Leopold Haas
Leopold Haas was born in Sydney, Australia. Educated at the University of Sydney, he left without graduating. He spent a number of years living in Germany and the United States, before moving to Ireland where he read Classics at Trinity College Dublin. He has published two previous books under a pseudonym. This is his first book of twelve-tone poetry. He lives in Dublin.
Download & read an extract from The Raft (pdf)
THE RAFT
This narrative retells the famous story of "The Raft of the Medusa", in which over one hundred people perished off the coast of Senegal in 1816. The Raft begins as the unlucky ship passengers (those with little money or education) find themselves consigned to a raft built from the remains of the sinking Medusa. Their provisions are running out and their chance of survival has just been cut."The raft, of course, is the world, and the survivors us all. This remarkable work uses disciplines adapted from serial music – twelve speaking characters, twelve ‘beats’ across the line, twelve chapters – to create a sea-storm of words through which the twelve voices call and recall, wonder and whisper, in search of their lost moorings." – Paul Griffiths