James Tingle's Reviews > Dart

I picked this up randomly from a bookshop ages ago, as I'd heard it was supposed to be very good and I did enjoy it in the main. I've not read many poetry books like this one, where its just one huge, interconnected poem, and so that was a bit different for starters. Its all about the River Dart, in Devon, Southern England, and its clear as you read it that the author, Alice Oswald, has done a lot of research into the subject matter and knows this river like the back of her hand. Like an actual river, it flows very smoothly and in unbroken fashion and drifts seamlessly from one aspect of the river's character to another, and has a graceful construction that has obviously been very carefully crafted. I like how she combines actual hard reality aspects of the natural environment with flourishes of imagination, and so it feels like a geography lesson, taught by a talented poet, which is pretty unique really.
The one thing that I found slightly problematic in a way, is that because she knows the area and the river itself so well, and has such an intimate knowledge of every water-polished rock, overhanging branch and darting fish, I sometimes think maybe you need to have walked along the banks of this river yourself, to fully understand all the details she goes into, as it is a very in depth, almost analytical poem in some ways...
Still, it is good and I enjoyed it on the level on which I could understand it, but I feel if you live in the area and know the river even a fraction as well as she obviously does, it will probably come to life even more, as you'll be able to fully picture a lot of the things she writes so descriptively about...overall, an evocative and lovely slice of nature.