Certain Things is a collection of poems by Australian poet Robert Gray, published by Heinemann in Australia in 1993.
The collection contains 37 poems from a variety of sources, with some published here for the first time.
The collection won the 1994 Victorian Premier's Literary Award – C. J. Dennis Prize for Poetry.
Contents
"Currawongs" "13th May (at Ted's)" "Harmonica" "The Pines" "Travelling" "The Girls" "(Traditional)" "Renga" "In Thin Air" "The Room" "A Testimony" "The West" "Wintry Evenings" "Descent" "Malthusian Island" "Landscape" "Doodling" "The White Roads" "Souvenir" "[Untitled] (from The Gift)" "Impromptus" "N.M.G." "On South Head" "Small Hours" "On a Forestry Trail" "The Life of a Chinese Poet" "Shard" "Outside (Going Outside)" "Arrivals and Departures" "Stanzas" "Today" "Illusions" "Dawn" "The South Coast, While Looking for a House" "In One Ear ..." "Afternoon Walk" "The Hawkesbury River"
Critical reception Kevin Hart, writing in The Age, noted that Gray was continuing his examination of his recent themes, meditating "on the contingencies of nature – of the self and nature as nothing other than contingencies." he also noted that in the poet's best poems "we sense, behind the melancholy and even behind the nobility of voice, a principled affirmation of existence."
Awards
1994 Victorian Premier's Literary Award – C. J. Dennis Prize for Poetry, winner
See also 1993 in Australian literature
References