Reviews:

Southern Ocean Review

Reviewed by Trevor Reeves.                    Photo:
Family Theatre
Judith Wolfe 2006

Il Colosseum (88 pages) and Treadmill (90 pages) by Frank Pervan, both published by Square One Press, Dunedin. Reviewed by Mark Pirie.

The late Frank Pervan (a Croatian-born writer now living in New Zealand) had been around the Auckland poetry scene for a while and had steadily been coming into his own here. It is with sadness I learned of his death last year. As English is not his first language he had remained a developing poet in English over the last decade. It was good then to see these new collections of Pervan's work recently published by Square One Press in Dunedin (with original covers by artist Judith Wolfe). Together the two books really showed his development from his previous collection Teeth published in the late 1990s. Teeth showed promise but it was a book showing the poet getting to grips with a new language. These two books on the other hand show a poet now writing with a great deal of confidence, and further evidence of this is provided by the Acknowledgements pages, which show an increasing list of inclusions in magazines and anthologies.

The best of Pervan's poems are light and entertaining while of course covering serious urban and social concerns. A feature of Pervan's writing is his ability to write on a wide range of topics. Subjects in these books include Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, film stars, news reports of events and disasters, sport, love, fashion, coffee bars, dining out (the hilarious 'Postmodern Eating'), poetry, gardening, death and environmental issues like 'GE'.
Always Pervan writes in a lucid, comic and informative manner touching lightly upon serious subjects often with wry satirical humour. The recent work of Vincent O'Sullivan comes to mind. O'Sullivan in a similar way comments on a wide range of topics although not in an autobiographical manner like Pervan.
The form of Pervan's poetry, however, is more experimental than O'Sullivan's work. Pervan instead uses forms assimilated from the Postmoderns, Carlos Williams, e.e. cummings and the American 'Concrete' movement of the '60s. Sometimes his free form typography can be wilfully idiosyncratic: some stanzas are presented in Bold type and he makes full use of the page with stanzas and lines occasionally designed in centre justified patterns.
At best the form of Pervan's poetry adds to his diverse subject matter. Too many poets are content with using the same form or style throughout their books. Pervan is not afraid to experiment and this does add interest to his work.
Overall, Pervan's books are a quiet consolidation of his output over the past decade. His writing is increasingly readable and enjoyable. Like Carlos Williams, nothing remains outside the touch of poetry in Pervan's world. A casual walk in the CBD of Auckland sparks a poem:

A well dressed man stopped me in Queen Street
saying: Aye man, could you please spare
a few dollars, please sir? I stopped, looked at him,
put my hand in my pocket to see what I had, then said:
What do you want it for…??

…. “I want to buy a few condoms mate,” he quickly said.
I imagined to myself, well, he has not lost
all his humour, despite his suit and tie.

Read on to find out what happens. Pervan's mind and pen - like that of Charles Bukowski's - drolly roves in these street-based poems; these books surprise at every turn. He will be missed not just for his own contribution to New Zealand poetry but for his generous support of other poets and magazines. Frank helped publish one of my own poems in the Croatian newspaper, Hratsko Slovo, and was always kind hearted towards the New Zealand poetry community.

Reviewed by Trevor Reeves.
In Continent, poems by Richard Reeve. Auckland University Press, Auckland, New Zealand.
Forced rhymes and lack of a distinctive style are a worry in this latest book of poems by Richard Reeve. I know I'm going to be accused of being stupid for not understanding a word of what is written here rather than that the poet not knowing what he is talking about, but that's life! However if you are heavily immersed in the classics, 'The Occupation of Tiberius' may contain a flicker of subtleties for you. Then I search earnestly for some (what I call) 'living poetry' and come across 'Lyrics for Global Warming', but it is full of awkward phrases like “Armageddon mapped out / antediluvian drought” and I wonder about the choice of words here; whether they are relevant, right, or even in the slightest way meaningful. The descent (or ascent) into something personal just doesn't work for me here, in the last four lines: “seeking subtle conquest / of country such as this, / the snows of your breast / the plains of your kiss”. It is obviously meant to be a great and powerful statement, but just isn't. In 'The Formalist MP Confesses' Reeve should take cognisance of what the master, Ezra Pound says in the preface about amateurs trying to drown out the masters. The art of poetry is the art of writing good poetry but I struggle to locate any of it here. Trying to be another Denis Glover (in 'Variation on a Theme') is counter-productive. I would rather see Reeve try to develop his own skills and style. Running out of ideas is a bad thing to happen when you are trying to construct a new poetry book and even worse when this becomes obvious. Somebody once said that the artist's best asset is his wastepaper basket. True. This is a horses for courses book, and it may pay to have a look at it.

Broken Shells and Hope. Stories by G. Emil Reutter. Stonegarden Publishing, California, USA.
I think G. Emil Reutter is quite a masterful writer of short stories, although I know that genre is not that popular these days. I appreciate stories like 'Fast Food'; a blunt celebration of a prisoner in jail for murder and quite obviously psychopathic. These stories are based on sheer reality as all literature should be. In these, Reutter combines good words with style and panache in the manner of the great masters of the genre, like Charles Bukowski. Some are almost dreamlike, like 'Steps' which leaves you guessing right to the end, which is sensitively done. Stories of loves and losses are always good if done with passion and reality. Try 'Living in the Circle' perhaps? I wish I could explain more about this particular story but you are going to have to get a copy to have a look for yourself. Love lost, regained and lost again is the substance of many of these stories, so clearly written. If you can get hold of a copy, go for it, it'll be really worth it.

Return to CONTENTS