Gillian Clarke: Collected Poems

by Gillian Clarke

The Welsh publishing house Gwasg Gomer published Gillian Clarke's first full collection of poems, The Sundial, in 1978. In the twenty years since then the poet has become one of the best-loved and most widely read writers of Wales, well-known for her readings, for her radio work and her workshops. Gillian Clarke is a severe critic of her own poems—Collected Poems includes all that she wishes to preserve of her work to date.

Genres: Poetry

220 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1997

About the author

Gillian Clarke is one of the central figures in contemporary Welsh poetry, the third to take up the post of National Poet of Wales. Her own poems have achieved widespread critical and popular acclaim (her Selected Poems has gone through seven printings and her work is studied by GCSE and A Level students throughout Britain) but she has also made her cultural mark through her inspirational role as a teacher, as editor of the Anglo-Welsh Review from 1975 - 1984, and as founder and President of Ty Newydd, the writers' centre in North Wales.

Clarke currently runs an organic small-holding in Ceredigion, the Welsh landscape is a shaping force in her work, together with recurrent themes of war, womanhood and the passage of time. Her last three books have all been Poetry Book Society Recommendations.

Reviews

[Harry Allagree · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a very strange reading experience for me. I found the poetry almost mesmerizing in its beauty of expression. Some examples:

"...I must write like the wind, year after year
passing my death-day, winning ground."

"...A move so delicate
along a traverse,
just fingertip
between the hold and the fall."

"...a lamb's head clean as a toy, the beads
of its vertebrae picked smooth as hail maries..."

"Mamgu, a century old, loops coloured wool.
She can't see them now. The shawl
is in her mind. She touches colour..."

"On an open shelf I keep my box
Its key is in the lock.
I leave it there for you to read,
or them, when we are dead,
how everything is slowly made,
how slowly things made me,
a tree, a lover, words, a box,
books and a golden tree."

That being said, I actually understood very little of what Gillian Clarke was saying through her poems. Some of it I could guess, but I concluded that since much of her poetry is so steeped in Welsh history, culture, language etc., that perhaps that is part of the problem in comprehending it. The only poem which I did understand, a poem I'd read some time earlier in another book, and which truly resonates with my heart is "Miracle On St. David's Day" (pp. 36-37).

I want to make it clear, however, that regardless of my personal experience with Gillian Clarke's poetry, she is, as the back bookcover states, "...one of the best-loved and most widely read writers of Wales, well-known for her readings, radio programmes and workshops." The Times Literary Supplement notes that "her work is both personal and archetypal..."

[Kate · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some lovely poems but just not ones that resonate with me. I think I definitely gel more with her later work (of what I've read). I think it's a great collection bewaring in mind Clarke has compiled it herself with all the poems she would like to be remembered for up to that point (1997).

[Katharine Holden · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful.

[Hope White-Heath · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gave me more empathy for mothers, especially my own. I loved the one about what mothers must do whilst children and husbands are away. They are invisibly amazing. It’s sad. I love you mothers!

[Andrea · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best poems ever :)

[ar · Rating 1 out of 5]

had to read it for literature class.

[Sally · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating collection. Such a variety of voices and themes. Some poems are long and lyrical, others short and punchy. Some are light, some deeply emotional. The sense of Welshness really runs through the whole collection. Gillian Clarke is a hugely talented and versatile poet but she seems extremely under rated outside Wales.