Accessibility Tools

  • Content scaling 100%
  • Font size 100%
  • Line height 100%
  • Letter spacing 100%

Anthony Lawrence

Ordinary Time by Anthony Lawrence and Audrey Molloy

by •
December 2022, no. 449
Rose Lucas reviews 'Ordinary Time' by Anthony Lawrence and Audrey Molloy

These strange years of pandemic and lockdowns certainly brought challenges and unusual experiences – those of constraint but also, surprisingly, of opportunity and richness. The curious spaces we occupy in the ether have become a seedbed for conversation and exchange; for connections that otherwise might not have found a field in which to prosper. Despite or perhaps because of the limits of the digital, perhaps even because we were undistracted by physical proximity, these spaces seemed to offer the potential for a raw honesty – lacunae of sotto voce conversations which brought us ironically into a form of seemingly unmediated communication. From the hermetically sealed bubble of lockdowns, digital connect took on the intensity of embodied dialogue, the intimate voice in the ear.

... (read more)

An interview with Anthony Lawrence

by Australian Book Review •
May 2022, no. 442
Poet of the Month with Anthony Lawrence

The list is long, and takes the scenic route, from Homer to Hill, on to Plath / and Sexton, Murray, Adamson, and many I’ve forgotten. An overgrown path / with signposts lit or down, pressing on by star or map light, word of mouth / or accidental find. Influence is confluence, where shock of emotion / meets quiet thought. I follow leads, read every day, avoiding emoticons. 

... (read more)

Ken by Anthony Lawrence & Aflame by Subhash Jaireth

by •
April 2022, no. 441
Luke Beesley reviews 'Ken' by Anthony Lawrence and 'Aflame' by Subhash Jaireth

Australia has a stylish new poetry press. The two books reviewed here by Life Before Man, the poetry wing of Gazebo Books, preference book cover art and poem above all the usual paraphernalia: publishing details, barcodes, author notes – even the epigraph – are tucked into a back page, and there are no apparently distracting contents pages or page numbers. Most of the poems sit neatly on the right side of the page with a private blank beige page buffer. There’s orientation in a contents list, and I trust the poets have a choice about whether they want one. That said, there’s a holiday-like liberation in slipping through unmoored. It’s a subtle reading experience, but do these aesthetic somewhat precious innovations justify the use of extra paper?

... (read more)

2022 Peter Porter Poetry Prize Winner

Competitions and programs
2022 Peter Porter Poetry Prize Winner

Anthony Lawrence is the winner of the 2022 Peter Porter Poetry Prize worth a total of $10,000. This was announced at an online ceremony on January 19.

Anthony receives $6,000 for his winning poem, 'In the Shadows of Our Heads', while the four other shortlisted poets – Chris Arnold, Dan Disney, Michael Farrell, and Debbie Lim – each receive $1,000. The full shortlist, including the winning poem, is available to read online and is published in the January–February issue of ABR. 

... (read more)

Levitation

by •
May 2021, no. 431

'Having mastered the art of using magnets / in discretionary acts / like making a pencil / float above a table ...'

... (read more)

'The Measurement Institute' a new poem by Anthony Lawrence

by •
December 2018, no. 407
'The Measurement Institute' a new poem by Anthony Lawrence

You wouldn’t think to look twice: no high fence
crowned with broken glass, no security guard
heavy with boredom and a lanyard of keys.

... (read more)

The 2022 Shortlist

January–February 2022, no. 439
2022 Peter Porter Poetry Prize Shortlist

ABR is pleased to present the shortlist for the 2022 Peter Porter Poetry Prize, which this year received 1,328 poems from thirty-four countries. Congratulations to those who reached the shortlist: Chris Arnold, Dan Disney, Michael Farrell, Anthony Lawrence, and Debbie Lim. Each of their poems is listed below in alphabetical order by author. For the full longlist, click here.

... (read more)

Selected Poems 1968–2014 by Paul Muldoon

by •
September 2017, no. 394
Anthony Lawrence reviews 'Selected Poems 1968–2014' by Paul Muldoon

Paul Muldoon’s friend and mentor, the late Seamus Heaney, once remarked that reading Muldoon was like being in a room with two informants: one a compulsive liar and one who always tells the truth. The trick, Heaney suggested, is ‘trying to formulate a question that will elicit an answer from either one that can be reliably decoded’.

Muldoon’s poems a ...

2017 Porter Prize Shortlist

by •
March 2017, no. 389

Drone

Someone says drone and I see the cell phone it tracks, see the hand holding the cell phone
Being tracked by the drone, see the arm connected to the hand holding the cell phone
Being tracked by the drone, see the shoulder manoeuvring the arm connected to the hand
Holding the cell phone being tracked by the drone, see the person attached to the shoulder
Manoeuv ...

Episode #6: The 2016 ABR Elizabeth Jolley Short Story Prize ceremony

by •
The ABR Podcast

The 2016 Elizabeth Jolley Short Story Prize ceremony was held at the Melbourne Writers Festival on 27 August. The event was compèred by ABR Deputy Editor, Amy Baillieu, with opening remarks from poet and author Maxine Beneba Clarke.