Still Life With Octopus

By Tania Hershman

Tania Hershman's Still Life With Octopus is an exquisitely-attuned second collection, a philosophical and poetic interrogation of the boundaries of animal and human worlds and the intimate nature of time, being and joy. Exploring the slippage between the life of the mind and the life of the body - in particular, those belonging to women – Hershman wonders what might happen if we let go of our preconceptions of both reality and language, taking nothing for granted and starting again from first principles, with fresh eyes.
While trying to fathom our physical and metaphysical existence, Hershman doesn't ignore the other forms of intelligent life we share our planet with; her octopus is envisioned both as a creature within and alongside us and as a way to consider our place as humans within a greater chain of co-existence. Still Life With Octopus is a precisely observed and open-hearted gift of a book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Nine Arches Press
• Release date: Jul 7, 2022
• ISBN: 9781913437435

Tania Hershman

Tania Hershman's second poetry collection, Still Life With Octopus, will be published by Nine Arches Press in July 2022 and her debut novel, Go On, by Broken Sleep Books in Oct 2022. Her poetry pamphlet, How High Did She Fly, was joint winner of Live Canon's 2019 Poetry Pamphlet Competition and her hybrid particle-physics-inspired book 'and what if we were all allowed to disappear' was published by Guillemot Press in March 2020. Tania is also the author of a poetry collection, a poetry chapbook and three short story collections, and co-author of Writing Short Stories: A Writers' & Artists' Companion (Bloomsbury, 2014). She is co-creator of the @OnThisDayShe Twitter account, co-author of the On This Day She book (John Blake, 2021), and has a PhD in creative writing inspired by particle physics. www.taniahershman.com

Book preview

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Still Life With Octopus

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Still Life With Octopus

Tania Hershman

ISBN: 978-1-913437-42-8

eISBN: 978-1-913437-43-5

Copyright © Tania Hershman, 2022.

Cover artwork: ‘Octopus Black Edition’ copyright © 2019 by Ben Rothery (adapted version of an original illustration first published by Ladybird Books, a part of the Penguin Random House group of companies, in Hidden Planet in 2019).

www.benrotheryillustrator.co.uk

Page illustrations of octopus tentacles: © Serhii Yakovliev

All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, recorded or mechanical, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Tania Hershman has asserted her right under Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

First published July 2022 by:

Nine Arches Press

Unit 14, Sir Frank Whittle Business Centre,

Great Central Way, Rugby.

CV21 3XH

United Kingdom

www.ninearchespress.com

Printed in the United Kingdom by:

Imprint Digital

Nine Arches Press is supported using public funding by Arts Council England.

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Contents

Arrival

Still Life With Octopus (I)

What You May Be Offered

Fed

Grip

Making New

Territorial Disputes

I am

Catherine the Great Reassesses her Expansionist Policies

Uncertainty

By the River

It was the Epoch

Still Life With Octopus (II)

Nevermuch

What Plays Today

Standardized Patient

And a Clock

And then God

Still Life With Octopus (III)

Psalm for the Seamstresses

Tied

When the Time Comes

Application

Middle of the Night

Tango

Still Life With Octopus (IV)

The Aunts

Resignation

My Moon

Time

Over, Forwards, Back

A Hierarchy of Arms

How to Make a Buttonhole Hand Stitch, 3 minutes 15 seconds, Feb 21, 2018

I’m in charge

Sfat Em

To John Clare, May 2020

Still Life With Octopus (V)

Being Wrong

Play

You