The Lammas Hireling

Description

Ian Duhig has long inspired a fervent and devoted following. With The Lammas Hireling - the title poem having already won both the National Poetry Competition and the Forward Prize for Best Poem - Duhig has produced his most accessible and exciting volume to date, and looks set to reach a whole new audience. A poet of lightning wit and great erudition, Duhig is also a master balladeer and storyteller who shows that poetry is still the most powerful way in which our social history - our lives, loves and work - can be celebrated and commemorated.

Ian Duhig was born in London of Irish parents, but now lives in Leeds. This is his first collection for Picador. His previous three collections, The Bradford Count (1991), The Mersey Goldfish (1995) and Nominies (1998), were published by Bloodaxe. He has won the National Poetry Competition twice, an Arts Council Writers' Award and a Cholmondeley Award.

'The most original poet of his generation' Carol Ann Duffy, Guardian 'His poetry is learned, rude, elegant, sly and funny, mixing gilded images, belly-laughs and esoteric lore about language (including Irish), art, history, politics and children's word-games' Ruth Padel, Independent on Sunday 'Duhig telescopes topical allusions, scholarly references and coarse humour into tightly-shaped, surreal poems which burst open with explosive moral force' Alan Brownjohn, Sunday Times