The poet Neil Curry was born in Newcastle upon Tyne, and now lives in Ulverston in the English Lake District. He read English at Bristol University, then taught at the University of Guelph in Canada and subsequently at secondary schools in England. His verse translations of Euripides, published by Methuen and Cambridge University Press, and in the USA by Doubleday, have been performed in many countries. He has published ten collections of poetry, starting with Ships in Bottles, a Poetry Book Society choice, Walking to Santiago in which he recounted his 500-mile walk along the medieval pilgrim route, and most recently On Keeping Company with Mrs Woolf. His translations range from Euripides to the French poet Jules Supervielle. As a literary critic he has published studies of Christopher Smart, Alexander Pope, George Herbert, William Cowper, Willian Shenstone and Samuel Johnson. And most recently, Horace Walpole.
The Well
Though he leant right out over the rim,
The water was too far down for him to see.
“Time, you realise,” someone remarked
Inside his head, “is only the rate
At which the past decays.” And so,
He let slip slowly through his fingers
The one or two choice memories he chanced
To have about him, then stood listening
Attentively for their depleted echo.
Neil Curry
Readings:
Neil Curry reading a selection of his poems in San Francisco (August '07).
Neil Curry reading from The Cumberland Coast (June '08).
