Description
Book SynopsisTaking Mesopotamia was originally inspired by Jenny Lewis's search for her lost father - the young South Wales Borderer who fought in the ill-fated Mesopotamian campaign of World War I. Through reconstructed diary extracts, witness statements, formal poems and free verse, the book extends into a wider exploration of the recent Iraq wars. It also includes translations of a number of the poems into Arabic, and photographs taken by Lewis's father on campaign in 1916. Woven throughout the book is a strand inspired by The Epic of Gilgamesh, whose themes of hubris, abuse of power and fear of death show us how little the world has changed in four thousand years.
Trade Review'Taking Mesopotamia is a truly memorable piece of work. Lewis is an acutely attentive observer, but this is more than a poetic documentary - it lives as much in the ear as in the imagination, so well acoustically arranged that we cannot forget any of the voices in it.' --Jane Draycott 'Taking Mesopotamia - a brilliantly ironic title for our times - controls its anger through an accomplished and flexible technique in verse and prose. It is [ - ] an eloquent rejoinder to those who say poetry can't, or shouldn't, concern itself with public matters.' --Bernard O'Donoghue
