An Arbitrary Light Bulb is Ian Duhig’s most personal collection of poems to date. It takes its title from the most common type of household bulb – yet one whose name is virtually unknown, like many people these poems celebrate.

Duhig finds in the arbitrary an image for the randomness of inspiration and of life, haunted here by deaths of family and friends. He laments the lost but also responds to the glories of our existence, especially among the overlooked, with humour, technical variety and contagious pleasure.

Starting out from ‘contrary Leeds’, his home for half a century, Duhig’s poems roam widely through history, art-forms, loves and injustices, fired by the desire to share it all with his readers: knowledge, joy, anger and wonder.

"The most original poet of his generation" - Guardian

"Duhig telescopes topical allusions, scholarly references and coarse humour into tightly-shaped, surreal poems which burst open with explosive moral force'" - Sunday Times

"His poetry is learned, rude, elegant, sly and funny, mixing gilded images, belly-laughs and esoteric lore about language (including Irish), art, history, politics and children's word-games" - Independent on Sunday

". . .one of Duhig's charms is that, for all his learning, he retains humility" - Magma Review

"Ian is a one-off legend, a true original" - Herald