Barry Hill Barry Hill i(A18213 works by)
Born: Established: 1943 Melbourne, Victoria, ;
Gender: Male
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Works By

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1 White Rose i "Fossil waters the garden as his beloved sleeps.", Barry Hill , 2024 single work poetry
— Appears in: Arena Quarterly , Autumn no. 17 2024; (p. 15)
1 Gauze i "Moon-silver has returned", Barry Hill , 2023 single work poetry
— Appears in: Arena Quarterly , Winter no. 14 2023; (p. 87)
1 1 y separately published work icon Eggs for Keeps : Poetry Reviews and Other Praise Barry Hill , North Melbourne : Arcadia , 2022 24456302 2022 selected work poetry essay criticism

'Eggs For Keeps picks up where the selected essays left off. It features short reviews, of poetry mainly, collected over thirty years, including the decade Hill was Poetry Editor for the Australian – responses to books by Paul Kane, Ian Wedde, Les Murray, Judith Beveridge, Robert Adamson, Seamus Heaney, Carol Anne Duffy, Gary Snyder, DH Lawrence, Kim Mahood, Martin Harrison, Tracy Ryan, Paul Muldoon, Ezra Pound … It contains prize-winning citations for David Malouf, Helen Garner and Paul Carter; and it attends to the monumental translation work of Burton Watson, Ian Johnston, Meredith McKinney and David Hinton. The book closes with Hill’s diary in Chamonix, where he was writing in the presence of Mont Blanc, the mountain which held Shelley in thrall.

'Eggs For Keeps has gifts all round for mind-heart on the poetry path.'  (Publication summary)

1 On Not Cutting Through i "Crossing the river Bug", Barry Hill , 2022 single work poetry
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 23 April 2022; (p. 15) Best of Australian Poems 2022 2022; (p. 107)
1 Blast; Intimations; Vedic Shit Shows, One More Time; Sleep Out; From River Deeps, Dragons Sing Out; Nothing Coming off Barry Hill , 2021 single work poetry
— Appears in: Arena Quarterly , no. 8 2021; (p. 66-70)
1 2 y separately published work icon Cold Mountain and the Sea Barry Hill , North Melbourne : Arcadia , 2021 23618785 2021 selected work poetry

'Cold Mountain and The Sea arises from two summers of swimming with the Zen Poet Han Shan.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

1 1 The Gusts i "A translator of Basho wrote to me: that the poem is not in the words.", Barry Hill , 2021 single work poetry
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 6 February 2021; (p. 18)
1 Ebb and Flow of a Life along the River Barry Hill , 2020 single work review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 26 September 2020; (p. 24)

— Review of Reaching Light Robert Adamson , 2000 single work poetry
1 Straw Dogs Barry Hill , 2020 single work poetry
— Appears in: Arena Quarterly , March no. 1 2020; (p. 71)
1 The Last Post Barry Hill , 2020 single work poetry
— Appears in: Arena Quarterly , March no. 1 2020; (p. 71)
1 Revelations Barry Hill , 2020 single work poetry
— Appears in: Arena Quarterly , March no. 1 2020; (p. 71)
1 y separately published work icon Kind Fire Barry Hill , North Melbourne : Arcadia , 2020 19529424 2020 selected work poetry

'“Barry Hill is a remarkable presence in Australian writing … I think of David Malouf, Judith Wright, and Les Murray as companion voices, for they too are writers of fiction, nonfiction and poetry, and brilliant essayists steeped in European literature who are profoundly interested in Aboriginality …
[He is] a confident Australianist whose writing life has moved decisively towards Asia and the universal in recent years.”
Tom Griffiths
Introduction, Reason and Lovelessness:
Essays, Encounters, Reviews, 1980–2018'

'Since 1990, with Penguin’s publication of Raft, Barry Hill has been acclaimed for his poetry. His Ghosting William Buckley (Heinemann 1993), which won his first Premier’s Award, was described by Overland’s Barrett Reid as a ‘major work’. David Malouf wrote that The Inland Sea (Penguin 2001) was ‘a mixture of intense contemplation and powerful eroticism’. Necessity: Poems 1996–2006 won the ACT Judith Wright Award. Lines for Birds (2011), a collaboration with the artist John Wolseley, was commended for the Prime Minister’s Prize, and described by Nathaniel Tarn as ‘a miraculous gift of a book’. His Naked Clay: Drawing from Lucian Freud (2012), which John Kinsella described as ‘a masterpiece’, was short-listed for the 2013 UK Forward Prize, and prompted Sebastian Smee to declare him ‘a superb poet’ … His Selected Poems was published last year. Kind Fire is his eleventh collection.

'Beloved Historian at Home
For the late Hugh Stretton and Patsy Stretton
He cannot remember a line of his great works
or my name, but most days he locates his toothbrush.
And he can, still, turn to his wife
who finds him there in his well of love.'

(Source: publisher's blurb)

1 The Proper Truth i "Is what a translator of Basho wrote to me:", Barry Hill , 2019 single work poetry
— Appears in: Arena Magazine , December no. 163 2019; (p. 31)
1 3 y separately published work icon Eagerly We Burn Eagerly We Burn : Selected Poems 1980-2018 Barry Hill , Bristol : Shearsman Books , 2019 18254139 2019 selected work poetry

'Barry Hill's tenth book of poetry selects from his Naked Clay: Drawing from Lucian Freud, which was shortlisted for the Forward Prize, 2013, and described by John Kinsella as a 'masterpiece'; Grass Hut Work (2016), his excursion into Hiroshima and Japanese poetry, which Sam Hamill said was 'beautiful and quietly powerful'; Lines for Birds (2011) his collaboration with the painter John Wolseley, was acclaimed by Nathaniel Tarn as 'a miraculous gift of a book'; The Inland Sea (2001), which David Malouf described as 'a mixture of intense contemplation and powerful eroticism'; Ghosting William Buckley (1993), deemed by Barrett Reid a 'major work' of 'stories, thought and music' from the encounter of a 'wild white man' and the indigenous people of the Australian frontier. This Selected also includes recent poetry--lyrical, political and in memoriam.' (Publication summary)

1 Ambassador (Saigon, 1963) i "The Venerable", Barry Hill , 2019 single work poetry
— Appears in: Arena Magazine , June no. 160 2019; (p. 39)
1 From “Reading Chuang Tzu in Seoul” Barry Hill , 2018 single work poetry
— Appears in: Antipodes , vol. 32 no. 1/2 2018; (p. 110-111)
1 3 y separately published work icon Reason & Lovelessness : Essays, Encounters, Reviews 1980-2017 Barry Hill , Clayton : Monash University Publishing , 2018 13204819 2018 selected work essay review prose

'‘This wonderful, mysterious and compelling collection of essays prompts us to consider Barry Hill’s unusual place in Australian letters…The essays are like jewels in a necklace, each glistening with its own beauty but together making something of greater elegance.’ 
Tom Griffiths

'‘A rich gift. Thirty two invitations to share the speculative adventures, in friendships, in family, in the world of politics and moral and spiritual commitment, of “a man in his wholeness, wholly attending”. An extraordinary revelation of the considered life.’ 
David Malouf

'‘Reason, as passionate analysis and the higher Reason of moral law, runs through this astonishing collection of essays as a lifeline cast to us in a loveless world bereft of justice. At last we have the proper lens for getting Barry Hill into focus: so varied and extensive is his accomplishment as a writer—in poetry, fiction, social and cultural history, and criticism—that we need this book to gather together in one place an adequate reflection of all that achievement. This is “Man Thinking”, in Emerson’s phrase—the work of a finely honed intellect and a capacious spirit—that educates us in the full range of our humanity. Like DH Lawrence, Rabindranath Tagore, and John Berger—all of whom he writes about cogently—Hill shows how a life of writing is a life of thinking, when both the mind and the heart are animated by love and by reason.’ 
Paul Kane , Vassar College

'‘These are intimate, stylish essays. This collection showcases Barry Hill’s remarkable intellectual curiosity and erudition. From questions of belonging and attachment, to global challenges of survival, belief and knowledge, Barry unflinchingly pushes through new frontiers to reveal, with passion and precision, new ways of seeing and feeling.’ 
Julianne SchultzGriffith Review (Publication summary)

1 Dogs and Grog : New Writing in Alice Springs Barry Hill , 2018 single work prose
— Appears in: Sydney Review of Books , February 2018;
1 Mister Lincoln or Camp David i "Cormorants at dusk fly in", Barry Hill , 2017 single work poetry
— Appears in: The Best Australian Poems 2017 2017; (p. 90-91)
1 Dark Star Barry Hill , 2017 single work essay
— Appears in: Meanjin , December vol. 76 no. 4 2017; (p. 134-143)

'I rarely feel calm and good,' Christina Stead wrote to a friend in 1967, just five years before she came back to face the old music in Australia: the cultural cringing she scorned; the family oppression and animus she'd long fled from; the 'raw, fresh and unhistorical society'. Her garrulous letters of this period are, however, calmer than they'd ever been: less flighty, impressionistic, less strained in their praise and courtesies towards others-less self-conscious, I suppose, than they were before her literary reputation built its solid foundations. But there was still that unfinished novel around her neck that was to be called I'm Dying Laughing-one of her several ironic titles, which was published posthumously in 1986. She saw it as 'full of anguish'. It would take a lot more work. She knew what she wanted to say. But that would involve 'cutting down the excitement and drama and conflict'. (Introduction)

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