Overview

Aphorisms have been described as 'the obscure hinterland between poetry and prose' (New Yorker) - short pithy statements that capture the essence of the human condition in all its shades. In this New and Selected, master of the form Don Paterson brings the best examples from his two previous volumes together with ingenious new material relevant to today's world. Moving and mischievous, canny and profound - these wide-ranging observations of no more than one or two lines demonstrate that the aphorism is the perfect form for our times. 'Consciousness is the turn the universe makes to hasten its own end.' 'Agnosticism is indulged only by those who have never suffered belief.' 'Poet: someone in the aphorism business for the money.'

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Don Paterson was born in Dundee in 1963. His previous poetry collections include Nil Nil, God's Gift to Women, Landing Light and Rain. Awards include the Whitbread Poetry Prize, the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize, the Costa Poetry Award, and all three Forward Prizes; he is currently the only poet to have won the T. S. Eliot Prize twice. He was awarded the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry in 2009. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, the English Association and the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and is currently Professor of Poetry at the University of St Andrews. Since 1997 he has been Poetry Editor at Picador Macmillan, and he also works as a jazz musician and composer.

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