Telling a Hawk from a Handsaw

Overview

Celebrating common household objects as well as fine-grained Australian landscapes, this emotionally engaged collection of poetry harvests the author’s wisdom, maturity, and interest in nearly everything. Exploring diverse topics—including a bush-entangled island, a bionic elephant, and Anne Boleyn’s ghost—each work uses a mixture of humor and gravity to scrutinize the meaning in our world, through the richly orchestrated language of one of Australia’s most significant poets.

Reviews

"Along with Peter Porter and Les Murray, [Wallace-Crabbe's] the Australian poet with the most significant international reputation" —David McCooey, senior lecturer, literature, Deakin University

"Wallace-Crabbe has been a name at the forefront of Australian poetry for some decades." —The West Australian

Author Biography

Chris Wallace-Crabbe is professor emeritus at the University of Melbourne. He is the author of The Amorous Cannibal, By and Large, Read It Again, The Universe Looks Down, and Whirling, and the editor of Oxford University Press’s Australian Writers and The Oxford Literary History of Australia.