Aislinn Hunter introducing
John Burnside
The virtual exchange begins with Canadian Aislinn
Hunter writing about Scottish poet John Burnside.
Aislinn
Hunter (Canada)
 Aislinn Hunter is the author of two books of poetry and two books
of fiction. Her last collection The Possible Past was shortlisted
for the Pat Lowther, Dorothy Livesay and ReLit poetry prizes.
In
late 2004, she gave readings and workshops in the Highlands and
in Edinburgh for the Scottish Poetry Library, and held the post
of writer in residence at the University of Lancaster.
…introducing John Burnside (Scotland)
 I
first discovered John Burnside's poetry the way most poets discover
other writers: in the form of a slim volume sitting on a crammed bookshelf
in a good bookstore. First of all I liked the title of the book (The
Light Trap) and the look of the font. I also liked the author's
name: it seemed warm and somehow familial. I pulled the book out,
opened it up and read a few lines. There it was: a sense of travel,
of being Elsewhere, of seeing another world as no one, save John Burnside,
has ever seen it.
Who in Canada would write, as Burnside does in Common Knowledge,
of 'The classes of jamjars. Subtleties of string'? Of 'tubers
locked in bottles, sprouting wings'? No one I knew of. But more
than that, more than the specifics of language and place, Burnside
was good: a good philosopher and a good technician; a rigorous examiner
of the common and the ephemeral; of the seemingly insignificant and
the large.
› Read more by Aislinn
Hunter on John Burnside
› Read poem by John Burnside
  
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