Longlisted for the Guardian First Book Award 2013.
Struck through with brilliant and sometimes sinister imagery reminiscent of Pan's Labyrinth or an Angela Carter novel, The Shipwrecked House is a unique and hallucinatory debut from a poet-to-watch.
Anchors, shipwrecks, whales and islands abound in this first collection by young Anglo-Breton poet Claire Trevien. These poems are sketches, lyrics, dreams, and experiments in language as sound. Trevien's is a surreal vision, steeped in myth and music, in which everything is alive and - like the sea itself - constantly shifting form. Fishermen become owls; one woman turns into a snake, another gives birth to a tree; a glow-worm might be a wasp or 'a toy on standby'.
'These are serious, visually stunning poems of nationality, history and memory, but they're personal and generous in their wit. Reading them is like spending an hour in the company of someone you secretly admire.' - Luke Kennard
Author
About Claire Trevien
Claire Trevien was born in Brittany. Her pamphlet Low-Tide Lottery was published by Salt in 2011. She is the editor of Sabotage Reviews and the co-organiser of Penning Perfumes, a creative collaboration between poets and perfumers.
