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The notion of 'abroad' is a concept that has intrigued the British for most of the 19th and 20th centuries - both the idea of travelling themselves and also through reading about it in the work of favoured British authors, from E. M. Forster to translations of Flaubert and Balzac to contemporary writers, including Julian Barnes and Martin Amis. It is by exploring the world of others who may appear foreign and different that in some way we can explore our world and gain a better understanding of ourselves. In the work of this month's featured authors, all three - Hermione Lee, Sean O'Brien and C. D. Rose - examine some sense of themselves through different worlds.
Hermione Lee visited New York ostensibly to undertake a fellowship at the New York Public Library. What follows is 'Manhattan Days' an engaging and elegant account of her experiences in an alien environment as she meditates upon taxi-drivers, politics, the arts and the quiet, beautiful parts of the city she stumbles across.
Sean O'Brien's ironic poem 'Symposium at Port Louis' is about attending a symposium in Mauritius hints at unease as he plays the role of cultural ambassador to a country with its own traditions and experiences. It is a dignified and perceptive poem that offers personal insights into a complex and beautiful island.
'The Neva Star' is C. D. Rose's account of three sailors stranded on a rusting tanker ship in Naples. It is a poetic piece of writing that seems to contain little action; however, it is in fact a powerful examination of the lives of three men trapped by both personal circumstances and the complications of the wider world around them.
Sean O'Brien
Sean O'Brien is a British poet, critic, playwright and editor. Five award-winning collections were followed by Cousin Coat: Selected Poems 1976-2001 (Picador, 2002). His essays, The Deregulated Muse (Bloodaxe), and an anthology The Firebox: Poetry in Britain and Ireland after 1945 (Picador) appeared in 1998. He is Professor of Poetry at Sheffield Hallam University. His version of Dante's Inferno is published by Picador (2006). Please click here to read more about Sean on the Contemporary Writers website.
Photograph: Moira Conway
Hermione Lee
Hermione Lee is a teacher, biographer, critic and broadcaster. She grew up in London, and is now the Goldsmiths' Professor of English Literature and Fellow of New College at the University of Oxford. Her books include Willa Cather: A Life Saved Up and Virginia Woolf. She is currently working on a biography of Edith Wharton and on a collection of essays about life-writing. Please click here to read more about Hermione on the Contemporary Writers website.
Photograph: Hermione Lee
C. D. Rose
After spending many years in the south of Italy, C. D. Rose now lives in England, completing a novel called Bid Me Strike a Match. 'The Neva Star' is taken from a collection of short stories called 'Pilgrim Souls' which deals with fish, shoes, ships, jewels, paintings, photographs, violins, cats, kites, big cities, small towns, bets, promises, deals, dreams, thefts, displacement, exile, love, loss and death. Other work includes 'The Shoemaker General of Naples', which featured in New Writing 10, 'Violins and Pianos are Horses' was included in the short story anthology Parenthesis (Comma Press) and short story 'The Year Cuba was British' is available at www.pulp.net
Photograph: C. D. Rose
Illustration © Maurizio Marmorato
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