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Look Here Look Away Look Again |
eBook Available
To look is to fill our thoughts and consciousness with an experience of the other.
an orientation of thought in thinking how a / thought begins and then travels on to arrive / at another place connected and like-minded
A work of art is never entirely present in itself but rather is always at large in the mind of the viewer. So it is that a painting needs to know the simplest question those viewing it are asking themselves. From the intimate starting point of observer and observed, Carson's seductive, exhilarating new collection turns poetry and paintings, making and representation, language and thought on their heads.
"What happens when we experience a work of art? The poems in Edward Carson's stunningly original collection explore the intricate patterns of communication and response that unfold when we look at paintings, respond to music, read poems. Rather than simply cataloguing the works' contents, Carson recreates their dynamics and takes us inside them. The wonderful phrase he applies to a Miró painting, ‘a rhetoric / of exuberant spaces,' is descriptive of Look Here Look Away Look Again itself, and it is matched by a rhetoric of exuberant language that takes such supposedly unpoetic words as ‘phenotype,' ‘quantum,' or ‘algorithm' and brings them to life. At the same time, Carson revitalizes that time-worn form, the sonnet sequence - for that is what this collection is, when you ‘look again' - and weaves it together with recurrent twilit glimpses of birds, moon, and stars. Readers of Look Here Look Away Look Again will be looking in delight, again and again." John Reibetanz, award-winning poet, author of By Hand
A work of art is never entirely present in itself but rather is always at large in the mind of the viewer. So it is that a painting needs to know the simplest question those viewing it are asking themselves. From the intimate starting point of observer and observed, Carson's seductive, exhilarating new collection turns poetry and paintings, making and representation, language and thought on their heads.
"What happens when we experience a work of art? The poems in Edward Carson's stunningly original collection explore the intricate patterns of communication and response that unfold when we look at paintings, respond to music, read poems. Rather than simply cataloguing the works' contents, Carson recreates their dynamics and takes us inside them. The wonderful phrase he applies to a Miró painting, ‘a rhetoric / of exuberant spaces,' is descriptive of Look Here Look Away Look Again itself, and it is matched by a rhetoric of exuberant language that takes such supposedly unpoetic words as ‘phenotype,' ‘quantum,' or ‘algorithm' and brings them to life. At the same time, Carson revitalizes that time-worn form, the sonnet sequence - for that is what this collection is, when you ‘look again' - and weaves it together with recurrent twilit glimpses of birds, moon, and stars. Readers of Look Here Look Away Look Again will be looking in delight, again and again." John Reibetanz, award-winning poet, author of By Hand
Details
Part of the Hugh MacLennan Poetry Series (number 46 in series)
96 Pages, 5 x 7.5
ISBN 9780773556263
April 2019
Formats: Paperback, eBook
"What happens when we experience a work of art? The poems in Edward Carson's stunningly original collection explore the intricate patterns of communication and response that unfold when we look at paintings, respond to music, read poems. Rather than simply cataloguing the works' contents, Carson recreates their dynamics and takes us inside them. The wonderful phrase he applies to a Miró painting, 'a rhetoric of exuberant spaces,' is descriptive of Look Here Look Away Look Again itself, and it is matched by a rhetoric of exuberant language that takes such supposedly unpoetic words as 'phenotype,' 'quantum,' or 'algorithm' and brings them to life. At the same time, Carson revitalizes that timeworn form, the sonnet sequence - for that is what this collection is, when you 'look again' - and weaves it together with recurrent twilit glimpses of birds, moon, and stars. Readers of Look Here Look Away Look Again will be looking in delight, again and again." John Reibetanz, award-winning poet, author of By Hand
"Look Here Look Away Look Again by Edward Carson is marvellous. Deep philosophical insights and a delightful set of forms of language that perhaps were indeed the unarticulated thoughts of Einstein or Monet or Mrio, or other geniuses of the past, travelling long space-time distances, like light itself, before they reveal themselves to us on the page." Madhur Anand, author of A New Index for Predicting Catastrophes
“Edward Carson’s engrossing collection erodes the boundaries between words and images, between seeing, thinking, and feeling. As the title suggests, the poet offers a new way of contemplating art, one that is experiential and deeply satisfying.” Montreal Review of Books
"Look Here Look Away Look Again by Edward Carson is marvellous. Deep philosophical insights and a delightful set of forms of language that perhaps were indeed the unarticulated thoughts of Einstein or Monet or Mrio, or other geniuses of the past, travelling long space-time distances, like light itself, before they reveal themselves to us on the page." Madhur Anand, author of A New Index for Predicting Catastrophes
“Edward Carson’s engrossing collection erodes the boundaries between words and images, between seeing, thinking, and feeling. As the title suggests, the poet offers a new way of contemplating art, one that is experiential and deeply satisfying.” Montreal Review of Books
Edward Carson, writer and photographer, is twice winner of the E.J. Pratt Medal in Poetry and author most recently of Knots, Birds Flock Fish School, and Taking Shape. He lives in Toronto.
PATTERN RECOGNITION | 1
Some Assembly Required | 3
AGAPANTHUS TRIPTYCH | 9
Look Here | 11
Look Away | 16
Look Again | 19
CONSTELLATIONS | 23
Sunrise | 25
The Escape Ladder | 26
People at Night Guided by the Phosphorescent Tracks of Snails | 27
Women on the Beach | 28
Woman with Blond Armpit Combing Her Hair by the Light of the Stars | 29
Morning Star | 30
Wounded Figure | 31
Woman and Birds | 32
Woman in the Night | 33
Acrobatic Dancers | 34
The Nightingale’s Song at Midnight and Morning Rain | 35
On the 13th the Ladder Brushed the Firmament | 36
Nocturne | 37
The Poetess | 38
Awakening in the Early Morning | 39
Toward the Rainbow | 40
Women Encircled by the Flight of a Bird | 41
Women at the Edge of the Lake Made Iridescent by the Passage of a Swan | 42
The Migratory Bird | 43
Ciphers and Constellations in Love with a Woman | 44
The Beautiful Bird Revealing the Unknown to a Pair of Lovers | 45
The Pink Dusk Caresses the Sex of Women and Birds | 46
The Passage of the Divine Bird | 47
CONFLUENCE | 49
Triptych with Swallows and Blossoming Lilies Survives a Volcano 1650-1550 BC | 51
541 Million Years Ago the Cambrian Explosion Spawns a Eukaryotic Cell | 52
A Bird’s Eye View (in Proportion) of Vitruvian Man Laid Flat on His Back | 53
Flying Away in Fear a Startled Flock of Birds Emerges From a Dark Wood | 54
The Salvator Mundi’s Ghost Emerges as Neural Networks Rework the Mind | 55
The Constellations of Abstract Art Consolidate as History in a Hurry | 56
From the Centre the Artist Views the Figure of the Heavenly Bodies | 57
Trajectory of an Escape Ladder in a Night Flight to the Pleiades | 58
A Girl and Pearl and a Turban Capture the Viewer’s Attention | 59
A Hue and Cry in a Drove of Birds Has a Habit of Tumbling Out of Us | 60
Giacometti’s Fascination with the Gaze in Portraits that Take the Place of the Person | 61
An Art of Resemblance as Exact Resemblance is No Ordinary Lie | 62
Escher Landscape with Flight of Stairs Leading Every Which Way | 63
We Are Who We Are When We Are Is How We Will Eventually Appear | 64
Woman 1 Emerges with Its Correct Allotment of Four Anatomical Parts | 65
The STRING of Information Plots the Genome of Escape and Return | 66
“You Look Out at the World with One Eye and into Yourself with the Other” | 67
When Exuberance of the Whole is at Odds with the Sum of Its Parts | 68
What Demoiselles Said to the Viewer upon Seeing the Painting Completed | 69
Convergence of the Unobserved in a SPlicing-based ANalysis of vaRiants | 70
Motherwell’s Elegy to the Spanish Republic is Time Repeating Itself | 71
Attacking the Canvas Seemed Like One of the Better Ideas at the Time | 72
How in Unguarded Moments We See When We Look at a Painting | 73
Coda | 75
Thanks & Notes | 77
Some Assembly Required | 3
AGAPANTHUS TRIPTYCH | 9
Look Here | 11
Look Away | 16
Look Again | 19
CONSTELLATIONS | 23
Sunrise | 25
The Escape Ladder | 26
People at Night Guided by the Phosphorescent Tracks of Snails | 27
Women on the Beach | 28
Woman with Blond Armpit Combing Her Hair by the Light of the Stars | 29
Morning Star | 30
Wounded Figure | 31
Woman and Birds | 32
Woman in the Night | 33
Acrobatic Dancers | 34
The Nightingale’s Song at Midnight and Morning Rain | 35
On the 13th the Ladder Brushed the Firmament | 36
Nocturne | 37
The Poetess | 38
Awakening in the Early Morning | 39
Toward the Rainbow | 40
Women Encircled by the Flight of a Bird | 41
Women at the Edge of the Lake Made Iridescent by the Passage of a Swan | 42
The Migratory Bird | 43
Ciphers and Constellations in Love with a Woman | 44
The Beautiful Bird Revealing the Unknown to a Pair of Lovers | 45
The Pink Dusk Caresses the Sex of Women and Birds | 46
The Passage of the Divine Bird | 47
CONFLUENCE | 49
Triptych with Swallows and Blossoming Lilies Survives a Volcano 1650-1550 BC | 51
541 Million Years Ago the Cambrian Explosion Spawns a Eukaryotic Cell | 52
A Bird’s Eye View (in Proportion) of Vitruvian Man Laid Flat on His Back | 53
Flying Away in Fear a Startled Flock of Birds Emerges From a Dark Wood | 54
The Salvator Mundi’s Ghost Emerges as Neural Networks Rework the Mind | 55
The Constellations of Abstract Art Consolidate as History in a Hurry | 56
From the Centre the Artist Views the Figure of the Heavenly Bodies | 57
Trajectory of an Escape Ladder in a Night Flight to the Pleiades | 58
A Girl and Pearl and a Turban Capture the Viewer’s Attention | 59
A Hue and Cry in a Drove of Birds Has a Habit of Tumbling Out of Us | 60
Giacometti’s Fascination with the Gaze in Portraits that Take the Place of the Person | 61
An Art of Resemblance as Exact Resemblance is No Ordinary Lie | 62
Escher Landscape with Flight of Stairs Leading Every Which Way | 63
We Are Who We Are When We Are Is How We Will Eventually Appear | 64
Woman 1 Emerges with Its Correct Allotment of Four Anatomical Parts | 65
The STRING of Information Plots the Genome of Escape and Return | 66
“You Look Out at the World with One Eye and into Yourself with the Other” | 67
When Exuberance of the Whole is at Odds with the Sum of Its Parts | 68
What Demoiselles Said to the Viewer upon Seeing the Painting Completed | 69
Convergence of the Unobserved in a SPlicing-based ANalysis of vaRiants | 70
Motherwell’s Elegy to the Spanish Republic is Time Repeating Itself | 71
Attacking the Canvas Seemed Like One of the Better Ideas at the Time | 72
How in Unguarded Moments We See When We Look at a Painting | 73
Coda | 75
Thanks & Notes | 77
