A Chorus of Ears

On 'the voice of the poem'

By: Denise Riley

‘One of the most eloquent thinkers about our life in language’ – The Sunday Times

A Chorus of Ears is a series of essays on voice, lyric and the persona of the poet from one of the greatest living English poets. Originally delivered as a lecture series at Trinity College, Cambridge, in A Chorus of Ears Denise Riley meditates upon the emphasis we place upon the persona of the poet, relegating their actual poetry to a second-order importance. Prize culture and the primacy of the poet – as opposed to the poem – transform criticism into a beauty contest, constraining our ability to meet the lyric on its own terms.

What, Riley asks, might be discovered about the purpose of poetry, its originary point within our language and more yet besides, when we liberate it from the persona of the author? In allowing the poem to speak, what might we hear?

Including a foreword by leading poet and critic Don Paterson

Critic reviews

Very occasionally, and always at the right time, an Angel of Poetry appears, holding up a light (Carol Ann Duffy, former UK Poet Laureate)

This is a book which sets Riley alongside Virginia Woolf, confirming her as one of the most profound poetic thinkers of our time (Deryn Rees-Jones)

A much-needed reminder of inspiration’s independence, A Chorus of Ears gently resets the coordinates of contemporary poetry away from the mechanical and literal-minded. My repeated thought on reading it was ‘Oh thank goodness for Denise Riley’ (Leontia Flynn)

One of the most eloquent thinkers about our life in language

Her strengths are so varied: notice one quality you admire, and another follows hard behind. Riley is an enormously gifted writer (Fiona Sampson)

Wondrous . . . one of the great poets of our time