'Here are these amazing works, highly praised, technically and emotionally heart-stopping poems reflecting gratefully on a life ... James's famous voice twinkles even in his weakened state.' Spectator
Clive James is the author of more than thirty books. As well as verse and novels, he has published collections of essays, literary criticism, television criticism and travel writing, plus four volumes of autobiography. In 1992 he was made a Member of the Order of Australia, and in 2003 he was awarded the Philip Hodgins memorial medal for literature.
James was diagnosed with emphysema and kidney failure in early 2010
and almost all of the poems [in Sentenced to Life] deal with
his illness ("Dying by inches") and his facing up to the end of
life. I read an advance copy recently and was moved, perhaps
changed, by the experience. It's one thing to encounter such a poem
now and then in a literary journal but to read 37 of them in one
sitting is overwhelming . . . This is a sad book, depressing even,
but it is full of insight and wisdom. -- Stephen Romei * The
Australian *
A writer whose commanding voice contains a constant variety of
colour and tone -- Robert McCrum * Observer *
Suffused with loss and guilt . . . although his impending death is
ever-present in the verse, his humour still shines through . . .
[James is] embarrassed at having lived with his death so long:
"High time to go," he says - how many last words, deathbed
aphorisms and funeral songs can his public take? Quite a few is the
answer, when they resonate as these poems do at their best. Keep at
it, Clive. May you go on being embarrassed for some time -- Blake
Morrison * Guardian *
James's recent poems, of course, are so much more than fuel for
Grub Street; they represent the very best work James has ever done
in verse -- Jason Guriel * New Republic *
His book of biographical essays, Cultural Amnesia, and his
epic translation of Dante's Divine Comedy may well be considered
his best works in a career featuring 40-plus published endeavours.
His latest poetry book, Sentenced to Life, must be
considered his bravest, a 37-poem fever sweat of longing and love,
regret and acceptance . . . Sentenced to Life is 56 pages of
deeply intense poetic language. Even the humour in this is pitch
black * Australian *
These poems, in which his braggadocio and salaciousness have been
subdued by his plight, are in many ways the most sympathetic he has
written. . . What is most striking about this collection is its
sustained expression of sorrow -- David Sexton * Evening Standard
*
Sentenced to Life is a valedictory volume, concerned with
the end of life, and with the slow robbery of terminal illness . .
. After writing poems for 50 years, his technique is deft and
assured * Independent on Saturday *
His poems have a poignancy and a moving recognition of the finality
of life that all must face . . . Clive James is courageously
fighting his dark future with that most powerful of weapons:
poetry.He may lose the battle but his words will linger -- Paul
Callan * Express *
These tight, lyrical poems, rich in allusiveness and association,
demand our full attention and we are rewarded for such engagement .
. . Sentenced to Life is a relatively short book at just 56
pages of poems. Its complexity and generosity of spirit make it
seem so much longer * Saturday Paper *
There are a few other things making Clive James' recent poetry
particularly poignant. One is the poet's physical inability to
return to his homeland for a last look. Another is the sense that
from that "great bunch of guys", as James was once memorably
described, the most important one was not the television star but
the poet * Sydney Morning Herald *
There is an inevitable sadness to this moving collection. This
being James, there are also moments of zinging energy and a sense
of fun . . . James will remain in the present tense as those
Japanese Maple's leaves continue to turn to flame. -- Rebecca K
Morrison * Independent *
Raw and confessional yet beautifully crafted * GQ *
A brave and risky book. . . .with its mixture of technical verve
(James had always been a master of form) and self-depreciating wit
to leaven the pathos, it seems that he has reached the pinnacle of
his powers . . . it would be hard to imagine a more elegant and
restrained farewell -- John Burnside * New Statesman *
Sentenced to Life . . . speaks of the intensity of emotions
before life's end. He writes with what George Eliot described as
the "acute consciousness" of "a man looking into the eyes of death
* Irish Independent *
It's not common for any book of poetry to hit number two in the
bestseller charts, but there it stands . . . Clive James, cracking
graceful jokes in a room full of old friends and young admirers,
showed there's another way to [face death] -- Sam Leith * Evening
Standard *
Moving and witty * Mail on Sunday *
Worth many a repeat read . . . James's confrontation with his
approaching death is nothing short of inspirational. Depressing?
Melancholy rather: he is leaving a glittering life. But the very
melancholy of its subject nourishes James's pleasures in all that
remains. Regret and loss certainly, but a glowing love of all
things that survive; sunlight, trees, places he loved. His will to
confront the inevitable, so lightly expressed, comforts all of us
getting on in years -- Joan Bakewell * Independent *
While it is to be hoped that these poems are not James's epitaph,
he takes the precaution of providing one just in case. The fine
sonnet "Procedure for Disposal" captures the headlong speed and
energy of his life in a single, breathless sentence which, in the
closing couplet, slows and falls like a feather into the sea. But
Clive James has always made a far bigger splash than that * TLS
*
Wise, witty, terrifying, unflinching and extraordinarily alive,
they are both a great pleasure and a chill in the nerves. -- AS
Byatt, Best Holiday Reads 2015 * Guardian *
His latest and finest collection. . . James has approached the time
of his vanishing with grace and good humour, not sentimentality or
anger. These essays and poems are death-haunted but radiant with
the felt experience of what it means to be alive * Financial Times
*
An old man recollecting lost youth is always an evocative theme but
James turns the phrases and they catch the light. . .I submit:
reader, look at these books, they're wonderful.Sentenced To
Life is the work of a lifetime, at least so far -- Philip
Collins * The Times *
[A] wonderful (and let's hope not last) collection -- Mary
Beard
A magical work, direct, lyrical, moving, and wholly unsentimental
-- John Banville * New York Review of Books *
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