Heroines from Abroad

Christine Marendon author Ken Cockburn translator

Format:Paperback

Publisher:Carcanet Press Ltd

Published:26th Jul '18

Should be back in stock very soon

Heroines from Abroad cover

Shortlisted for The 2019 Oxford-Weidenfeld Prize for Translation

Heroines from Abroad
introduces a vibrant new voice to the English language. Christine Marendon’s enigmatic, meditative poems, translated here from the German and collected for the first time, draw on dreams, fairy tales and childhood memories to tap into a world beyond conscious reach.
Marendon’s poems do not present ideas so much as embody states of mind. Something is realised through the poem, rather than said within it. Here, the voice is more important than the particularities of what is said – language, not words.
For the translator, Heroines from Abroad is the fruit of seven years’ steady work. The poems’ clarity and subtle force, the ‘crystalline, precise quality of their lyricism’ (Sasha Dugdale), are testament to that humble, unhurried collaboration in words.

'Marendon's work may bridge for English-language readers the perceived chasm between avant-garde and mainstream poetry. It's not obscure, it's not banally 'accessible'. The voice and the language of Cockburn's translations feels freshly rinsed.'
Carol Rumens


'With a distinctively female voice, there is indeed a dreamy, Dali-esque quality, where apparently unconnected images circle around each other and leave the reader to make connections, to recognise something deep inside themselves.'
Tamsin Writing review of book launch


'...this collection considers the liminal spaces of dreams, of poetry, of fairy tales, of the subconscious, of our relationships to the planet and its beings...It is a compelling collection, one that readers will return to and will return to readers in dreams and contemplation.'
Jeanetta Calhoun Mish, World Literature Today


'At times elusive, but built around moments and strong images, Heroines from Abroad is most concerned with reflecting this state of the self being a part of nature and trying to write the natural world, whilst simultaneously feeling cut off from it.'
Chrissy Williams, Modern Poetry in Translation


'The feeling that overcomes you when reading the poems is numinous; they take you out of your home… make you distinctly aware of your place on the planet.'
Chloe Vaughan,The Manchester Review


'Her poems are serious, probing (sometimes delicately, sometimes more aggressively) and linguistically exciting.'
Dilys Wood, Artemis Poetry

  • Short-listed for Oxford-Weidenfeld Prize for Translation 2019

ISBN: 9781784106300

Dimensions: 216mm x 135mm x 10mm

Weight: unknown

112 pages