Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD’s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. Once upon a time Sydneysiders were content with a modest fireworks display which, it was agreed, enhanced the beautiful environs of Sydney Harbour, ushering in the…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD’s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. The subject of Prometheus has appealed to poets from the Greeks onwards. Though Shelley’s ‘Prometheus Unbound’ is probably the best known poem on the subject, many…

Australian poet and author writes 3QD’s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA.     Though you should never live in the past, one must, with reverence and humility, acknowledge and give thanks for what has led to the present. To the…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD’s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au  and at the NLA. The following is excerpted from Notebook, first published in A Dwelling Place, 1997, 49-60 If you’d really disordered all the senses, rationally or not—no Rimbaud. Australia’s…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD’s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. Do they give acting awards to dogs? Perhaps they should in the case of the television program Inspector Rex—Kommissar Rex—an amazing German Shepherd (or series of…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD’s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. Following on from last month’s post concerning commitment, politics and poetry, here is a poem written in 1984 and first published in 1991. When this poem…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD’s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. The politically-engaged poem follows in the wake of the horrors of history, or as a literary tremor in the tidal pool of self thrust into a…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD‘€™s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. A recent performance of the Sixth Symphony at the Sydney Opera House put me in a continuing Mahler mood, as could be expected. This great work…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3 Quarks Daily’s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. Since one should always take art seriously (Duchamp, anyone?), there is always the danger of then taking yourself terribly seriously too. Therein lies the…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3 Quarks Daily’s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. The one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of Edward Elgar’s birth fell on June 2, 2007. This anniversary has been the spur for some strange…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD’s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. In The Guardian in March 2007 Ruth Padel listed what was styled as the top ten women poets, perhaps better noted below the headline as ‘her…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD’s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. In Act Three of Jules Massenet’s opera Manon, the Chevalier des Grieux, now an abbé, attempts to cast off his passion for Manon Lescaut. He prays…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD‘s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. Poetry is a foreign country: they do things differently there. (Apologies to L. P. Hartley.) And for that very reason I sometimes want to get right…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD’s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. Apparently Patrick White used to build himself up into a state about bad crits of his books. However, the vegetation in his garden, and across the…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD‘s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. To commemorate the centenary of the birth of the poet W. H. Auden which falls on 21 February, 2007 I am posting my poem ‘Asking Auden’…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD‘s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. One of my favourite television shows in recent times has been Curb Your Enthusiasm. Larry David, Executive Producer of Seinfeld, plays ‘Larry David’ in a largely-Los…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD‘s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. Here is the curious (curioser and curioser) case of Ern Malley, an entirely fictional poet, invented in 1943 to expose what the perpetrators thought of as…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD‘s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. Very occasionally in art comes the miraculous, the words, music or paint that permanently transform the history of culture. On these mountains we slouch below, looking…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD‘s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA.                                                 Aboriginal languages Aranda, Arrernte, Bundjalung, Dharug, Gindavul, Galmahra, Githavul, Gunditjmara,…

Australian poet and author Peter Nicholson writes 3QD‘s Poetry and Culture column (see other columns here). There is an introduction to his work at peternicholson.com.au and at the NLA. Whatever is sufficient unto the human, with glories and miseries—freedom’s torch, the begging hand, aloneness; skyscrapers rearing with aesthetic delights not from a lesser god; acres…