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'Petra White's poetry is distinctive for its sharp and unusual imagery, its authoritative expressions of the inner life and its existential preparedness and irony. Mythic imagination and narrative are at the heart of this book, her fourth collection. The ancient Book of Ezekiel is the unlikely source for a compact epic, "How the Temple was Built". Playful in its invention, this poem is terrifying and poignant. The Bible account is reinvented through a secular lens, touching on familiar concerns: war, displacement and feminism. The old epic tropes - love, death, faith, despair - drive this story. White's myth-making here explores the limits of being human and the limits of being a god. The second section, "Landscapes" is thirteen sketches of human solitariness, featuring ancient mythic figures and anonymous modern ones. Unobtrusively presented landscapes, at times hyper-real, or shading to dream, interpolate the characters. These incursions into psyche are fluid and metamorphic. Each singular poem crackles with impulse, marking iconic stillness and strange beauty. Reading for a Quiet Morning, which also includes several spirited versions of Rilke, is Petra White's most daring collection to date.' (Publication Summary)
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
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June in Poetry
2019
single work
review
— Appears in: Overland [Online] , June 2019; -
Brianna Bullen Reviews Reading for a Quiet Morning by Petra White
2018
single work
review
— Appears in: Plumwood Mountain [Online] , February 2018;
— Review of Reading for a Quiet Morning 2017 selected work poetry -
Inquietudes, Solaces
2018
single work
review
— Appears in: Antipodes , vol. 32 no. 1/2 2018; (p. 330-332)
— Review of Reading for a Quiet Morning 2017 selected work poetry'Part unauthorized biography, part Miltonic character study, and part examination of what it is that makes us hominids of the sapiens order tick, the first section of Petra White's new collection, Reading for a Quiet Morning, casts an oracular, topological gaze across a place of outposts imagining themselves toward stabilities. In "How the Temple Was Built," the poet imagines a milieu of flat domains propped up by "handmade gods / vivid as puppets held up to the burning sun" (4) and acutely understands metaphysics as an ur-discourse straightening mayhem into particular directions...' (Introduction)
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Ivy Ireland Reviews Petra White and Magdalena Ball
2018
single work
essay
— Appears in: Cordite Poetry Review , 1 February no. 84 2018;'Approaching new work from such sharp, prolific and often dazzling poets as Magdalena Ball and Petra White is arguably no job for a quiet morning. Both White’s Reading for a Quiet Morning and Ball’s Unmaking Atoms demand (and duly reward) close attention. The perusal of such multi-layered, expansive texts is more suited, perhaps, to the intensity of early evenings, the drawn-out moments of twilight. For there is strident and persistent music erupting from both of these collections; sometimes it might seem serene, but more often the tune that floods out of the text feels more like an intense, liturgical dirge.' (Introduction)
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Form and Function
2017
single work
review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 2 December 2017 2017; (p. 18)
— Review of On the Outskirts 2017 selected work poetry ; With the Youngsters : Group Sestinas and Group Villanelles 2017 anthology poetry ; Reading for a Quiet Morning 2017 selected work poetry'Since the late 1980s, the work of John Kinsella has been protean and prodigious. At times a pastoral poet (some say anti-pastoral), such as with The Silo (1995), at others an experimental one. as in Syzgy (1993), Kinsella is best known these days as an eco-poet, a term to which his work has given an almost definitional focus.' (Introduction)
-
Form and Function
2017
single work
review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 2 December 2017 2017; (p. 18)
— Review of On the Outskirts 2017 selected work poetry ; With the Youngsters : Group Sestinas and Group Villanelles 2017 anthology poetry ; Reading for a Quiet Morning 2017 selected work poetry'Since the late 1980s, the work of John Kinsella has been protean and prodigious. At times a pastoral poet (some say anti-pastoral), such as with The Silo (1995), at others an experimental one. as in Syzgy (1993), Kinsella is best known these days as an eco-poet, a term to which his work has given an almost definitional focus.' (Introduction)
-
Inquietudes, Solaces
2018
single work
review
— Appears in: Antipodes , vol. 32 no. 1/2 2018; (p. 330-332)
— Review of Reading for a Quiet Morning 2017 selected work poetry'Part unauthorized biography, part Miltonic character study, and part examination of what it is that makes us hominids of the sapiens order tick, the first section of Petra White's new collection, Reading for a Quiet Morning, casts an oracular, topological gaze across a place of outposts imagining themselves toward stabilities. In "How the Temple Was Built," the poet imagines a milieu of flat domains propped up by "handmade gods / vivid as puppets held up to the burning sun" (4) and acutely understands metaphysics as an ur-discourse straightening mayhem into particular directions...' (Introduction)
-
Brianna Bullen Reviews Reading for a Quiet Morning by Petra White
2018
single work
review
— Appears in: Plumwood Mountain [Online] , February 2018;
— Review of Reading for a Quiet Morning 2017 selected work poetry -
Ivy Ireland Reviews Petra White and Magdalena Ball
2018
single work
essay
— Appears in: Cordite Poetry Review , 1 February no. 84 2018;'Approaching new work from such sharp, prolific and often dazzling poets as Magdalena Ball and Petra White is arguably no job for a quiet morning. Both White’s Reading for a Quiet Morning and Ball’s Unmaking Atoms demand (and duly reward) close attention. The perusal of such multi-layered, expansive texts is more suited, perhaps, to the intensity of early evenings, the drawn-out moments of twilight. For there is strident and persistent music erupting from both of these collections; sometimes it might seem serene, but more often the tune that floods out of the text feels more like an intense, liturgical dirge.' (Introduction)
-
June in Poetry
2019
single work
review
— Appears in: Overland [Online] , June 2019;
Awards
- 2018 highly commended Victorian Premier's Literary Awards — Prize for Poetry
