Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    The Figure in the Cave: And Other Essays
    The Figure in the Cave: And Other Essays
    The Figure in the Cave: And Other Essays
    Ebook327 pages4 hours

    The Figure in the Cave: And Other Essays

    By John Montague and Antoinette Quinn

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    The Figure in the Cave selects the prose of one of Ireland’s foremost contemporary poets – part autobiography, part criticism, part self-commentary – a gathering, from the mid-century to the present day, that marks a lifetime’s critical engagement with literature in both Europe and America. In the title essay Montague looks over his career as a writer; in others he describes a coming-of-age in Ulster, explores his own poetics, and appraises Goldsmith, Carleton, George Moore, Joyce and Beckett, MacNeice, Clarke, Kavanagh, Hewitt and MacDiarmid. Pieces on American literature include a vignette of Saul Bellow, a review of Lowell and an intimate sketch of Berryman. To conclude, the author examines the impact of international modern poetry on Irish writing. Humorous, forceful, impressionistic, enriched with personal and political observation, this dialogue between early and later selves traces the development of the boy from Garvaghey to the figure in the cave, and reveals the workings of a fine poet’s mind.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherThe Lilliput Press
    Release dateFeb 1, 2015
    ISBN9781843514237
    The Figure in the Cave: And Other Essays

    Read more from John Montague

    Related to The Figure in the Cave

    Related ebooks

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      The Best Books Of The Year

      Dec 13, 2023

      The Best Books Of The Year
      8 min read

    • Article

      They Were One-offs

      Apr 6, 2022

      HOW I wish I’d written this book! Matthew Kelly celebrates four women whose work created the organisations and attitudes to conservation we take for granted today. Two are well known, two are not; all their stories enrich us. The well-known two are O

      7 min read

    • Article

      Readers’ Letters

      Sep 21, 2022

      Readers’ Letters
      6 min read

    • Article

      Florida Man

      Dec 1, 2023

      Florida Man
      17 min read

    • Article

      Giving Lincolnshire Its Due

      Jun 29, 2022

      MAY we play a word-association game? I say ‘Lincolnshire’ and you reply... Yes, you might struggle to find anything to say about the ancient shire of that name. Perhaps ‘cathedral’ and ‘cabbages’ will float up through the mist of memory. I doubt many

      5 min read

    • Article

      All Hail The King

      Jan 12, 2022

      All Hail The King
      5 min read

    • Article

      Table Talk

      Mar 1, 2022

      Table Talk
      8 min read

    • Article

      When I Find Hidden Gems, I Destroy Them

      Jul 28, 2021

      Three people may keep a secret if two of them are dead, said Benjamin Franklin. The sickening truth about travel writers is that they reveal secret locations in exchange for a free trip. It’s a Faustian pact and I must admit I bear some guilt in this

      3 min read

    • Article

      A Very Short Book For Camilla

      Mar 6, 2024

      There is a dear little exhibition in the London Library at the moment. Tiny books are displayed in a glass case – dolls’-size Bibles printed in the 16th century, minuscule books illustrated by Kate Greenaway, etc. This comes at a time when Queen Mary

      3 min read

    • Article

      Finding Facts In Fiction

      Mar 12, 2021

      Finding Facts In Fiction
      10 min read

    • Article

      Read More Puritan Poetry

      Feb 4, 2022

      Coming to love Puritan poetry is an odd aesthetic journey, for poets like Edward Taylor are not easy. It's the sort of thing you expect people partial to bowties and gin gimlets to get involved with. The post Read More Puritan Poetry appeared first o

      18 min read

    • Article

      She Was The Toast Of The World

      Jun 1, 2022

      She Was The Toast Of The World
      8 min read

    • Article

      The Old Un's Notes

      Feb 8, 2023

      The Old Un's Notes
      4 min read

    • Article

      Stop Hating on Adjectives!

      Jun 12, 2019

      A common admonition in creative writing pedagogy is, “Cut as many adjectives as possible.” I propose that this rule springs from mere prejudice. The post Stop Hating on Adjectives! appeared first on The Millions.

      7 min read

    • Article

      A Final Walk With Olds

      Oct 2, 2023

      A Final Walk With Olds
      6 min read

    • Article

      Crazy For Cider

      Aug 25, 2021

      JAMES CROWDEN is a poet, shepherd and total cider nut. In this, at least his third book on the subject, there is no other drink but that it suffers from his passion for cider, apple brandy and cider’s delicate, sweet sister, perry—and almost no momen

      5 min read

    • Article

      Philip Larkin: The Man Who Was Always Right

      Sep 29, 2022

      IN THE FONDLY-REMEMBERED Nineties comedy The Fast Show, one of the sketches revolved around the character of the jovial painter Johnny Nice, played by the series’ co-creator Charlie Higson. Johnny likes nothing more than to set-up his easel at a loca

      8 min read

    • Article

      Nine Haunting Postapocalyptic Novels

      Feb 3, 2022

      The paradox of imagined apocalypses is that they’re always more about the present than the future. Here's a list of a few haunting and evocative titles. The post Nine Haunting Postapocalyptic Novels appeared first on The Millions.

      4 min read

    • Article

      A Place Worth Fighting For

      Mar 30, 2022

      Daisy Dunn (Wiedenfeld & Nicolson, £20) ON one of his lighter poetry-writing mornings, Christmas 1944, T. S. Eliot wrote this: Mr Maurice Bowra Gets sourer and sourer,Having been in a hurryTo succeed Gilbert MurrayAnd is now (poor soul) at the bott

      5 min read

    • Article

      LASTING Impressions

      Feb 17, 2020

      LASTING Impressions
      4 min read

    • Article

      Thirty Years Of Laughs

      Feb 9, 2022

      Thirty Years Of Laughs
      5 min read

    • Article

      Commonplace Book

      Jun 4, 2018

      I like long walks, especially when they are taken by people who annoy me. —Fred Allen I have always wondered, in reading travels, at the childish joy travellers felt at meeting people they knew, and their sense of loneliness when they did not, in

      4 min read

    • Article

      Encounters

      May 13, 2021

      Encounters
      5 min read

    Reviews for The Figure in the Cave

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      The Figure in the Cave - John Montague

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1