These Fields Were Rivers (Goose Lane Editions Poetry Books) - Softcover

MacLaine, Brent

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0864924046 ISBN 13: 9780864924049

Publisher: Goose Lane Editions, 2004

Synopsis

Brent MacLaine's poems, like the poet himself, are rooted in the history and landscape of Prince Edward Island. Yet, MacLaine possesses a remarkable ability to graft rural values to contemporary culture, with its urban habits and popular entertainments, its scientific theories and technological mythologies.

MacLaine belongs to the first generation of Islanders not farming the land, and his poems explore his uneasy relationship with the patch of earth where he lives. He follows the island contours in an expansive sweep across the fields and into the woods; he also shares an islander's sense of confinement, bound into a small place by the sea and the red cliffs. The island before human existence, the coming of European settlers, or the stubbled ground tilled by his father are as readily available to his fertile imagination as meteorological patterns, modern art, or The Odyssey.

Using his Maritime home as template for larger universal concerns, MacLaine offers clear-headed insight into the natural world — and into human nature — in an astonishing range of poems shaped by his nimble attention to his quotidian world.

About this title

About the Author

Brent MacLaine teaches modern literature at the University of Prince Edward Island. His poetry collections include Shades of Green, These Fields Were Rivers, and Wind and Root. MacLaine has won the PEI Milton Acorn Award for Poetry and the Atlantic Poetry Prize.

From the Back Cover

Brent MacLaine's poems are rooted in the history and landscape of his native Prince Edward Island. At the same time, his is a poetry without roots; MacLaine belongs to the first generation that is not farming the land. He has a remarkable ability to graft a rural past to a keen sense of contemporary culture, its urban habits and its popular entertainments, its scientific theories and its technological mythologies.

These Fields Were Rivers presents an astonishing range in mood and idea, the poems shaped by the poet's nimble attention to his quotidian world.

From the Inside Flap

Brent MacLaine's poems are rooted in the history and landscape of his native Prince Edward Island. At the same time, his is a poetry without roots; MacLaine belongs to the first generation that is not farming the land. He has a remarkable ability to graft a rural past to a keen sense of contemporary culture, its urban habits and its popular entertainments, its scientific theories and its technological mythologies.

These Fields Were Rivers presents an astonishing range in mood and idea, the poems shaped by the poet's nimble attention to his quotidian world.

Edition details

• Publisher: Goose Lane Editions
• Publication date: 2004
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0864924046
• ISBN 13: 9780864924049
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 108