AustLit

'The second stanza of the poem "What's in a Name" contains the lines, But at the Foundling Hospital Museum I find a clue in names inscribed of orphans left by desperate women with no choice; it's easy to imagine I'm descended from rough trade to Muddle Lane, for beside Ms. Plantagenet and Master Tudor, Ollie Cromwell and Alexander Pope, the moniker of my own great forbear, Augustus Caesar is plainly blazoned, a long way from court and the affairs of state. Section 2, "Shots in the Louvre," is the shortest of the collection and is not especially compelling because in the poems the speaker's voice has a heavy-handed element that leads readers to suspect he is attempting to moralize the paintings he is observing.' (Publication abstract)