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Dear Boy
Dear Boy is the dramatic and inventive debut by Emily Berry. These smart and darkly witty poems explore lives lived strangely in unusual worlds, through a series of deft and seductive soliloquies. In a collection with a taste for ventriloquy and wickedness, and a flair for vocal cross-dressing, the balance of power is always shifting in an unexpected direction — an ingénue masquerades as a femme fatale, a doctor appears more disturbed than his patient, and parents seem more unruly than their children. Eccentric, intimate, arch, anxious, decadent and sometimes mournful, the book’s confiding voices tell stories recognisable and refracted, carried along by the undercurrent on which the collection ebbs and rides: the anguish and energy brought about by a long-distance love affair, which propels and terrorises and ultimately unites the work.
Dear Boy is an irresistible and enlivening collection by a new poet of startling gifts.
Emily Berry grew up in London and studied English Literature at Leeds University and Creative Writing at Goldsmiths College. An Eric Gregory Award winner in 2008, she co-edits the anthology series Stop Sharpening Your Knives and is a co-writer of The Breakfast Bible, a compendium of breakfasts. She works as a freelance writer and editor.
Dear Boy is an irresistible and enlivening collection by a new poet of startling gifts.
Emily Berry grew up in London and studied English Literature at Leeds University and Creative Writing at Goldsmiths College. An Eric Gregory Award winner in 2008, she co-edits the anthology series Stop Sharpening Your Knives and is a co-writer of The Breakfast Bible, a compendium of breakfasts. She works as a freelance writer and editor.
57 pages, Paperback
First published March 7, 2013
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About the author
Emily Berry
23 books84 followersEmily Berry is a poet, writer and editor. She grew up in London and studied English Literature at Leeds University and Creative Writing at Goldsmiths College. Her debut poetry collection Dear Boy won the Forward Prize for Best First Collection and the Hawthornden Prize. She is a contributor to The Breakfast Bible, a compendium of breakfasts, and is currently working towards a PhD in Creative and Critical Writing at the University of East Anglia.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 70 reviews
May 6, 2013
A stimulating, if at times highly personal,first date with Emily Berry's oeuvre! She has produced some very finely-etched & varied poems in this collection,with a consistent quality & a voice with both poignancy & humour,encapsulating human emotions & feelings in an often prosaic world.Berry hints at hidden depths within her masquerading,& doesn't shy away from startling vulgarities; the factious line
"He slapped my face with his penis./
'To get you going,'he said"
(from 'The Incredible History of Patient M.'),
had me perplexed & prurient,but inexplicably impressed,at the same time, at its daring.
And the memorable,quotable refrains come noisily,to mix metaphors!;
"His stories were mostly warnings/
I am love's crooked detour,he said
('Love Birds')
"If I tell him I've missed him, he says:'Love is
the bloom on a problem,and must be cut away.'"
('Manners').
"My breasts frothed like champagne from a bottle.My eyes bulged."
('A Short Guide To Corseting').
A flavour of the month? A brief spring intermezzo? No; there's enough here in this debut by Berry to suggest a furtive & febrile poetic imagination.I look forward to her next joyous effervescence...to her next rampant uncorking...with a hope of further frothingly poetic revelations.The juice of this berry has a kick to it!
"He slapped my face with his penis./
'To get you going,'he said"
(from 'The Incredible History of Patient M.'),
had me perplexed & prurient,but inexplicably impressed,at the same time, at its daring.
And the memorable,quotable refrains come noisily,to mix metaphors!;
"His stories were mostly warnings/
I am love's crooked detour,he said
('Love Birds')
"If I tell him I've missed him, he says:'Love is
the bloom on a problem,and must be cut away.'"
('Manners').
"My breasts frothed like champagne from a bottle.My eyes bulged."
('A Short Guide To Corseting').
A flavour of the month? A brief spring intermezzo? No; there's enough here in this debut by Berry to suggest a furtive & febrile poetic imagination.I look forward to her next joyous effervescence...to her next rampant uncorking...with a hope of further frothingly poetic revelations.The juice of this berry has a kick to it!
January 3, 2022
"Other times I wake up and the day's flung out in front of me like a roll of lino and I'd rather not step on it I'd rather stay in bed".
A brilliant debut collection of insightful poems by Emily Berry. Some of these were highly enjoyable: superbly crafted, elegantly written and relatable; and while others were less agreeable (disjointed or a little too enigmatic), overall an endearing read.
Three particular stand-outs were 'A Short Guide to Corseting' in which Berry pertains Pain as "the spine of life, it holds you up'. 'The Tea-party Cats', which ingeniously captures cat decorum and etiquette and 'The Old Fuel' which deftly encapsulates the complexities of ordinary life.
A brilliant debut collection of insightful poems by Emily Berry. Some of these were highly enjoyable: superbly crafted, elegantly written and relatable; and while others were less agreeable (disjointed or a little too enigmatic), overall an endearing read.
Three particular stand-outs were 'A Short Guide to Corseting' in which Berry pertains Pain as "the spine of life, it holds you up'. 'The Tea-party Cats', which ingeniously captures cat decorum and etiquette and 'The Old Fuel' which deftly encapsulates the complexities of ordinary life.
Read
June 18, 2023le poesie di emily berry ti sussurrano intimamente. sono affollate di figure sgretolate, che compaiono avvolte da un alone di mistero, proiettate sulla pagina dai meandri del suo vissuto, talmente personali che pur nella consapevolezza di non averle comprese tutte, né tutte a pieno, le ho amate. ora ne voglio ancora, e ancora, e ancora.
la forma, anche se incline al prosastico, non manca di quella raffinatezza linguistica e stilistica propria della poesia. tante volte leggendo di poesia contemporanea non si ha la sensazione di leggere veramente poesia: si tratta piuttosto di narrazioni ad arte che vengono spezzate in versi brevi con risultati goffi se non ridicoli. non sono qui a parlare dei tratti della versificazione di emily berry, né ne ho le competenze, ma non posso che sottolineare la sensazione onirica di cui sono intrise le sue poesie, potenti nelle immagini anche quando queste appartengono alla quotidianità più scontata. le poesie più cupe, dai toni folkloristici e ancestrali, grondano di macabro e lo fanno in modo mozzafiato. ormai ho imparato che il mio per le scritture fitte di metafore non è un debole ma un fetish, e berry ha soddisfatto ogni mia voglia. la sensazione di irrequietezza e affanno e oppressione di cui sono intrisi i pezzi più inquietanti l'ha istantaneamente fatta avvicinare al mio altro grande amore letterario: r.i.p. shirley jackson, you would've loved emily berry.
(ho preferito le poesie più immaginifiche a quelle narrative, che d'altronde sono anche quelle più difficili da intendere, non per il linguaggio metaforico più calcato, ma perché al lettorə non è dato a sapere il ricordo a cui rimandano. inaspettato ma graditissimo il tema del feticcio, con qualche incursione nel mondo bdsm che non avrei visto nemmeno col cannocchiale. sono diversi i passaggi erotici, a volte di un amore dolcissimo, altri di corpi violati, ma per lo più di quel dolore inscindibile al piacere controllato che sa descrivere così bene).
la forma, anche se incline al prosastico, non manca di quella raffinatezza linguistica e stilistica propria della poesia. tante volte leggendo di poesia contemporanea non si ha la sensazione di leggere veramente poesia: si tratta piuttosto di narrazioni ad arte che vengono spezzate in versi brevi con risultati goffi se non ridicoli. non sono qui a parlare dei tratti della versificazione di emily berry, né ne ho le competenze, ma non posso che sottolineare la sensazione onirica di cui sono intrise le sue poesie, potenti nelle immagini anche quando queste appartengono alla quotidianità più scontata. le poesie più cupe, dai toni folkloristici e ancestrali, grondano di macabro e lo fanno in modo mozzafiato. ormai ho imparato che il mio per le scritture fitte di metafore non è un debole ma un fetish, e berry ha soddisfatto ogni mia voglia. la sensazione di irrequietezza e affanno e oppressione di cui sono intrisi i pezzi più inquietanti l'ha istantaneamente fatta avvicinare al mio altro grande amore letterario: r.i.p. shirley jackson, you would've loved emily berry.
(ho preferito le poesie più immaginifiche a quelle narrative, che d'altronde sono anche quelle più difficili da intendere, non per il linguaggio metaforico più calcato, ma perché al lettorə non è dato a sapere il ricordo a cui rimandano. inaspettato ma graditissimo il tema del feticcio, con qualche incursione nel mondo bdsm che non avrei visto nemmeno col cannocchiale. sono diversi i passaggi erotici, a volte di un amore dolcissimo, altri di corpi violati, ma per lo più di quel dolore inscindibile al piacere controllato che sa descrivere così bene).
[…] Look for a man with faith
and hands strong enough to teach you how to
give yourself away. Don't be afraid of restraint.
Pain is the spine of life. It holds you up.
I wear a corset for these reasons: love came
sideways, like a crab. I wanted to agree with
love; I wanted to be carried off in its claws.
Read
October 23, 2022what a lovely collection!!
dear boy, we were deeply fascinated by the dark originality, the vulnerability, and the unique conjunction of all poems/ stories/ voices in their own right(s) to a spheric Whole. still flabbergasted that this is possible & could be done??
long-distance relationships seem awful and please stay away from doctors, nuns, and cult leaders named arleen xxx
dear boy, we were deeply fascinated by the dark originality, the vulnerability, and the unique conjunction of all poems/ stories/ voices in their own right(s) to a spheric Whole. still flabbergasted that this is possible & could be done??
long-distance relationships seem awful and please stay away from doctors, nuns, and cult leaders named arleen xxx
February 8, 2017
I enjoyed some of these and some not so much and that's my insightful review.
May 4, 2022
Everything She Does is Not Her Fault
The truth is, I didn’t imagine I would melt this way,
down to my bones and my milk teeth, this old tin
I kept the things I lost in. I didn’t imagine
you’d be round to see me like this, have to listen
to this rattling all night long. Darling, I don’t know
if you thought about it, the way the round bone
of my cheek fits the bowl of your eye-socket exactly,
the slow blink of your still-lemonade eyes beneath my face,
each eyelash-graze a tiny sip like a bird drinking.
The truth is, I didn’t imagine I would melt this way,
down to my bones and my milk teeth, this old tin
I kept the things I lost in. I didn’t imagine
you’d be round to see me like this, have to listen
to this rattling all night long. Darling, I don’t know
if you thought about it, the way the round bone
of my cheek fits the bowl of your eye-socket exactly,
the slow blink of your still-lemonade eyes beneath my face,
each eyelash-graze a tiny sip like a bird drinking.
Read
August 6, 2022somebody in the reviews here calls this a first date & I think I’m right with them this collection feels something like a perfect first date that’s not something for all poets but Emily does this with incredible precision & levity.
The collection drives its way into an exploration of conventional vulnerabilities, the irreconcilable between form and practice. I also think & maybe because everything I read at the moment is fed to the gills with one’s own death - that this is in many ways a happy collection there’s an affinity with Jack Underwood & I’d love to keep it near me
If I may be more daring I’d suggest there’s a hue of the guide to this a manual for the sweetness & indecency of vulnerability - the capacity for loving in the very modern era. It seems a fantastic place to start I need to scoop up more emily
The collection drives its way into an exploration of conventional vulnerabilities, the irreconcilable between form and practice. I also think & maybe because everything I read at the moment is fed to the gills with one’s own death - that this is in many ways a happy collection there’s an affinity with Jack Underwood & I’d love to keep it near me
If I may be more daring I’d suggest there’s a hue of the guide to this a manual for the sweetness & indecency of vulnerability - the capacity for loving in the very modern era. It seems a fantastic place to start I need to scoop up more emily
Read
April 28, 2023dark, voracious, twee, sexy, a little desperate. good thoughts about love and regret and the pull and push between people. glad I own this so I can revisit (thank u oce <3 )
favorites: our love could spoil dinner, dear boy, zanzibar, her inheritance
favorites: our love could spoil dinner, dear boy, zanzibar, her inheritance
March 2, 2013
buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book buy this book
Read
February 11, 2023ADORED ! favorite was letter to husband xx thanks ciel!!
November 29, 2019
Just really wasn't for me... There were a few nice phrases, but for me most poems just fell flat...
November 24, 2018
“Every time I think a new thought I can smell an old one burning”
Full disclosure — I don't "get" a lot of poetry. I was so intimidated to read this, and I carried it around for weeks before finally diving in.
I do feel like I missed things in these poems that others probably get. Nevertheless, I really enjoyed reading this collection. Many of Emily's poems were dreamy, magical, like wonderland. Others were leaking dark undertones. I loved her style. Many of the poems had a quirky layout and each flowed so well.
This particular quote hit me hard. It's the perfect description of what it felt like to lose my father.
I definitely recommend this collection if you're looking for some modern poetry.
“I have cried your name in every possible colour”
Full disclosure — I don't "get" a lot of poetry. I was so intimidated to read this, and I carried it around for weeks before finally diving in.
I do feel like I missed things in these poems that others probably get. Nevertheless, I really enjoyed reading this collection. Many of Emily's poems were dreamy, magical, like wonderland. Others were leaking dark undertones. I loved her style. Many of the poems had a quirky layout and each flowed so well.
This particular quote hit me hard. It's the perfect description of what it felt like to lose my father.
“I was very young when I was cracked open.
Some things you should let go of
Others you shouldn't
Views differ as to which
I keep hold of everything, just in case”
I definitely recommend this collection if you're looking for some modern poetry.
“I have cried your name in every possible colour”
December 2, 2014
I sat at the bar drinking a glass of bourbon, neat, while reading this arresting collection of poems. Definitely one of the most satisfying afternoons I have enjoyed in a while. There's a very good chance that my mind became more intoxicated with the quality of this poet's verse than it did with the Knob Creek in my glass. This book absolutely needs a publisher on this side of the pond. Highly recommended.
October 17, 2024
so good the second time around! emily berry's rhythm and style of poetry is unmatched. my favorite poems were london love song, love bird, and hermann's travelling heart
February 8, 2024
A short, witty poetry collection filled to the brim with dreamy verse. I really enjoyed Berry's use of rhythm - my favorites from this collection are "Our Love Could Spoil Dinner," "The International Year of the Poem," "My Perpendicular Daughter," and "Some Fears." Can't wait to check out more of Berry's work!
November 11, 2019
Occasional brilliance (Letter to Husband) lying next to poems whose depths I could not measure (and think, in my own way, are too shallow for the measuring stick).
Bear in mind my lack of poetic understanding, and my dislike of poems the glamourise London.
Bear in mind my lack of poetic understanding, and my dislike of poems the glamourise London.
November 25, 2019
As it usually goes with poetry collections, some of these I really loved, some of these were kind of forgettable.
November 27, 2014
TERRIFIC. Love the language in these poems, the flat affect, the reoccurring characters and themes, the concern with psychoanalysis. Very modern and contemporary-feeling. And my god, the humor! Highly, highly recommended.
September 11, 2016
this just wasn't for me. it just wasn't my style of poetry and writing. the poems didn't really speak to me and i didn't really feel/understand them. i could see the beauty in a few lines but all in all it just wasn't for me.
September 29, 2023
good poems! some favorites: the numbers game, manners, questions i wanted to ask you in the swimming pool, zanzibar, hermann's traveling heart, arlene's house, devil music, the tomato salad, plans for a future romance
October 10, 2025
Dear Boy
Actually it’s Tuesday, and I’m taken aback.
You rang me three times and said ‘I can explain everything!’
into my voicemail. You know perfectly well I believe
nothing worthwhile is explainable. Dear boy,
don’t be so literal. I’m not sure if you were there or not.
Did you want to be? We can make something up.
Perhaps it was you I parasailed with above the Mediterranean?
I think I remember you now; my young love!
You complained that the harness was hurting your balls.
We had such plans. We were slung between sea and sky.
I tangled your legs in mine. We were a knot in the grain of the world.
Suddenly the sea was a blunt spur at our heels, remember?
(p. 7)
The Way You Do at the End of Plays
Anyway. We went for a drink and he ate and I didn’t and at first we struggled with inevitable silences and when I spoke my voice sounded embarrassing with the possibility of tears, and he insinuated that the fact of us meeting was a mistake all along, but things got easier and we went to the play, which was like a circus, and a cabaret, but also sort of like a fairytale, with clowns and men dressed as women and spankings and beatings and Y-fronts and fake genitals, and it was really rather amusing, and at the end the two main characters, who are falling in love, are hooked on to these two elastic swings by their belts and they’re bouncing up and down and swinging around, you know, like babies, and every now and then they try to swing towards each other, and eventually they succeed and manage to kiss, before bouncing apart, and it was so clumsy, and beautiful, and funny, and we didn’t look at each other the whole time, we were watching a play after all, and I sort of felt like crying again, but in a nice way, and then the play ended, and we turned to each other, you know in the way you do at the end of plays, and I couldn’t stop thinking about them bouncing together and apart in this amazing, crazy, awkward way.
(p. 17)
Some Fears
Fear of breezes; fear of quarrels at night-time; fear of wreckage; fear of one’s reflection in spoons; fear of children’s footprints; fear of the theory behind architecture; fear of boldness; fear of catching anxiousness from dogs; fear of ragged-right margins; fear of exposure after pruning back ivy; fear of bridges; fear of pure mathematics; fear of cats expressing devotion; fear of proximity to self-belief; fear of damp tree trunks; fear of unfamiliar elbows (all elbows being unfamiliar, even one’s own); fear of colour leaking from vegetables; fear of the mechanics of love affairs; fear of slipping; fear of ill-conceived typography; fear of non-specific impact leading to the vertical ejection of the spine from the body; fear of leaf mulch; fear of the timbre of poetry recitals; fear of balcony furniture; fear of colour leaking from the heart; fear of internal avalanche; fear of the notion of a key engaging with the inside of a lock; fear of psychoanalytical interpretations; fear of dregs; fear of book titles; fear of particular
hues of sky glimpsed from aeroplane windows; fear of text stamped into metal; fear of promises; fear of alienation brought on by hospitality; fear of unexplained light; fear of comprehensive write-off; fear of fear; fear of help. Fear of asking for, receiving, refusing, giving, or being denied help.
(p. 30)
London Love Song
Lord of our paving stones, the trodden
and the newly laid, how quietly you take from us
our reparations. Calling us to account under
lamp-posts, in the long shadows of tower blocks,
on streets scribbly with trees after rain…
We repeated your name till our voices
warped on the concrete, till you seeped
through our veins like gutter-dirt, floored us
on gum-pocked pavements, shouldered
all manner of burdens on the damp of your kerbs.
Wind-tanned, river-coloured, we emerged
from your alleyways addicted, streaking
the white edges of your smarter districts,
eyes winking like coins in a drain. We fell for you,
for your tender bus stops and careless roads,
every light brush with calamity. We broke
our hearts on your pavements pinched white
from the cold. You were our familiar, but strange;
in the curved small hours you kept changing.
You were constantly sad and your tears rained;
on bad days they came through the roof.
Prince of long dark nights and teenage hopes,
we spent our youth on you, on the adrenalin burn
of cheap drink necked in queues, glances back
and the journey home. The more we lost —
first kisses, last trains, our nerve, dignity — the more
you claimed; lord of monoliths and stubborn spirits,
how crookedly you remind us of our obligations…
with magpies courting on telephone lines and windows
ablaze in the sun while the scaffolding rises.
O city of winds and temperaments, believe,
no misdemeanour, however shabby, will release us.
(p. 39)
Actually it’s Tuesday, and I’m taken aback.
You rang me three times and said ‘I can explain everything!’
into my voicemail. You know perfectly well I believe
nothing worthwhile is explainable. Dear boy,
don’t be so literal. I’m not sure if you were there or not.
Did you want to be? We can make something up.
Perhaps it was you I parasailed with above the Mediterranean?
I think I remember you now; my young love!
You complained that the harness was hurting your balls.
We had such plans. We were slung between sea and sky.
I tangled your legs in mine. We were a knot in the grain of the world.
Suddenly the sea was a blunt spur at our heels, remember?
(p. 7)
The Way You Do at the End of Plays
Anyway. We went for a drink and he ate and I didn’t and at first we struggled with inevitable silences and when I spoke my voice sounded embarrassing with the possibility of tears, and he insinuated that the fact of us meeting was a mistake all along, but things got easier and we went to the play, which was like a circus, and a cabaret, but also sort of like a fairytale, with clowns and men dressed as women and spankings and beatings and Y-fronts and fake genitals, and it was really rather amusing, and at the end the two main characters, who are falling in love, are hooked on to these two elastic swings by their belts and they’re bouncing up and down and swinging around, you know, like babies, and every now and then they try to swing towards each other, and eventually they succeed and manage to kiss, before bouncing apart, and it was so clumsy, and beautiful, and funny, and we didn’t look at each other the whole time, we were watching a play after all, and I sort of felt like crying again, but in a nice way, and then the play ended, and we turned to each other, you know in the way you do at the end of plays, and I couldn’t stop thinking about them bouncing together and apart in this amazing, crazy, awkward way.
(p. 17)
Some Fears
Fear of breezes; fear of quarrels at night-time; fear of wreckage; fear of one’s reflection in spoons; fear of children’s footprints; fear of the theory behind architecture; fear of boldness; fear of catching anxiousness from dogs; fear of ragged-right margins; fear of exposure after pruning back ivy; fear of bridges; fear of pure mathematics; fear of cats expressing devotion; fear of proximity to self-belief; fear of damp tree trunks; fear of unfamiliar elbows (all elbows being unfamiliar, even one’s own); fear of colour leaking from vegetables; fear of the mechanics of love affairs; fear of slipping; fear of ill-conceived typography; fear of non-specific impact leading to the vertical ejection of the spine from the body; fear of leaf mulch; fear of the timbre of poetry recitals; fear of balcony furniture; fear of colour leaking from the heart; fear of internal avalanche; fear of the notion of a key engaging with the inside of a lock; fear of psychoanalytical interpretations; fear of dregs; fear of book titles; fear of particular
hues of sky glimpsed from aeroplane windows; fear of text stamped into metal; fear of promises; fear of alienation brought on by hospitality; fear of unexplained light; fear of comprehensive write-off; fear of fear; fear of help. Fear of asking for, receiving, refusing, giving, or being denied help.
(p. 30)
London Love Song
Lord of our paving stones, the trodden
and the newly laid, how quietly you take from us
our reparations. Calling us to account under
lamp-posts, in the long shadows of tower blocks,
on streets scribbly with trees after rain…
We repeated your name till our voices
warped on the concrete, till you seeped
through our veins like gutter-dirt, floored us
on gum-pocked pavements, shouldered
all manner of burdens on the damp of your kerbs.
Wind-tanned, river-coloured, we emerged
from your alleyways addicted, streaking
the white edges of your smarter districts,
eyes winking like coins in a drain. We fell for you,
for your tender bus stops and careless roads,
every light brush with calamity. We broke
our hearts on your pavements pinched white
from the cold. You were our familiar, but strange;
in the curved small hours you kept changing.
You were constantly sad and your tears rained;
on bad days they came through the roof.
Prince of long dark nights and teenage hopes,
we spent our youth on you, on the adrenalin burn
of cheap drink necked in queues, glances back
and the journey home. The more we lost —
first kisses, last trains, our nerve, dignity — the more
you claimed; lord of monoliths and stubborn spirits,
how crookedly you remind us of our obligations…
with magpies courting on telephone lines and windows
ablaze in the sun while the scaffolding rises.
O city of winds and temperaments, believe,
no misdemeanour, however shabby, will release us.
(p. 39)
May 20, 2025
What draws me most to Emily Berry’s 𝘋𝘦𝘢𝘳 𝘉𝘰𝘺 (Faber and Faber, 2013) is its extraordinary imagination. Reading the collection feels like stepping into a world that is both familiar and entirely askew—where emotional experience is filtered through absurd scenarios, theatrical personas, and unexpected turns of thought. There is a freshness to Berry’s voice, a sense that anything might happen, and often does.
What I especially admire is the wit that runs beneath even the most serious or emotionally charged poems. Her humour is sly, knowing, and disarming, often arriving at moments when the tone might otherwise tip into sentiment. This comic instinct and emotional intelligence give the collection its distinctive energy. Rather than confessional exposure, Berry offers artful indirection, speakers who perform their feelings as much as express them, sometimes with sincerity, sometimes with sharp self-awareness.
Some poems reflect on romantic and familial relationships (but never in conventional terms). Roles are questioned, voices fractured, and situations delightfully strange. There is an undercurrent of feminist inquiry, but it never dominates; it is embedded in the tone, the point of view, the resistance to cliché.
𝘋𝘦𝘢𝘳 𝘉𝘰𝘺 is a strikingly original debut: funny, intelligent, and inspiring.
What I especially admire is the wit that runs beneath even the most serious or emotionally charged poems. Her humour is sly, knowing, and disarming, often arriving at moments when the tone might otherwise tip into sentiment. This comic instinct and emotional intelligence give the collection its distinctive energy. Rather than confessional exposure, Berry offers artful indirection, speakers who perform their feelings as much as express them, sometimes with sincerity, sometimes with sharp self-awareness.
Some poems reflect on romantic and familial relationships (but never in conventional terms). Roles are questioned, voices fractured, and situations delightfully strange. There is an undercurrent of feminist inquiry, but it never dominates; it is embedded in the tone, the point of view, the resistance to cliché.
𝘋𝘦𝘢𝘳 𝘉𝘰𝘺 is a strikingly original debut: funny, intelligent, and inspiring.
January 16, 2022
Trying to ignore the fact that I slipped in a volume of poetry to bump up or bolster my January reading total ( well the slim volume still counts right??) this actually felt much more substantial with some meaty sinewy poems that made this reader work hard. I have already enjoyed Stranger Baby her second volume before I tackled this - and it’s a genuine first volume - raw at times; less Honed; less thematic than Stranger Baby. Rhythms are there but sometimes eschew showing themselves - there is a fighting challenging quality to Berry’s style - combative at times - favourite poems included, Our Love could spoil dinner; The Way you do at the End of Plays; Arlenes House and piquantly Bad New Government.
Lots of interior voices and tricky situations - each poem sort of justifying its inclusion without sometimes a unifying whole.
I had originally intended to review this in poetic form but forgot my intention
And shouldn’t have mentioned
The stylistic take
That I failed to make
But
Emily Berry is very….
( answers on a postcard to that place in Derby that does those free holiday draw thingies )
Lots of interior voices and tricky situations - each poem sort of justifying its inclusion without sometimes a unifying whole.
I had originally intended to review this in poetic form but forgot my intention
And shouldn’t have mentioned
The stylistic take
That I failed to make
But
Emily Berry is very….
( answers on a postcard to that place in Derby that does those free holiday draw thingies )
May 22, 2017
I read every single poem like two or three times to try understand it, to find sense, but NO! I think that even If I had read them in my native language, I wouldn't have understood them either. It was not for me. There were a few of them that I manage to undrestand, to feel them, to find sense in them, but that's all.
For the most of the reading I felt like the author ate some "mushrooms" and started writing nosense using absurd metaphors, that only she knew what they meant. For me, poems have to speak to the reader in an easy way, without needing a degree in English literature to manage to understand "what the author wants to say". :/
For the most of the reading I felt like the author ate some "mushrooms" and started writing nosense using absurd metaphors, that only she knew what they meant. For me, poems have to speak to the reader in an easy way, without needing a degree in English literature to manage to understand "what the author wants to say". :/
August 4, 2020
Very confused by this collection of poems. You coud easily categorise many of them as "fake deep": Berry makes an attempt at creating something with layers that the reader can't truly find because there aren't any other layers. Many of these poems fell really flat for me or incredibly disturbing (the ones about the Doctor... still wondering what this was all about to be honest) and I found it hard to truly understand what they were about. Some of the poems have this typical cliché straight romance kind of vibe. I truly believe this collection wasn't for me.
favourite poem: Questions I Wanted to Ask You in the Swimming Pool
favourite poem: Questions I Wanted to Ask You in the Swimming Pool
February 26, 2020
Disappointed by the first 15 or so poems. Overall however, the collection was a witty and delicate look at often serious subject matters. The poems come in with the lightest of touch and shine the brightest, (in my bias opinion) when the are talking about the longing, pain and softness that comes with a long distance relationship. Beautifully written. The language drips with lush imagery. The structure of Berry's line is also cool. The use of cesura gives a fractured quality, with thoughts often collapsing in on themselves and breathes a lived experience into the collection.
January 11, 2021
A wonderful collection. The poems are eclectic, witty and full of “a flair for vocal cross-dressing” as the blurb puts it. As someone who doesn’t often read poetry collections, this is the kind of collection that is at the same time intriguing and challenging but also approachable. For Berry, poetry feels like a form of storytelling, and each poem tells its own distinctive story (some relatable, some very personal, some political and some just delightfully silly). Just good stuff
January 12, 2023
Am I becoming a poetry girl or just a Faber Poetry girl? I see it, I like it, I want it, I get it. A beautiful and worthy impulse purchase.
[…] Darling, I don't know
if you thought about it, the way the round bone
of my cheek fits the bowl of your eye-socket exactly,
the slow blink of your still-lemonade eyes beneath my face,
each eyelash-graze a tiny sip like a bird drinking.
From Manchester, with love.
[…] Darling, I don't know
if you thought about it, the way the round bone
of my cheek fits the bowl of your eye-socket exactly,
the slow blink of your still-lemonade eyes beneath my face,
each eyelash-graze a tiny sip like a bird drinking.
From Manchester, with love.
October 27, 2023
"You cannot describe it except to say there is no light, your
hands on the rope are raw and your whole body aches
At every moment you think
I cannot go on
But you go on."
Emily Berry has taken my heart out of my chest, squeezed it, wrapped it in cotton, stamped on it, flung it off a balcony, picked it back up and loved it, held it, smashed it again, and then put it down in the grass in sunlight, to warm up.
hands on the rope are raw and your whole body aches
At every moment you think
I cannot go on
But you go on."
Emily Berry has taken my heart out of my chest, squeezed it, wrapped it in cotton, stamped on it, flung it off a balcony, picked it back up and loved it, held it, smashed it again, and then put it down in the grass in sunlight, to warm up.
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