Swimming to Albania

Born in England in 1965, Matthew Geden has lived in Kinsale, County Cork since 1990. A reviewer, critic and translator, he has been widely published in literary journals and anthologies. He co-founded the Bandon Arts Festival as well as Soundeye Festival of the Arts of the World. He runs an independent bookshop in Kinsale.Matthew Geden´s first collection of poems is an exploration of the mythic realms of landscape and of the travails of the human condition. His writing draws on a broad range of literary and geographical influences and yet he is still very much rooted in the fields and sea breezes of West Cork.This new collection is a beautiful work, combining the hard rock-face of exile with the transforming attrition of love and  family. Whether watching gannets circling or preparing a breakfast of stale bread and wine, he has certainly filled the house of Kinsale with words. Thomas McCarthy.