Publisher's Synopsis
Barry MacSweeney wrote his first poem at the age of seven, and was an alcoholic from the age of 16. His hard drinking almost cost him his life prior to the writing of these poems. After a series of life-threatening fits and convulsions, which culminated with his being hooked up to life support in a hospital, MacSweeney underwent rehabilitation through detoxification in several hospitals and an addiction clinic. The Book of Demons records his fierce fight against addiction, the demonic visions that arose, and the great love of those who helped save his life. Between times of ravaging, though, MacSweeney wrote the sequence Pearl, included here as a prelude to The Book of Demons. While Demons is a book of hard relentless experience, Pearl is pure lyrical innocence, a poetic sequence of harmlessness before harm set in. Pearl is an ode to the mute Northumbrian girl of the same name, whom MacSweeney taught to read and write on a slate in the rain, his first love. Now out of print in this combined edition, both The Book of Demons and Pearl were reprinted in Wolf Tongue: Selected Poems 1965-2000 (Bloodaxe Books, 2003).
