Blind Field (Oxford Poets)

The term `Blind Field' refers to photography, and in this, George Szirtes's seventh collection, photographic themes supply the starting points for a number of poems of almost surrealistic dislocation. These give way at the end to a group of more warmly affectionate, personal poems. The centre of the book is occupied by a long work, Transylvana , in which the poet revisits his mother's former home in Romania and depicts the life of an unnamed relative in that country's still ominous political climate. On Bridge Passages (Oxford Poets, 1991): `Trained as a painter, Szirtes uses what can be seen...as a moral key, combining a dizzy metamorphic imagination with formal strictness.' Sean O'Brien, Sunday Times `Szirtes zigzags his way to greatness.' Richard Burns, Jewish Chronicle This book is intended for readers of contemporary poetry.