Forthcoming
In a radical departure in style and tone, Rob A. Mackenzie’s new collection, Woof! Woof! Woof!, offers biting satire and sweeping social commentary. From the murk of political engagement in an age of offence sensibility, to the bleached-out culture of munificent late-capitalism, Mackenzie’s experimental poems take the reader on an engaging and engaged descent into the sort of purgatory we may never choose to escape from, yet his impish wit offers us all a large dose of saving grace. Sardonic, at times morally exhausted, the poems offer a clear-sighted challenge to the risk of isolationism and powerless relativism.
‘This is a dense, allusive, layered collection and I feel I shall need several more readings to really get under its skin. That will be no hardship, and anyway I always feel it is a virtue in a book not to give up all its meaning at once.’ —Sheenagh Pugh
‘Mackenzie always seems to manage to blend the dichotomy between seriousness and humour with irrevocable style; prodding us to question what it is we should take seriously at all, and, this poem is no different; with a lace-up of double-entendres and clever lyrical dips in language, embedding pop song lyrics alongside the political climate, popular culture with the slightly surreal.’ —Scottish Poetry Library