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Extract

A luminous exploration of thought by one of our most distinguished poets.

If sometimes I think of thoughts as being behind the eyes, sometimes I think of them more as floating, in a kind of cloud around the outside of my head.

Part autobiography of thought, part philosophical tract, part poetics, a book about chickens and family and seasons, Terrier, Worrier is a literary sequence to be relished as language and as thought.

Author

Anna Jackson is the author of seven collections of poetry as well as Diary Poetics: Form and Style in Writers’ Diaries 1915–1962 (Routledge, 2010) and Actions & Travels: How Poetry Works (Auckland University Press, 2022). She lives in Island Bay, Te Whanganui-a-Tara, and is associate professor in English literature at Te Herenga Waka – Victoria University of Wellington.

Endorsements

‘Terrier, Worrier is a remarkable and playful book on language, anxiety, poetry and the strangeness of being a person. I loved its short length especially, as well as its fragmentary form falling somewhere between a diary and a collection of poetic essays . . . wish more of my favourite poets wrote these kinds of books.’
— Nina Mingya Powles

‘Terrier, Worrier is extraordinary, in both concept and form. It joins the conversations of great writers and thinkers, past and present, who analyse how we function aesthetically in our little lives.’
— Anne Kennedy

Media

• ‘Worried about worrying? New literature wave offers lessons for all ages’ – Terrier, Worrier features in last weekend’s Sunday Star Times

• ‘The aliveness of this new literary sequence comes as no surprise as Anna Jackson’s writing is consistently electric; however, there is a distinctive energy about this work that sets it apart from Anna’s previous collections.’ – Amy Marguerite, from her launch speech

• ‘What can definitely be said is that Jackson gives us many provocative and stimulating ideas.’ – The Listener

• ‘Like a lot of top poetry, Anna Jackson’s darting, soaring lines finally elude the gumboot plod of any prose interpretation. A book that’s rewarding to hold in the hand and the mind: what a satisfying . . . thought.’ – David Hill, Kete Books

• ‘The whole experience of Terrier, Worrier is of having a conversation with a good friend.’ – Marcus Hobson, NZ Booklovers

• Read an interview with Anna Jackson on NZ Booklovers: ‘Terrier, Worrier is a book of thoughts – thoughts I have had on being a person, language, instincts, emotions, my hens, my chickens, grieving, dreaming, what an afterlife might be, what it is to worry, what I should be worrying about.’