The Hard Word wittily reflects on the stuff of words and what can be done with them, or to them, their uses and abuses - especially on the subject of love, perhaps the hardest word of all. Peter Kirkpatrick taught English and Australian literature at Western Sydney University and the University of Sydney, and has published two other collections: Wish You Were Here (Five Islands, 1996), and Westering (Puncher & Wattmann, 2006), which was shortlisted in the 2008 NSW Premier's Literary Awards. He is also the author of The Sea Coast of Bohemia: Literary Life in Sydney's Roaring Twenties (2nd ed. API Network, 2007) and, with Jill Dimond, Literary Sydney: A Walking Guide (UQP, 2000). With Fran De Groen he co-edited Serious Frolic: Essays on Australian Humour (UQP, 2009) and, with Robert Dixon, Republics of Letters: Literary Communities in Australia (Sydney University Press, 2012)