y separately published work icon Divine Comedy : Journeys Through Regional Geography selected work   poetry   prose  
  • Author:agent John Kinsella http://www.poetrylibrary.edu.au/poets/kinsella-john
Issue Details: First known date: 2008... 2008 Divine Comedy : Journeys Through Regional Geography
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'Inspired by Dante's Divine Comedy, John Kinsella's "distractions" create a world in which heaven, hell and purgatory co-exist. Set in the wheatbelt zone of Western Australia, Kinsella's Divine Comedy takes the reader on a journey through the real and imagined and nature in its full regalia. This is a book of hope and redemption that faces up to the terrors and traumas in all of us.' (Publisher's blurb)

Notes

  • Divided into three sections: 'Purgatorio: up close', 'Paradiso: rupture' and 'Inferno: leisure centre'.
  • Dedication: For Tracy, as always...

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

Works about this Work

Not the Poem Alone : In Medias Res John Kinsella , 2024 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Cambridge Companion to Australian Poetry 2024; (p. 292-312)

'This chapter argues that ecopoetry is too easily absorbed back into the logics of capitalism and colonialism. Aware of the delimiting forces surrounding its own context, the chapter argues to be taken not as an essay but as an action. It argues that for a poem to bring about environmental change, it must be part of connected interventions. The chapter outlines the poetic yarning between John Kinsella and Charmaine Papertalk Green, a member of the Wajarri, Badimaya, and Nhanagardi people of the Yamaji Nation, as a means of generative protest. It also provides an example of poems written in medias res in the collective resistance to a proposal to build bike trails on Walwalinj, a mountain sacred to the Ballardong Noongar people. This example demonstrates a poem is shaped by the particular situation and how the poem is one part of a network of actions that formed a campaign that was led by Aboriginal elders. The chapter also includes collaborative poetry written during the Roe 8 Highway protests in 2016 and poetry protesting the proposed destruction of the Julimar Forest by mining companies.'

Source: Abstract.

The Cybernetic Wheatbelt : John Kinsella’s Divine Comedy Tony Hughes-d'Aeth , 2021 single work criticism
— Appears in: Angelaki , vol. 26 no. 2 2021; (p. 43-54)

'John Kinsella’s poetry returns again and again to the landscape of the Western Australian wheatbelt. The wheatbelt is a region that was suddenly and violently re-made by capital in the service of cereal and fibre production during the course of the twentieth century. Despite this radical repurposing of land and the wholesale eradication of an ancient biome, the new farming zone quickly took on the halo of a natural landscape within state and nationalist ideologies. Against the backdrop of this event, Kinsella’s wheatbelt can be viewed as a comprehensive deconstruction of the forces that have led the wheatbelt to where it is now and which still provide the material conditions of its existence. In this essay, Kinsella’s Divine Comedy: Journeys Through a Regional Geography (2008) is considered as exemplary of his wheatbelt poetry. The essay explores the basic conceits that animate Kinsella’s poetics of critique. It argues that Kinsella’s poetry offers a strategic intervention into the claims of “capitalist realism,” which is Mark Fisher’s term for the foreclosure of alternatives to profit-driven patterns of production and consumption. Capitalist realism, in the context of the wheatbelt, asserts that whether we like it or not, one cannot argue against the basic entitlement that productive imperatives (and its agents) have to use land as they see fit. This essay attempts to detail the kinds of ways that Kinsella’s poetry tries to fracture this claim to common sense that capitalist production monopolises. What it finds, somewhat counter-intuitively, is that Kinsella’s poetry draws together two things which are traditionally regarded as antinomies – the machine and the organism. In this respect, Kinsella’s poetry is distinctly different from conventional ecopoetry, which tends to uphold the distinction between an authentic nature and a corrupting technology. Kinsella’s Divine Comedy makes use of the tripartite layering of Dante’s eschatology to evolve new topologies of being in the wheatbelt, and indeed, being in the world. Further still, the essay makes the claim that Kinsella delivers us a “cybernetic wheatbelt,” which refigures nature as a communicative machine.' (Publication summary)

Is There an Australian Pastoral Poetry? Andrew Taylor , 2015 single work criticism
— Appears in: Le Simplegadi , November no. 14 2015; (p. 38-51)
Pastoral was common as a European literary genre from the Renaissance until the eighteenth century. It existed in other artistic forms as well, especially in the visual arts, and after its demise as a distinct genre elements of it persisted into the twentieth century, for example in music. With the colonial spread of European culture the pastoral influence also extended into other countries, with a mixed fate. Recently, the term Pastoral has come back into prominence in literature in English, not only in Great Britain but also, notably in the USA and Australia, with the growth of writing motivated by ecological involvement with the natural world, especially landscape. This has led to re-definitions of the term Pastoral in the last few decades. A number of Australian poets are looked at to see whether, and how, their writing about landscape might relate to, or incorporate elements of the Pastoral. The Australian poet John Kinsella, in particular, has been a widely published spokesperson for a new definition of Pastoral. His published works trace his move from a politically activist anti-colonialist redefinition of Pastoral towards a quieter, more harmonious, and essentially ethical engagement with the natural world.
Salt Scars : John Kinsella's Wheatbelt Tony Hughes-d'Aeth , 2012 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australian Literary Studies , vol. 27 no. 2 2012; (p. 18-31)
Half-Masts : A Prosody of Telecommunications John Kinsella , 2010 single work criticism
— Appears in: Activist Poetics : Anarchy in the Avon Valley 2010; (p. 76-89)
Dante, Seen from Down Under Peter Pierce , 2008 single work review
— Appears in: The Canberra Times , 4 October 2008; (p. 12)

— Review of Divine Comedy : Journeys Through Regional Geography John Kinsella , 2008 selected work poetry prose
Dante, Set Among the Sandgropers Richard King , 2008 single work review
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 18-19 October 2008; (p. 39)

— Review of Divine Comedy : Journeys Through Regional Geography John Kinsella , 2008 selected work poetry prose
At the Crossroads : Australian Poetry 2008-2009 Julian Croft , 2009 single work review
— Appears in: Westerly , July vol. 54 no. 1 2009; (p. 115-127)

— Review of The Golden Bird Robert Adamson , 2008 single work poetry ; View from the Lucky Hotel Sandra Hill , 2008 selected work poetry ; Theatre Alison Croggon , 2008 selected work poetry ; Letters to the Tremulous Hand Elizabeth Campbell , 2007 selected work poetry ; Vincent Buckley : Collected Poems Vincent Buckley , 2009 selected work poetry ; True Thoughts Pamela Brown , 2008 selected work poetry ; The Other Way Out Bronwyn Lea , 2007 single work poetry ; Bark Anthony Lawrence , 2008 selected work poetry ; Divine Comedy : Journeys Through Regional Geography John Kinsella , 2008 selected work poetry prose ; Growing Up With Mr Menzies John Jenkins , 2008 selected work poetry ; Man Wolf Man L. K. Holt , 2007 selected work poetry ; Aria Sarah Holland-Batt , 2008 selected work poetry ; Autographs : 56 Poems in Prose Alex Skovron , 2006 selected work poetry ; Ambulances and Dreamers Bel Schenk , 2008 selected work poetry ; Speed and Other Liberties Andrew Sant , 2008 selected work poetry ; Therapy Like Fish : New and Selected Poems Marcella Polain , 2008 selected work poetry ; Sixty Classic Australian Poems Geoff Page , 2009 single work criticism ; Poems : 1980-2008 Jan Owen , 2008 selected work poetry ; The Incoming Tide Petra White , 2007 selected work poetry ; Southern Edge : Three Stories in Verse Barbara Temperton , 2009 selected work poetry
On Reading Opposite Long Distance Sara Wintz , 2010 single work review
— Appears in: Jacket , July no. 40 2010;

— Review of Divine Comedy : Journeys Through Regional Geography John Kinsella , 2008 selected work poetry prose
Kinsella's Magic Pudding Simon West , 2009 single work review
— Appears in: Blast , Spring/Summer no. 10 2009; (p. 36-44)

— Review of Divine Comedy : Journeys Through Regional Geography John Kinsella , 2008 selected work poetry prose
Road to Hell Runs Through Us John Kinsella , 2008 extract prose (Divine Comedy : Journeys Through Regional Geography)
— Appears in: The Australian Literary Review , August vol. 3 no. 7 2008; (p. 24)
Passions of the Poet Rod Moran , 2009 single work column
— Appears in: The West Australian , 10 January 2009; (p. 6)
Ali Alizadeh Interviews John Kinsella Ali Alizadeh (interviewer), 2009 single work interview
— Appears in: Cordite Poetry Review , December no. 31 2009;
John Kinsella's most recent book Divine Comedy: Journeys Through a Regional Geography is an incredibly ambitious and meticulous rewriting of that great epic poem of the Middle Ages, Dante's The Divine Comedy. Our guest poetry editor for Epic, Ali Alizadeh, interviewed Kinsella recently, via email. Their discussion ranged from traditional notions of the epic form, and Kinsella's relationship with it, to ecological manifestoes and collaborative projects, and the concept of 'pushing against form'.
John Kinsella’s Poetics of Distraction Louis Armand , 2010 single work criticism
— Appears in: Cordite Poetry Review , August vol. 33 no. 2010;
Rupturing Dante: John Kinsella's 'Divine Comedy' Ali Alizadeh , 2010 single work criticism
— Appears in: Hidden Agendas : Unreported Poetics 2010; (p. 130-149)
Last amended 20 Mar 2012 11:49:25
Subjects:
  • Western Australia,
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