Catherine Walsh

City West
Shearsman Books: 2005. A4. 82 pp. pbk. ISBN 1 85298 017 6.
Euro 13.50

Long poem in three sections. Distributed in Ireland by hardPressed poetry.

From the cover:

It seems a shame that many Irish poetry readers are unaware of Catherine Walsh's very obvious gifts. Her brilliant punning, the way she assembles disjointed, yet perfectly rendered fragments of Dublin argot and her ability to imply simultaneous narratives mark her out from her contemporaries.
Dónal Morairty: The Art of Brian Coffey

Walsh's work subsequent to Making Tents shatters practical language in its rejection of transparent or normative discourse.(Her) disjunctive, disorientating poetry acknowledges language as a medium which constructs our relation to others, to objects, to ourselves. Her poetic subjects are always Idir Eatortha, caught "between two worlds"
Alex Davis: A Broken Line

Walsh's poetry attempts to move away from a position of hierarchical domination and construct a poetic space of non-mastery and heterogeneity.Thus, Walsh's poetry, unlike Derrida's theory, allows for speaking positions for women within the liminal space. However, these positions are always temporary, facilitating the articulation of many different subjective voices across a range of many different spatial settings.
Claire Bracken: 'Each nebulous atom in between': reading liminality - Irish studies, postmodern feminism and the poetry of Catherine Walsh in New Voices in Irish Criticism 5

Short Stories
North & South: 1989. A5. 24 pp. pbk.. ISBN 0-907562-54-X.
Euro 5.00

Definitely not prose.

'Of the newer poets, she's unique; she's also amongst the best.' David Miller.

'the common phrase, finely balanced and razor sharp, each echo cared for' Ric Caddel.

Pitch
Pig Press: 1994. 23 x 14 cm. 48 pp. pbk. ISBN 1 85298 017 6.
Euro 12.50

A poem in four parts.

'worth reading not least to watch thought select which parts of itself to display in language' Tom Raworth.

'a variety of complex tonalities too rarely found in the more monolithic ironized play of many experimentalists' Dr. Tuma (oc. cit.).

Idir Eatortha and Making Tents
Invisible Books: 1996. A4. 85 pp. pbk.. ISBN 0 9521256 4 1.
Euro 7.00

44 page poem, extending Walsh's use of space, silence and multiple voicing, plus reprint of a 1987 hardPressed Poetry pamphlet. A beautifully produced book with illustrations by Didi Baldwin.

Prospect into Breath: Interviews with North & South Writers
North & South: 1991. A5. 190 pp. pbk.. ISBN 1 870314 17 4.
Euro 12.60

19 page interview with Catherine Walsh, in which she discusses her formative influences, feelings about contemporary Irish poetry, etc. Plus Ric Caddel, Eric Mottram, Jonathan Williams, Lee Harwood and 4 others.

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