Liquid Nitrogen

by Jennifer Maiden

Jennifer Maiden’s ‘weaving’ poems are like verse essays or conversations, in which the political issues of our time and the figures who dominate them are presented with the same clear intelligence and eye for detail, as the most personal aspects of the poet’s experience. This is the quality of liquid nitrogen which gives the book its title – ‘the frozen suspension which is risky/ but also fecund and has beauty’ – a substance which permits intense and heated interactions, and at the same time the survival of delicate organisms. In the cool medium of Maiden’s poetry Julia Gillard is considered by her mentor Nye Bevan, Kevin Rudd shares a flight with Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Eleanor Roosevelt plays Woody Guthrie for Hillary Clinton. The poems focus on the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, Breivik in Norway, dissidents in Beijing, the protests in Tahrir Square and Gillard’s use of power, alongside tributes to friends and family, the ox and the tiger, music and the power of poetry.

Jennifer Maiden has published sixteen collections of poetry; her most recent book, Pirate Rain (Giramondo, 2010) won the Age Poetry Book of the Year Award and the NSW Premier’s Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry. She is a recipient of the Christopher Brennan Award for lifetime achievement

Genres: Poetry

86 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2012

Reviews

[Initially NO · Rating 2 out of 5]

Newspaper clipping
put into prose
typeset to mimic
the look of poetry
otherwise
unmarketable
very short inauthentic dry
novella
without a gripping plot,
but 'oh so important details'.
rhythm near non existent;
bland elevator music, if any is there
in the sketchy notes,
just notes
about imposturous politicians and their
go here
go there.

the mention of the title 'liquid nitrogen' repeatedly
a tad trite.
a tad, tad, tad try-hard thematically.
poetry dead air,
desperately trying to excuse
the gulf
the substantial deficit in the pages
as literary trickery a plenty
don't you get it don't you get it don't you, don't you...

Easy. Nothing to it. Get out of here when there's so many touching, authentic books to read!
I don't want the snore of regurgitated newsfeed.

[Marian Weaver · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book won the Victorian Premier's Literary Award for Poetry.

I don't see the attraction.

[Blair · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not my thing. I loved one poem at the end, but her poetry is generally too prosaic for my taste.

[Melanie · Rating 2 out of 5]

My eyes kept glazing over trying to get through these poems. Someone has called them prosaic and that's the word.

[Sharon Hollis · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book in a bit of a hurry for book group and think I might have enjoyed it more if I could have taken a little more time over the poems. I particularly enjoyed the poems about politicians and their mentors and found some phrases lingering in my mind. Well worth a read and if good reads had half stars I'd have given it 3.5

[Septi Triandini]

reading

[Cody · Rating 2 out of 5]

Between 2 and 3 stars because I didn't really see them as poems but it was a very interesting collection and some of them aroused something in me.