Books by John Glenday

John Glenday's Selected Poems collects the finest work from his previous five prize-winning collections.

After the success of Grain (shortlisted for the Griffin Poetry Prize, poetry's most prestigious international award) John Glenday returns with The Golden Mean.Glenday's poetry - once something of a closely guarded secret - now has many devotees, and this new book shows why: Glenday's mastery of the short translucent lyric and his unashamed and direct concern with matters of the spirit, of love, of human nature and natural law - means he can often read as a Spanish or East European poet in immaculate translation. But for all its apparently weightless and aerodynamic grace, Glenday's poetry can be playful, experimental and occasionally even surreal, and his voice local and intimate.The Golden Mean shows Glenday's full range, and a poet at the height of his imaginative powers.

Though John Glenday has long been admired for his lyrically delicate and emotionally powerful poetry, he has remained something of a well-kept secret. His third collection, Grain, makes his singular talent available to a wider audience. Sometimes Glenday's poems are forcefully direct; sometimes they are so quiet they feel as if they were composed within a capacious listening, as a form of secular prayer. Glenday's seamless lyric can also disguise some wild and surreal tales: the Beauty and the Beast told in reverse, a bizarre list of new saints, or a can of peaches waiting for the invention of the tin-opener. However, the lasting impression is of a genuinely spiritual poet, one with the ability to turn every earthly detail towards the same clear light. Grain announces Glenday as an essential voice in contemporary poetry.