A Love Letter to the Auld Soul of the North
For the stones that remember
and the trees that breathe;
for the gorse-gold hills and the pulse of the Auld Soul.
I came as a wanderer, stayed as a wonderer.
Edinburgh and Scotland claimed my heart,
and I leave a parcel of it in these pages as a gift to you.
"I thought I could simply leave and leave the surface untouched... but heart and soul have ways of their own."
When Bohumila Ottová arrived in Edinburgh, she was a wanderer. By the time she left, she was a part of the stone itself.
Edinburgh Dreams is a vibrant collection of 85 poems and 76 original photographs that capture a sudden, breathless love affair with Scotland. From the "merciless" winds of Arthur’s Seat to the hidden, seashell-lined corners of the city, this book is for anyone who has ever lost their heart to a place they weren't expecting to call home.
#EdinburghDreams #Edingurgh #Scotland #Poetry #EdinburghInHeart #TravelDifferently
A Love Letter to the Auld Soul of the North
For the stones that remember
and the trees that breathe;
for the gorse-gold hills and the pulse of the Auld Soul.
I came as a wanderer, stayed as a wonderer.
Edinburgh and Scotland claimed my heart,
and I leave a parcel of it in these pages as a gift to you.
"I thought I could simply leave and leave the surface untouched... but heart and soul have ways of their own."
When Bohumila Ottová arrived in Edinburgh, she was a wanderer. By the time she left, she was a part of the stone itself.
Edinburgh Dreams is a vibrant collection of 85 poems and 76 original photographs that capture a sudden, breathless love affair with Scotland. From the "merciless" winds of Arthur’s Seat to the hidden, seashell-lined corners of the city, this book is for anyone who has ever lost their heart to a place they weren't expecting to call home.
#EdinburghDreams #Edingurgh #Scotland #Poetry #EdinburghInHeart #TravelDifferently
Bohumila Ottová's Edinburgh Dreams: Poems and Musings of a Wanderer Who Fell in Love With the City at First Sight is an elegant meditation on place from a poet with sharp lyrical sensibilities and equally affecting skills as a photographer. The collection offers an intimate impression of one wanderer's experience in Scotland. And while the poems might have pushed further to fold in the contemporary people of Edinburgh, Ottová's exploration of physical, natural, and historical space offer a gorgeous illustration of one's almost spiritual experience of a city.
Historical markers, natural settings, key locations in and around Edinburgh—Ottová's travelog records not only her physical movement through these places, but also her emotional and intellectual movement as a traveler attuned to what is truly interesting about a city steeped in history. The collection brilliantly captures the conversation between space and a poet's self. And as the speaker makes meaning of the physical place as a text, so too does she embody that meaning internally. The reader can witness true love for a city developing as a lyrical process in the sequence of these poems. The variety of pieces—short snippets intermingling with longer meditations—replicates thought beautifully in this collection. Some elements of an experience trigger a sudden but affecting four-line response. Others lead to longer reflections that wander with the poet. Ottová's "I" is never far. This is very much a book that emphasizes the impact Edinburgh has made on a visiting self.
If Edinburgh Dreams falls short of its potential, it is only in the absence of Edinburgh's people. The reader is treated to such a robust relationship between the poet and the "stuff" of place (which can, at times, hint at human beings). But the collection largely shows the reader a city without the voices, gestures, faces, music, or vibrancy of its citizens. The late poem "Broken Angel" stands out as the exception—the speaker offers hope, presumably to the young woman featured in the accompanying photograph. Apart from this moment, the collection risks showing readers an Edinburgh that is something of a ghost town, which it is obviously not. Ottová cannot be faulted for this though—a poet's attention and verse will connect with the observable world that most calls to them. However, the reader will occasionally feel as though something is missing.
Edinburgh Dreams is a moving collection. Ottová's account of having become enamored with the city feels real and relatable to anyone who's ever fallen in love with a place. While the collection might have shown the reader how Edinburgh's people fit into the relationship between a poet and a city, the poems here reveal how affecting the city's tangible, navigable realities can be.