... author of the collection of poetry, The Hammer of God.
I was sent a copy of this collection of poetry for an honest and frank review. All comments recorded here are solely my own.
I have always loved poetry and have spent many hours reading, learning and reciting the work of many and varied poets from Shakespeare and Spenser to more modern-day greats such as Sassoon, Owen, Auden, Plath, Hughes and many others. It was a great pleasure to be asked to review this particular collection.
As with any author new to me, I go straight to the writing. I want to read the words without any pre-conceived ideas and without any background knowledge that might colour my enjoyment or influence my assessment of their work.
I thoroughly enjoyed this particular body of work. Each poem has its own rhythm which changes and flows as the words move through the exposition of the central subject to a conclusion. For me, that is important. A poem is an entity in itself in the same way that a novel moves from its beginning to a conclusion. I was impressed by this author's use of language and her extensive vocabulary - there have been so many times I've picked up a poem that began well but quickly fell into doggerel, often purely for the sake of the rhyme. There's none of that in this collection.
I found the subject matter of some of the poetry to be a little heavy. I did get the opportunity to ask Aria about this and her explanation provided the clarity I needed. Having started writing when she was eight, Aria became interested in anything that would allow her to express herself. Like me, she grew up in a house full of books. At 'a very young age', she said, she 'was reading Byron, Poe. Yeats, etc' and had her 'first poem published at the age of eight, which was a small work about birds.'
When prompted about The Hammer of God she said it 'was written following the deaths of several family members. These events along with the political and racial turmoil that was starting to seep into the social landscape were a catalyst' for the collection. Through her poetry Aria admitted she had tried to find 'solace'. And yes, I get that. The poetic form can, and does support the presentation of difficult and harrowing subjects. So many of the poems in this collection caused me to think and to go back and re-read them.
Having had a life-long association with poetry myself, it has just never occurred to me to write in that form, my preference being for stories and novels. I was intrigued to find out if Aria had only ever written poetry. 'I have written five screenplays, many short stories and a novel,' she said. But then admitted that she did 'find novels tough and prose more of a sticky wicket in terms of keeping the thread going.' Hmmm and I know exactly what she means!
I was sent a copy of this collection of poetry for an honest and frank review. All comments recorded here are solely my own.
I have always loved poetry and have spent many hours reading, learning and reciting the work of many and varied poets from Shakespeare and Spenser to more modern-day greats such as Sassoon, Owen, Auden, Plath, Hughes and many others. It was a great pleasure to be asked to review this particular collection.
As with any author new to me, I go straight to the writing. I want to read the words without any pre-conceived ideas and without any background knowledge that might colour my enjoyment or influence my assessment of their work.
I thoroughly enjoyed this particular body of work. Each poem has its own rhythm which changes and flows as the words move through the exposition of the central subject to a conclusion. For me, that is important. A poem is an entity in itself in the same way that a novel moves from its beginning to a conclusion. I was impressed by this author's use of language and her extensive vocabulary - there have been so many times I've picked up a poem that began well but quickly fell into doggerel, often purely for the sake of the rhyme. There's none of that in this collection.
I found the subject matter of some of the poetry to be a little heavy. I did get the opportunity to ask Aria about this and her explanation provided the clarity I needed. Having started writing when she was eight, Aria became interested in anything that would allow her to express herself. Like me, she grew up in a house full of books. At 'a very young age', she said, she 'was reading Byron, Poe. Yeats, etc' and had her 'first poem published at the age of eight, which was a small work about birds.'
When prompted about The Hammer of God she said it 'was written following the deaths of several family members. These events along with the political and racial turmoil that was starting to seep into the social landscape were a catalyst' for the collection. Through her poetry Aria admitted she had tried to find 'solace'. And yes, I get that. The poetic form can, and does support the presentation of difficult and harrowing subjects. So many of the poems in this collection caused me to think and to go back and re-read them.
Having had a life-long association with poetry myself, it has just never occurred to me to write in that form, my preference being for stories and novels. I was intrigued to find out if Aria had only ever written poetry. 'I have written five screenplays, many short stories and a novel,' she said. But then admitted that she did 'find novels tough and prose more of a sticky wicket in terms of keeping the thread going.' Hmmm and I know exactly what she means!
One last thing that I wanted to put to Aria was about the use of illustrations in her book. As I was reading through it I noticed a Delarouche, a Cowper, an Edwin Davis
illustration, and a mention of Dali (I assumed Salvador) in one of the poems. Aria, like a lot of creative people, loves the arts, per se. And she said she has 'been drawing since a very young age,' of about 'five or six.' No wonder the collection is illlustrated so well.
about the book... The book begins with a chord of anger, with the titular work, Hammer of God, traveling through personal angst which then reaches outward to worldly considerations returning at the end, to a place of peace. This is rather akin to therapy in which the individual who seeks help is often distraught, but through inner reflection, finds solace in the process, and through it comes out on the other side, wholly changed, and often to such an extent, they are no longer the same.
about the author... Aria Ligi is an award-winning poet who has been writing for over fifty years. She has a great love of history, and in particular, the English Romantics. Her work has appeared in October Hill’s Winter’s, Fantasy Realm, Z Publication’s New York’s Best Emerging Poets anthology, Light Journal: the Australian Times, University of South Dakota’s Vermillion Literary Project, and New Poetry to name a few. She has been a frequent guest on Progressive News Network’s Blog Talk Radio and is the Senior Poetry Editor at October Hill Magazine.
You can follow Aria on Twitter Facebook Goodreads and on her Website
You can get her books from Amazon Poetic Justice ABEBooks Alibris Books The Book Depository Better World Books Barnes and Noble
