Author:George Herbert

Herbert experimented brilliantly with a remarkable variety of forms, from hymns and sonnets to "pattern poems," the shape of which reveal their subjects. Such technical agility never seems ostentatious, however, for precision of language and expression of genuine feeling were the primary concerns of this poet who admonished his readers to "dare to be true." An Anglican priest who took his calling with deep seriousness, he brought to his work a religious reverence richly allied with a playful wit and with literary and musical gifts of the highest order. His best-loved poems, from "The Collar" and "Jordan" to "The Altar" and "Easter Wings," achieve a perfection of form and feeling, a rare luminosity, and a timeless metaphysical grandeur.
He is by turns hilarious and subversive, a master of the cheekily surreal, whose conspiratorial mateyness often conceals a grinning skull
—— New StatesmanVery individual, imaginative, fresh work... The poems are disquieting, odd, dark, beautifully honed and cadenced
—— Ruth Padel , Financial TimesAlways original, genuine and generous, Matthew Sweeney's poetry has matured to the point where its artistry can be recognized. He's brilliant on stories that disclose the strange, the ironic, the sad
—— Douglas DunnHere are the small and great truths of the imagination that bursts forth out of our daily lives. Sweeney's poems are reflective, funny, supremely inventive and impeccably written. This is contemporary poetry at its very best
—— Charles SimicOne of our greatest authors... Greene had the sharpest eyes for trouble, the finest nose for human weaknesses, and was pitilessly honest in his observations... For experience of a whole century he was the man within
—— Norman Sherry , IndependentMr Greens' extraordinary power of plot-making, of suspense and of narration...moves continuously both in time and space and in emotion
—— The TimesHis style is spare, that's what is so beautiful. His novels are genuine romans philosophies - novels illustrating ideas
—— Piers Paul ReadIn a class by himself...the ultimate chronicler of twentieth-century man’s consciousness and anxiety
—— William Golding






