A review of my latest book from Carcanet poet Carola Luther
Angles and Visions is a collection of elegant poems, playfully structured around the discourse of film history, and ideas of watching, pretense, performance and the often lonely gaps between art and reality.
In the poems, Anthony Costello evokes cinematic atmospheres and references that have become embedded in Western culture His writing is clear and subtle. He uses imagery sparely and often to strong effect. Many of his poems display a really dextrous patterning of sound (How the stairwells resemble / film noir: Brighton Rock / or Hangover Square).
Anthony Costello feels like a man who has travelled. Both the sensibility and formal principles of the collection seem more cosmopolitan than specifically British. I found this refreshing. Woven into the poems are fleeting glimpses of personal story or preoccupation, but this is not a confessional collection; there is layer, irony and humour here, as well as deadly seriousness: we have film noir, illustration, ancient myth, horror, painting, world literature, soft porn, soundtrack, thriller, theatre, mask, cinematic process, and cultural stereotype.
While Costello's writing has a light touch, there is finally a sense of melancholy in the central voice. This is perhaps, intrinsic to the theme. The collection focuses on ideas of representation, and sometimes, alienation. The effect is to give the collection a concern with separation and a lingering undertone of sadness.
Carola Luther
My book can be purchased from the 'Press' section of:
thehighwindowpress.com
thehighwindowpress.com/thehighwindowpress.com/category/poetry/category/poetry/
Best Wishes,
Anthony
