Just After
Midnight (Enitharmon Press, 2004, ISBN 1-904634028, £8.95) - available from the
publisher at www.enitharmon.co.uk.
In Cyclops'
Cave, a new translation from Homer' s Book 9, The Odyssey.
(The Greville Press. Mellors Court. The Butts. Warwick. CV34 4ST -
available from the author or publisher for £2.25, 2003;
ISBN 0 906887747).
Her seventh collection was the book
length sequence The Odysseus Poems: Fictions on the Odyssey of Homer
(Cargo Press, The Annex, Perhaven House, Cliff Road, Gorran Haven, PH26
6JN or www.cargo_press.co.uk, 1999, ISBN 1899980075) .
In print, available from publisher - £9.50 inc
pp. Email inquiries to
Cargo Press here.
Illus by Jacqueline Morreau with four full page original etchings.
- A sensuous interweaving of the famous
voices, Odysseus, Penelope, Kalypso and Circe, even the many headed
monster Skylla, they slyly point up the weak links in Odysseus'
account of his Great Wanderings. So the hero becomes human: callous,
deeply divided in himself, yet courageous and in his fashion
true.
- Judith Kazantzis with Irving Weinman
perform 'Sex, Lies and Odysseus' devised from the poems.
Her sixth collection was Swimming
Through The Grand Hotel (Enitharmon Press 1997, ISBN 1-900564-20-3) - available from the
publisher at www.enitharmon.co.uk.
- Poems of love, fantasy, art, politics
and landscape.
- The Times Literary Supplement:
"Judith Kazantzis writes a poetry of sensuous immediacy couched
in an agile, conversational style."
- Stand: "the world made
strange, surreal, subterranean fantasia ... an unusual voice in
contemporary poetry in Britain."
Selected Poems 1977-1992
(1995 Sinclair-Stevenson,
ISBN 1-85619-552-X)
- This selection included poems from
five and more books:
The Rabbit Magician Plate
(1992 Sinclair-Stevenson)
Flame Tree (1988 Methuen)
A Poem for Guatemala, poem
cycle (1988 The Greville Press - see above)
Lets Pretend (1984 Virago)
Touch Papers (with Michele
Roberts and Michelene Wandor, 1982, Allison and Busby). Available
through Ice
House Books.
The Wicked Queen (1980
Sidgwick and Jackson)
Minefield (1977 Sidgwick
and Jackson)
Many of Judith Kazantzis' books may be
found at www.amazon.com (US/$) or www.amazon.co.uk
(UK/£).
Her poems have appeared in
many magazines and newspapers including The Independent on Sunday, London Magazine, Stand, Ambit, Agenda, Poetry
Review, Poetry London, Poetry Wales, Bete Noire, The Honest Ulsterman,
Poetry Ireland, Red Pepper, The Independent, The New Statesman, Tribune.
The Independent
featured her poems in their column 'The Daily Poem', most recently from The
Odysseus Poems (1999). The Independent on Sunday
featured 'Two for the Senora', a poem from Just After Midnight
(2004).
Short stories published in Critical
Quarterly, London Magazine and Aquarius.
On Just After Midnight,
RV Bailey: "Adventurous, challenging, surrealist, magical, ... the
work of an alert and committed writer". Frognal Papers:
"her formidable range... ample evidence that she has found a
significant number of new avenues to explore".
On In Cyclops'
Cave: Robert Fagles, the Homeric translator: "...such a fine
blend of the lyric and the gutsy, the punning and the deadly
earnest..."
Of Love and Terror:
Hanan al-Shaykh's response was "Raw
emotion explodes on every page. I was smiling and sobbing at the same
time." Ruth Fainlight's novel choice for 2002 (Independent
on Sunday). "A story rare for these days, where passion and
private gain struggle with a sense of right and self... immense sublety
and finesse", Dorothy Schwarz, Quality Women's Fiction.
"An absorbing read", The Tablet.
Of The Odysseus Poems:
Fictions on the Odyssey of Homer, Ruth Fainlight writes
"She
gives further evidence of an ability to imagine herself into many roles...
This tender, ironical portrait of a hero who has fascinated the European
imagination for more than two millennia makes a fascinating development in
the work of this justifiably ambitious poet."
Marina Warner writes: "Judith
Kazantzis'
sequence of interwoven voices casts the many struggles with monsters, the
seductions and loneliness of love, and the long wanderings of heroes into
a vivid meditation for our turbulent times."
"A sense of a poet moving up a register
of inspiration... her uncommon insight into the complexities of male
sexuality indicates that the classics are still rich territory for the
truly original poet, all themore so for the sheer entertainment value of
some of her poems". James Sunderland Smith, PN Review
"She sensualises The Odyssey, not to
soften it but tot plunge it further into inhuman mysteries"...
"this powerful and complex work" Orbis
"her strategy recalls Auden's
characters in The Sea and The Mirror but some of the poems evoke the more
beautiful bits of The Cantos" Herbert Lomas, Ambit
"'extraordinarily seductive... the
pure work of poetry, tacking and veering between vernaculars and lyrical
writing" Judy Gahagan, Poetry
London
See also: Other
media, for dramatisation of The Odysseus Poems.
On Swimming Through The Grand Hotel:
The Times Literary Supplement:
"Judith Kazantzis writes a poetry of sensuous immediacy couched in an
agile, conversational style."
Stand: "the world made
strange, surreal, subterranean fantasia ... an unusual voice in
contemporary poetry in Britain."
Some review quotes of the Selected
Poems:
The Sunday Telegraph:
(Vernon Scannell): "Considerable variety of technical skill, mood and
subject-matter. Nearly all these poems are informed by a sharp wit,
intelligence and a courageous confrontation of the less endurable aspects
of human life at the end of our troubled century."
Poetry Review (Helen
Dunmore): "assured, flexible and rich with
experience".
The Times Literary
Supplement: "an intriguing and unpredictable writer. The best of
the free verse charges up like a battery".
Stand (Jon Glover):
"an important and wide ranging volume".
What reviewers said of
previous collections:
Of The Rabbit
Magician Plate (1992), distinguished American Laureate poet
Richard Wilbur wrote: "though there are many things one might praise
about Judith Kazantzis' poems, what strikes me everywhere is the
unexpectedness of her word choice; re-encountered, her words surprise
again through their unusual accuracy and their nice governance of tone, not
derailing the reader (as tawdry surprises do) but putting him precisely on
the track".
Poetry Review praised
"her bright abundances of imagery and her musically mobile
constructions."
"By far and above the
best collection of this present crop, including both Harrison and Armitage.
Rush out and buy it". Peter Finch, The New Welsh Review.
Of her poem cycle A
Poem for Guatemala (1988) Harold Pinter said that it was "A
rare event: A major political poem...beautiful wrought, concrete, and
passionate." Carol Ann Duffy said "Someone should give a
copy to Colonel North."
Of Flame Tree
(1988) the TLS noted "this all too rare ability to fuse personal and
polemical statements."
Of Lets Pretend (1984)
Poetry Review: "[she] discovers a further level of liberation
in her cool compassion, her unangry, strenuous exploration of our social
secrets."
Of The Wicked Queen
(1980) poet Ann Stevenson noted its "tenderness and a wry
insight...There are, in fact, many wicked queens and Kazantzis makes a
case for them all"
Of Minefield
(1977) poet novelist Michele Roberts commented, "the handling of
language is totally satisfying: time and time again I exclaimed Yes,
that's exactly it, you have made me see what you mean." And
..."the book is well-named; if a minefield could write poetry, this
is the poetry it would write...." or "nervous energy, bitter
wit, and keen eye for striking visual detail.." DM Thomas, TLS
