but, as the title suggests, the book highlights his poems of love and loss, of temporary lust and lasting desire that make his work complex and authentic as well as frequently laugh-out-loud.

Gerry Murphy was born in Cork in 1952. He has published six previous collections of poetry, including My Flirtation with International Socialism (2010). End of Part One: New and Selected Poems appeared in 2006 to critical and popular acclaim. His poetry was adapted for actors and musicians by Crazy Dog Audio Theatre and, as The People’s Republic of Gerry Murphy, had a week-long run at Cork’s Everyman Palace in 2008.

“The chief enjoyments of Muse lie in its best poems and in the process of going with the flow, wondering whatever will come next.”
Poetry Review

“Like much of Murphy’s oeuvre, many of these poems can be spoken in a single breath, and held onto (as a Philosophy student, I confess to having gotten unseemly mileage out of his ‘Existential Café’). Instead of expanding this poet’s territory of reference, Muse digs deeper into one or two areas of it, enhancing what has gone before, and finally, reminding us that Murphy is one of the finer love poets writing today.”
– Dean Browne


ISBN 9781910251058 Paperback
140 x 216 mm, 80 pp

April 2015

Additional information

Dimensions216 × 140 mm

Product Detail

  • ISBN: : 9781910251058
  • Size: : 140 x 216 mm
  • Pages: : 80 pp
  • Published: : April 2015

About The Author

Author

GERRY MURPHY is an Irish poet, born in Cork in 1952. His poetry collections include A Small Fat Boy Walking Backwards (1985, 1992) and five previous collections from Dedalus, Rio de la Plata and All That (1993), The Empty Quarter (1995), Extracts from the Lost Log-Book of Christopher Columbus (1999), Torso of an Ex-Girlfriend (2002), My Flirtation with International Socialism (2010) and Muse (2015) His latest collection is The Humours of Nothingness (2020). Dedalus also published End of Part One: New and Selected Poems (2006). He has published two chapbooks with Southword Editions. Murphy's poems have appeared in many journals and anthologies, including Poetry Ireland Review, The Well Review and The Future (Arlen House, 2018). Pocket Apocalypse, his translations of the Polish poet Katarzyna Borun-Jagodzinska, appeared in 2005 from Southword Editions. Murphy's own poems form the basis for a live poetry-and-music show by Crazy Dog Audio Theatre, entitled The People's Republic of Gerry Murphy, which ran at the Cork Guinness Jazz Festival in 2010 to considerable critical success. REVIEW EXCERPT "Murphy's voice is salacious, funny, pithy, angry-making, often verging on the side-of-the-mouth and, dare one add, tender... This is a worthwhile book, energetic and wise." — Fred Johnston, Poetry Ireland Review