A Poetry Society Recommendation
Dean Browne arrives at the After Party with the maturity and style of an altogether more seasoned poet. In a debut collection of standout and stand-alone poems, each tests the boundaries of its unique universe. Browne is a mesmeric teller of strange tales, imaginings that can seem origamically contained within the compressed dimensions of a poem. A leg sets off on a long train journey; a Parisian alley cat is launched into space; earthbound lovers attempt to connect while their inner lives prove unbridgeable.
Losses are mourned: two poets elegized here – Charles Simic and the late Donegal poet Matthew Sweeney – might offer a fingerpost of sensibilities, though Browne’s significant talent is distinctly his own. After Partyintroduces a beguiling, resonant new voice, a raised eyebrow and fidelity to the image – sometimes carried along the tightrope much further than seems possible. In poems that are both death-haunted and youthful, and thrumming with a delicious dark humour, Dean Browne brings a much-needed injection of the surreal – or the surreal-ish as he might prefer to say – to Ireland’s rising generation.
‘Poems that sneak in the side-door then exit through the ceiling’
Caroline Bird
‘Dean Browne is a terrific poet: his language is agile and fresh, his ideas surprising, and the reader feels invigorated, renewed – and lucky to have met such poems’
Nick Laird
After Party
Kitchens at Night
Winner of the 2021 International Book & Pamphlet Competition judged by Daljit Nagra & Pascale Petit
Kitchens at Night exists in the space between domesticity and imagination, the dreamt and the actual. A goat appears with a message. A chilli prompts metaphysical questions. A coffin appears in the flea market. In half-light, relationships falter and familiar objects are restored to their original mystery and strangeness in these spellbinding and playful poems.
Quirky, kooky, dark, philosophical, absurd and always wonderful, often edged between outrageous humour and revelation, these richly imagistic poems are full of invention. Each poem treads slowly onwards inventing itself as it proceeds to celebrate the transforming powers of poetry. An original and thrilling poet whose every poem hit the mark!
Daljit Nagra
These poems are packed with exuberant images. They twist and turn in constantly surprising ways – line by line, I never know where they’ll take me next! The first read exhilarates; re-reads reveal hidden depths and subterranean passages to the magical adventures. I adored the furniture poems especially, but every poem thrills. This is gorgeous, exciting work and I’m in awe of its energy and vitality.
Pascale Petit