This Is Not Your Final Form by Richard O'brien

This Is Not Your Final Form by Richard O'brien

This Is Not Your Final Form showcases the best of Birmingham: a rich, varied and vibrant city capable of inspiring a range of contemporary poetic responses. This anthology, bringing together entries from the inaugural Verve Poetry Festival Competition, depicts a second city which is no longer content to play second fiddle. Poets take on the area’s musical past, its complex industrial history, its unique blend of architectural styles and the experiences of its many immigrant communities. Writers celebrate the lives of significant figures, from Matthew Boulton to Benjamin Zephaniah, and ordinary Brummies alike. Ranging from spoken word-inspired pieces to more traditional styles, much of the work collected here channels the energy and the political anger that runs like a seam through centuries of Birmingham history. Taken together, This Is Not Your Final Form is a tough, unsentimental love letter to the Midlands metropolis, which finds beauty in concrete and unity in contradiction.

This Is Not Your Final Form is a compact, accessible read befitting multiple revisits in order to uncover the poems’ many layers[...] The poets have channelled the city’s depths and looked (for the most part) beyond the obvious clichés. Talented voices of many different backgrounds and poetic styles are featured, reflecting the diversity which to me is one of the city’s greatest strengths. The city’s distinctive self-deprecating humour and outlook fill the pages of this funny, bleak, uplifting, tragic, original, gritty and inspirational love letter to Birmingham.

Contemporary Small Press

Richard O’Brien is a poet, translator and academic based in Birmingham, UK. Emma Dai'an Wright (1986) is a British-Chinese-Vietnamese publisher and illustrator. She worked in ebook production at Orion Publishing Group before leaving in 2012 to set up The Emma Press with the support of the Prince's Trust. She has since published over 500 writers across more than 70 books, including poetry anthologies for adults and children, short stories, and translations. In 2016 The Emma Press won the Michael Marks Award for Poetry Pamphlet Publishers. She lives in Birmingham.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9781910139608
ISBN 10	1910139602
Title	This Is Not Your Final Form
Author	Richard O'brien
Series	The Emma Press Poetry Anthologies
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	The Emma Press
Year published	2017-02-16
Number of pages	80
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.