Windy Gap (poem)

"Windy Gap" is a poem by Australian poet David Campbell.

It was first published in The Bulletin on 12 December 1951 and later in several of the author's poetry collections and a number of other Australian poetry anthologies.

Outline

A shepherd, moving his sheep through Windy Gap, is transfixed by a hawk and a magpie who seem to bring the world around him into sharper focus.

Critical reception

In his commentary on the poem in 60 Classic Australian Poems Geoff Page noted "You can almost see the Akubra, the Drizabone and the R. M. Williams boots; you can practically smell the horse sweat though none of these is mentioned. You can feel seventeenth- and nineteenth-century English verse in the background, but you don’t doubt for a minute it's Australian."60 Classic Australian Poems edited by Geoff Page, University of NSW Press, 2009, pp 108-110

Further publications After its initial publication in The Bulletin in 1951, the poem was reprinted as follows:

Australia Writes : An Anthology edited by T. Inglis Moore, Cheshire, 1953 The Penguin Book of Australian Verse edited by John Thompson, Kenneth Slessor and R. G. Howarth, Penguin Books, 1958 Australian Poets Speak edited by Colin Thiele and Ian Mudie, Rigby, 1961 Vision Vol 1 No 1, Jun 1963 Selected Poems 1942-1968 by David Campbell, Angus and Robertson, 1968 Silence Into Song : An Anthology of Australian Verse edited by Clifford O'Brien, Rigby, 1968 The Penguin Book of Australian Verse edited by Harry Heseltine, Penguin Books, 1972 The Land's Meaning edited by L. M. Hannan and B. A. Breen, Macmillan, 1973 Australian Verse from 1805 : A Continuum edited by Geoffrey Dutton, 1976 Selected Poems by David Campbell, Angus and Robertson, 1978 The Golden Apples of the Sun : Twentieth Century Australian Poetry edited by Chris Wallace-Crabbe, Melbourne University Press, 1980 The Illustrated Treasury of Australian Verse edited by Beatrice Davis, Nelson, 1984 My Country : Australian Poetry and Short Stories, Two Hundred Years edited by Leonie Kramer, Lansdowne, 1985 Cross-Country : A Book of Australian Verse edited by John Barnes and Brian MacFarlane, Heinemann, 1988 Collected Poems by David Campbell, edited by Leonie Kramer, Angus and Robertson, 1989 Fivefathers : Five Australian Poets of the Pre-Academic Era edited by Les Murray, Carcanet, 1994 80 Great Poems from Chaucer to Now edited by Geoff Page, University of NSW Press, 2006 Hardening of the Light by David Campbell, edited by Philip Mead, Indigo, 2006 The Penguin Anthology of Australian Poetry edited by John Kinsella, Penguin, 2009 60 Classic Australian Poems edited by Geoff Page, University of NSW Press, 2009 The Puncher & Wattmann Anthology of Australian Poetry edited by John Leonard, Puncher & Wattmann, 2009 Sense, Shape, Symbol : An Investigation of Australian Poetry edited by Brian Keyte, Phoenix Education, 2013

See also 1951 in poetry 1951 in literature 1951 in Australian literature Australian literature

References