El. knyga: Deaths of the Poets

A rollicking mixture of literary biography, commentary, travelogue and anecdotage, much of it deeply amusing. -- Claire Harman * Evening Standard * So much material of such innate interest is presented with just the right balance of panache, wit, insight and elegy A good, clever, kindly and enjoyable book it is, like eavesdropping on two smarter friends when they are sparking off each other Farley and Roberts are always entertaining and illuminating, gentle guides and quixotic questers. -- Stuart Kelly * Scotland on Sunday * Deaths of the Poets is packed with anecdotes and macabre frisons; its forays through some of poetrys more sensational edge-lands make for a compelling read. -- Nicholas Roe * Literary Review * A terrifically entertaining book: thoughtful, funny, informative, with an eye for good quotes and anecdotes, and wide-ranging in both the distance it travels and the material on which it draws. -- Blake Morrison * Guardian * Deaths of the Poets is a gripping, witty read, but also asks serious questions about the way the post-Romantic myth of the doomed poet skews the way we interpret their work. -- Kathryn Hughes * Mail on Sunday * It is a thoughtful book, structured as a series of pilgrimages to the places where poets have died. -- Lara Feigel * Irish Independent * The authors are agreeable, well-informed and slyly humorous company. -- Dan Brotzel * UK Press Syndication * Poets Paul Farley and Michael Symmons Roberts make a comic routine out of their own relative longevity An absorbing, if melancholy trip. -- Suzi Feay * Financial Times * On their pilgrimage, Michael and Paul honour their poetic heroes, but also investigate and interrogate the myth, sending themselves up in the process. The result is a book that is enlightening and provocative, eye-wateringly funny and powerfully moving. * About Manchester * The book is a fascinating if slightly ghoulish examination of poets deathbeds, and sometimes their last words, such as Philip Larkins bleak remark, I am going to the inevitable Deaths of the Poets is highly readable, informative and resonating with a literary hinterland. -- Francis Philips * Catholic Herald *