With Such Caution : A Life Glimpsed in Short Pieces

My Introduction to the book, followed by the comments of two informed readers.'I have gathered together here most of the short line pieces I have written in the last 50 years or so. Originally I called these short line pieces because they were just that to me. Unlike my other writing they are not short stories, although they have about them elements of the short story; neither are they novels, although in each one there is the potential, the essence of a novel.It was some time before a literary friend took me to one side and told me these were really poems. So in recent years I have called them poems. Each one stands alone to be read on its own and be interpreted as it stands.Anyway, these poems are pure glimpses of a life - some of them remembered 30 or 40 years later; some of them were written on the cusp of the events that inspired them to be revisited and re-interpreted as the years unfolded.You will notice that the poems are not set out here in autobiographical time. Rather they are inspired by my feelings about them in the present ,as I edit them and put them in order for this collection. Perhaps the ordering constitutes a glimpse of my state of mind in the present day while I have been assembling this collection.You will also note that the pieces vary widely in theme and content. Some poems carry footnotes to clarify the source of the inspiration for that poem.' From Avril Joy. - Novelist and Poet.'I like so much that you haven't chosen a linear path - I think when we reflect on our lives we do so in myriad images and scattered memories. I suppose I'm saying that your chosen form mimics the process of remembering. I've been thinking about this a lot myself - because as you know I'm attracted to your short pieces and feel this is the way I would like to approach my own memoir writing. But of course, here in WSC you have the valuable resource of original pieces from past notebooks and journals and this shines through.So many beautiful poems here!! - and WSC was a perfect title choice. As a title poem it gets to the heart of the shy, timid, girl that haunts you still. She is alive in these pages, Wendy, we feel her caution, her apprehensions and fears. As well as her deep loss. I was struck by the number of nightmares that feature here - but it's not surprising for a war baby, for a girl who lost her father, and for a woman who has struggled with the restraints society, marriage, domesticity etc have placed on her. I found you here on every page Wendy, the Wendy I know, the Wendy I know less well. What more can you ask of memoir?In contrast to the dark elements I loved the painterly pieces, the artists colours, the eye for landscape and its people. I recognise the people here, your mother especially, the family, those we can acknowledge, those in our secret lives. I think it's alive, raw in its emotional reach, finely polished in its language, and has a universal relevance. Its openness and honesty will have huge appeal.'From Donna Maynard PhD.- Researcher and writer,'I think your voice is one of the collections great strengths, I hear it speak clearly and candidly throughout and, among other things, it sounds frank, intelligent, intellectually curious, honest, questioning, hurt, warm, amused, reflective, probing and combative. It is a great idea also to include footnotes which add another aspect or layer of voice as if you are speaking directly to the reader. The interdisciplinary range of your interests are well represented here in poems about art, history, travel, education, for example. The different aspects of your public and private persona are also intriguing: I see both a Wendy that I recognise and one that is half-hidden from the world.'