Noel Rowe, A Cool and Shaded Heart: Collected Poems

“Humour and humanity, compassion, candour and a sense of life’s absurdities are the outstanding qualities of this collection, a rich and varied harvest from twenty years work and dedication. Portraits, opinions, politics, places, families, friends, religious evocations, explorations of the meaning of suffering—these scrupulous and attentive poems show affinities with Francis Webb and Thomas Merton, poets whose work was crucial in Noel Rowe’s complex development. There is no other voice quite like his in our poetry and no recent volume that plumbs this depth and range of personal experience. His death is a sad loss to Australian poetry.”   Vivian Smith

Noel Rowe (20 June 1951 – 11 July 2007) was a poet who lived in Sydney, Australia, and was Senior Lecturer in Australian Literature at the University of Sydney where he was also awarded the University Medal (1984) and doctorate (1989). His books include Perhaps, After All (Vagabond, 2000), Next to Nothing (Vagabond Stray Dog, 2004) and Touching the Hem (Vagabond, 2006). He was co-editor of the literary journal Southerly. He also, with Vivian Smith, edited Windchimes: Asia in Australian Poetry(Pandanus Books, 2006). In 2005, Rowe was awarded the William Baylebridge Memorial Prize for poetry. He was also invited to read his poetry at International Festivals in Rotterdam (2005) and Jerusalem (2006). He had particular interest in the interrelationship between literature, theology and ethics. Rowe died on 11 July 2007, after being ill for two years. He is deeply missed by the Sydney poetry community he did so much to support and encourage.

Edited by Michael Brennan.

2009. 192pp. ISBN 978-0-9805113-0-7