Micheline Wandor’s new poetry collection excels in the richness of its subject matter, the witty and sensuous language, the musicality of its rhythms and the way in which she is able to combine sophistication with accessibility.
She is as comfortable with Italian Renaissance music as she is with the poignancy of the history of Europe’s Jewish populations. Her retelling of the book of Esther is a tour de force of Midrashic free-form poetry, and her speculation on Shakespeare’s Dark Lady of the Sonnets is a tribute to both Elizabethan poetry and a mischievous imagination.
"This is Michelene Wandor’s best book yet. She combines her erudtion and passion as poet, musician and scholar in a collection that gives immense pleasure, and also continually challenges the reader with the force and variety of its ideas."
Alan Brownjohn
Michelene Wandor is a playwright, poet, short story writer, reviewer, broadcaster, theatre historian and musician. She has taught in Britain at the Guildhall School of Drama, London, the City Lit, London, London Metropolitan University and at various universities abroad and currently holds a Royal Literary Fund Fellowship at Birkbeck College, London. Recipient of many awards and nominations, particularly for her radio dramatisations, she is a prolific, and widely published, writer. She is also an accomplished musician, performing Renaissance
and Baroque music with her early music group, The Siena Ensemble.
She is as comfortable with Italian Renaissance music as she is with the poignancy of the history of Europe’s Jewish populations. Her retelling of the book of Esther is a tour de force of Midrashic free-form poetry, and her speculation on Shakespeare’s Dark Lady of the Sonnets is a tribute to both Elizabethan poetry and a mischievous imagination.
"This is Michelene Wandor’s best book yet. She combines her erudtion and passion as poet, musician and scholar in a collection that gives immense pleasure, and also continually challenges the reader with the force and variety of its ideas."
Alan Brownjohn
Michelene Wandor is a playwright, poet, short story writer, reviewer, broadcaster, theatre historian and musician. She has taught in Britain at the Guildhall School of Drama, London, the City Lit, London, London Metropolitan University and at various universities abroad and currently holds a Royal Literary Fund Fellowship at Birkbeck College, London. Recipient of many awards and nominations, particularly for her radio dramatisations, she is a prolific, and widely published, writer. She is also an accomplished musician, performing Renaissance
and Baroque music with her early music group, The Siena Ensemble.