Apocrypha

by Peter Boyle

Intellectually and poetically, this is the most ambitious book that has appeared in Australian poetry in the last decade. Its structure is to imagine a set of lost or forgotten documents written in the thousand years since the sixth century BC. These include passages from Herodotus and Plato but they also include the works of imaginary poets. The history that produces these documents is a rather distorted version of actual world history. All of this is intellectually coherent and very well-informed when it comes to the geography and intellectual activity of the ancient world. The great achievement is in the imagining of a number of poets whose work is represented here.Peter Boyle is an Australian poet living in Sydney. He has received several awards for his poetry, including the New South Wales Premier’s award and the South Australian Festival award. His most recent collection, Museum of Space, was shortlisted for the Queensland Premier’s Prize. He is also a translator of French and Spanish poetry.

292 pages, Paperback