John Burnside's Books

Selected Poems

By: John Burnside

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Over seventeen years and nine collections, John Burnside built - in the words of Bernard O'Donoghue - 'a poetic corpus of the first significance', a poetry of luminous, limpid grace. In this Selected Poems, his territory is the no-man's-land of threshold and margin, the charmed half-light of the liminal, a domestic world threaded through with mystery, myth and longing. We can see themes emerge and develop within the growing confidence of Burnside's sinuous lyric poise: the place of the individual in the world, the idea of dwelling, of home, within that community, and the lure of absence and escape set against the possibilities of renewal and continuity. This is consummate, immaculate work born out of a lean and agile craftsmanship, profound philosophical thought and a haunted, haunting imagination; the result is a poetry that makes intimate, resonant, exquisite music.

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Page Count

119

Publisher

Random House

Published Date

ISBN 10

1448114659

ISBN 13

9781448114658

Burnside's Bridge

Antietam

By: John Cannon

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Burnside's Bridge

Antietam

By: John Cannon

The stone bridge on the southern flank of the Antietam battlefield became one of the Civil War's most powerful symbols of courage and sacrifice. Each stage of the battle is described by extracts from memoirs and diaries of the time, with details of the area as it was in 1862 and as it is today.

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Page Count

151

Publisher

Pen and Sword

Published Date

ISBN 10

0850527570

ISBN 13

9780850527575

I Put a Spell on You

By: John Burnside

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I Put a Spell on You

By: John Burnside

In this exquisite, haunting book, John Burnside describes his coming of age from the industrial misery of Cowdenbeath and Corby to the new world of Cambridge. This is a memoir of romance âe" of lost love and the love of being lost âe" darkened by threat, illuminated by glamour. The old Scots word âe~glamourâe(tm) means magical charm, and the first time he was played I Put a Spell on You, John Burnside thought he had never heard a more beautiful song âe" it was an enchantment, a fascination that would turn to obsession. Implicit in the song were all the ambiguities that intrigued him âe" love, possession and danger âe" and this book is an exploration of the darker side of glamour and attraction. Beginning with memories of a brutal murder, the book follows the author through a series of uncanny encounters with âe~lost girlsâe(tm), with brilliant digressions on murder ballads, voodoo, acid and insomnia, and a cast that includes Kafka and Narcissus, Diane Arbus and Mel Lyman, The Four Tops and Screaminâe(tm) Jay Hawkins, and time spent lost in the Arctic Circle, black-and-white films and a mental institution. Ending with the tender summoning of the ghost of his dying mother as she sings along to the radio in her empty kitchen, I Put a Spell on You is a book about memory, about the other side of love: a book of secrets and wonders.

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Page Count

290

Publisher

Random House

Published Date

ISBN 10

0099554941

ISBN 13

9780099554943

Gift Songs

By: John Burnside

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Gift Songs

By: John Burnside

To the Shakers, a good song was a gift; indeed the test of a song's goodness was how much of a gift it was. In their call to 'labour to make the way of God your own', Shaker artists expressed an aesthetic that had much in common with the old Japanese notion, attributed to Hokusai, that to paint bamboo, one had first to become bamboo. In his tenth collection, John Burnside begins with an interrogation of the gift song, treating matters of faith and connection, the community of living creatures and the idea of a free church - where faith is placed, not in dogma or a possible credo, but in the indefinable - and moves on through explorations of time and place, towards a tentative and idiosyncratic re-ligere, the beginnings of a renewal of the connection to, and faith in, an ordered world. The book closes with a series of meditations on place, entitled 'Four Quartets', intended both as a spiritual response to the string quartets of Bartók and Britten (as Eliot's were to Beethoven's late quartets), and as an experiment in the poetic form that the finest of poets, the true miglior fabbro, chose as a medium for his own declaration of faith. The poems in this collection are true gifts: thrillingly beautiful, charged with power and mystery, each imbued with the generous skills of a master of his craft.

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Page Count

106

Publisher

Random House

Published Date

ISBN 10

1409017559

ISBN 13

9781409017554

The Glister

By: John Burnside

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The Glister

By: John Burnside

Acclaimed author John Burnside delivers a profound, page-turning novel about innocence, evil, morality, and the dark corners of the human psyche. Mysterious illnesses affect the inhabitants of the post-industrial village of Innertown, and a pervasive sense of malaise hangs everywhere. So when teenage boys disappear into the poisoned woods surrounding the village’s abandoned chemical plant, no one notices, or if they do, they don’t say a thing. Not even the town’s only cop, whose leads have long since died. To one boy, however, the chemical plant is beautiful, and it is there he will enact a plan to change the fate of the children of Innertown. To do so he will have to confront the blinding reality that burns in the chemical plant’s cavernous center.

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Page Count

274

Publisher

Anchor

Published Date

ISBN 10

0307455335

ISBN 13

9780307455338

Waking Up in Toytown

By: John Burnside

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Waking Up in Toytown

By: John Burnside

Biographies & autobiographies.

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Page Count

274

Publisher

Random House

Published Date

ISBN 10

0099507838

ISBN 13

9780099507833

The Music of Time

Poetry in the Twentieth Century

By: John Burnside

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The Music of Time

Poetry in the Twentieth Century

By: John Burnside

First published in a slight different form in Great Britain in 2019 by Profile Books Ltd."--Title page verso.

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Page Count

528

Publisher

Princeton University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0691218862

ISBN 13

9780691218861

The Crater

Burnside's Assault On The Confederate Trenches July 30, 1864

By: John Cannan

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The Crater

Burnside's Assault On The Confederate Trenches July 30, 1864

By: John Cannan

A spectacular early morning underground explosion followed by bloody hand-to-hand combat and unprecedented command malfeasance makes the story of the Crater one of the most riveting in Civil War history. Da Capo's new "Battleground America" series offers a unique approach to the battles and battlefields of America. Each book in the series highlights a small American battlefield-sometimes a small portion of a much larger battlefield-and tells the story of the brave soldiers who fought there. Using soldiers' memoirs, letters and diaries, as well as contemporary illustrations, the human ordeal of battle comes to life on the page.All of the units, important individuals, and actions of each engagement on the battlefield are described in a clear and concise narrative. Detailed maps complement the text and illustrate small unit action at each stage of the battle. Then-and-now photographs tie the dramatic events of the past to the modern battlefield site and highlight the importance of terrain in battle. The present-day historical site of the battle is described in detail with suggestions for touring.

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Page Count

170

Publisher

Da Capo Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0786749857

ISBN 13

9780786749850

The Battle of the Crater

A Complete History

By: John F. Schmutz

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The Battle of the Crater

A Complete History

By: John F. Schmutz

The Battle of the Crater is one of the lesser known yet most interesting battles of the Civil War. This book, detailing the onset of brutal trench warfare at Petersburg, Virginia, digs deeply into the military and political background of the battle. Beginning by tracing the rival armies through the bitter conflicts of the Overland Campaign and culminating with the siege of Petersburg and the battle intended to lift that siege, this book offers a candid look at the perception of the campaign by both sides.

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Page Count

429

Publisher

McFarland

Published Date

ISBN 10

0786453672

ISBN 13

9780786453672

Living Nowhere

By: John Burnside

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Living Nowhere

By: John Burnside

Corby, the industrial new town built around a vast steel works, draws many to the fires of its furnaces - in the hope of steady work, a better house, a fresh start. Amongst them are Francis Cameron, from Scotland, and his friend Jan Ruckert, the son of Latvian refugees. Alienated, intelligent and curious, they form a strong and lasting bond: two teenage boys finding their feet in a foreign place. But violence hangs in the Corby air like the ash and the stench from the steel works, and when it comes down it is sudden and lethal - with repercussions that will last a lifetime. Living Nowhere is a story of friendship and loss - a resonant, thrilling book that carries at its core a beautiful and terrible secret.

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Page Count

351

Publisher

Random House

Published Date

ISBN 10

1446444929

ISBN 13

9781446444924

Swimming In The Flood

By: John Burnside

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Swimming In The Flood

By: John Burnside

A breakthrough book of poetry by one of the most exciting young poets in Britain. Dealing with issues of childhood, betrayal and domestic and sexual violence, SWIMMING IN THE FLOOD is Burnside's darkest and most powerful collection yet.

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Random House

Published Date

ISBN 10

1448114888

ISBN 13

9781448114887

Ruin, Blossom

By: John Burnside

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Ruin, Blossom

By: John Burnside

A remarkable collection exploring ageing, mortality and environmental destruction **WINNER OF THE DAVID COHEN PRIZE FOR LITERATURE 2023** 'By far the best British poet alive' SPECTATOR 'A master of language' HILARY MANTEL In this powerful, moving book, John Burnside takes his cue from Schiller, who recognised that, as one thing fades, so another flourishes: everywhere and always, in matters great and small, new life blossoms amongst the ruins. Here, in poems that explore ageing, mortality, environmental destruction and mental illness, Burnside not only mourns what is lost in passing, but also celebrates the new, and sometimes unexpected, forms that emerge from such losses. An elegy for a dead lover ends with a quiet recognition of everyday beauty – first sun streaming through the trees ... a skylark in the near field, flush with song – as the speaker emerges from lockdown after a long illness. Throughout, the poet attends to the quality of grace – numinous, exquisite, fleeting as an angel’s wing – and the broken tryst between humankind and its spiritual and animal elements, even with itself: the gaunt deer on the roads/like refugees. He acknowledges the inevitability of the fading towards death, but still finds chimes of light in the darkness – insisting that, here and now, even in decline, the world, when given its due attention, is all Annunciation.

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Publisher

Random House

Published Date

ISBN 10

1529921643

ISBN 13

9781529921649

Book's by John Burnside

Selected Poems

Selected Poems

Burnside's Bridge

Burnside's Bridge

I Put a Spell on You

I Put a Spell on You

Gift Songs

Gift Songs

The Glister

The Glister

Waking Up in Toytown

Waking Up in Toytown

The Music of Time

The Music of Time

The Crater

The Crater

The Battle of the Crater

The Battle of the Crater

Living Nowhere

Living Nowhere

Swimming In The Flood

Swimming In The Flood

Ruin, Blossom

Ruin, Blossom

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