'Gary Catalano was an important Australian poet. His talent was exquisitely refined, both in his subtle verse and in the prose poetry which he took to a higher pitch of excellence than any other Australian has attained.' — Les Murray
'The recent decade has witnessed a rapid rise in the number of Australian poets turning their hand to the prose poem. It is timely then to be reminded of the formidable oeuvre of our finest exponent of the form. The body of prose poetry Gary Catalano produced between 1980 and his death in 2002, now collected in a single volume for the first time, remains unsurpassed in our literature.'
Source : publisher's blurb
'The poetry community in Australia, as in the United Kingdom, has been slow to accept prose poetry as a legitimate poetic form. Yet there have been celebrated exponents of prose poetry over nearly two centuries – and even longer if the prose component of the Japanese Haibun, developed by Matsuo Bashō (1644–94), is understood as prose poetry.' (Introduction)
'The poetry community in Australia, as in the United Kingdom, has been slow to accept prose poetry as a legitimate poetic form. Yet there have been celebrated exponents of prose poetry over nearly two centuries – and even longer if the prose component of the Japanese Haibun, developed by Matsuo Bashō (1644–94), is understood as prose poetry.' (Introduction)
