Alashka

<p><em>Alashka</em> is a lost book. It was first published as half of a very large well-printed volume in 1979 spliced together with Tarn’s <em>Selected Poems</em> up until that point. The publisher was a new outfit in Boulder Colorado called Brillig Works and born in an eponymous bookstore. Distribution was limited and fitful and copies were notoriously hard to come by. This ensured that what was in effect Janet Rodney’s first collection vanished from view. Also although it was a valuable expansion of Tarn’s anthro- and eco-poetics this hardly registered in the wider worrld whether in Alaska or in the lower states. </p><p>    The book finally gets its own set of covers here and a chance to find its own niche and will soon be joined by some other long out-of-print Tarn volumes. Although some 40 years old this book has scarcely aged and its themes are as apposite today as they were in the 1970s.</p>