If All the World and Love Were Young

Longlisted for the Swansea University International Dylan Thomas Prize 2020 'Every poem in this book is a marvel. Taken all together they make up a work of almost miraculous depth and beauty' - Sally Rooney'A poetry debut fit to compare with Seamus Heaney. This wonderful long poem is up there with the greats' - The Sunday TimesShortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection When Stephen Sexton was young, video games were a way to slip through the looking glass; to be in two places at once; to be two people at once. In these poems about the death of his mother, this moving, otherworldly narrative takes us through the levels of Super Mario World, whose flowered landscapes bleed into our world, and ours, strange with loss, bleed into it. His remarkable debut is a daring exploration of memory, grief and the necessity of the unreal.