Electric Light
Seamus Heaney
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
<p><p><b>A powerful new collection by the bestselling translator of <i>Beowulf</i>.</b><br><i>In the finland of perch, the fenland of alder, on air</i><br><i>That is water, on carpets of Bann stream, on hold</i><br><i>In the everything flows and steady go of the world.</i><br>&#8212;from "Perch"<br>Seamus Heaney's new collection travels widely in time and space, visiting the sites of the classical world and revisiting the poet's childhood: rural electrification and the light of ancient evenings are reconciled within the orbit of a single lifetime. This is a book about origins (not least, the origins of words) and oracles: the places where things start from, the ground of understanding &#8212; whether in Arcadia or Anahorish, the sanctuary at Epidaurus or the Bann valley in County Derry.<br><i>Electric Light</i> ranges from short takes to conversation poems. The pre-Socratic wisdom that everything flows is held in tension with the elegizing of friends and fellow poets. These gifts...</br></br></br></br></br></br></p></p>