Sarah Law – författare

Prepare for some adventures in "Perihelion". These poems evoke shifting states of mind and heart, from childhood terrors to the wisdom of the mystic, with all the twists of love, doubt and insight which come in between. There are monsters in this collection (but are they generated by science-fiction or the psyche?); there is grace, there is art, and there is longing. In her writing, Sarah Law traces the dynamics of relationship and of solitude, pushing lyric poetry to a playful complexity, but allowing the poignancy of our human condition to flow through each poem. Sarah Law studied literature at Cambridge and London universities, and currently teaches literature and creative writing at the University of East Anglia, Norwich. She has two poetry collections published by Stride (Bliss Tangle, 1999, The Lady Chapel, 2003). This is her third collection.

What is it like to have a saint for a sister? This lyrical and fragmentary novel draws us into the brief life and powerful legacy of Saint Therese of Lisieux (1873-1897), a French Carmelite nun who remains a much-loved figure in and beyond the Catholic Church. We follow Therese''s story through the voices of six characters who knew her well: her sisters Marie, Pauline, Leonie, and Celine; a young cousin; and a troubled seminarian with whom she corresponds towards the end of her life. Each character offers their own perspective as they witness to Therese''s life and death, the turns of history, and the subsequent complexities of promulgating a saint. Spanning the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, each voice negotiates the tensions of religious life. The novel presents some remarkable people and events while inviting in the mysteries of grace, silence, and sunlight.

"Ascension Notes" makes a place for space and light. Language ascends and reflects back on itself in short lyrical poems and longer fragmented sequences. A woman, at a table, writing; Woolf's phrase echoes through these lines. Meditations on creativity and spirituality are as open-ended as the forms they take: the conclusion reached is one of the necessity of 'making the sign of the poet' in an always shifting and strangely illuminated human world.