Description
The prevailing tone is one of cool detachment, often preceding a final punch-line which punctures pomposity or undermines the official version of some event … These are very accessible poems, well-crafted and shaped with deft choices of word and phrase – London Grip on Hip Hind Hook
Timely, satirical and razor-sharp poems – Michael Symmons Roberts, on Kingdom, Power, Glory
Straightforward, precise, and subtly ironic language – Carole Satyamurti, on Kingdom, Power, Glory
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Nigel Pantling was a soldier in the Seventies, Private Secretary to the Home Secretary in the Eighties, and a merchant banker in the Nineties. His pamphlets Belfast Finds Log (Shoestring Press 2014) and Hip Hind Hook (Smith|Doorstop 2018) relate the danger and human frailty he saw during Northern Ireland’s “Troubles” and the Cold War, and his full collection Kingdom Power Glory (Smith|Doorstop 2016) lifts the lid on the absurdity and integrity of life in Whitehall and the City. Nigel is now a strategic adviser to company chief executives.
