Happy October!
We love reading and talking books! Here's a roundup of what the editors of T4R are reading and recommending monthly.
I gasped! I love a fractal, interruptive, interrogative scream. There’s something magical about what can be accomplished in a long poem and Olivia Cronk’s Womonster is such magic! I adore an intertextually-centered approach that unfamiliarizes the familiar—run don’t walk to this book!
I’m looking forward to spending time with Kazim Ali’s newest book The Voice of Sheila Chandra.
Aimee Bender's The Butterfly Lampshade is magic and reality intertwined. A beautiful book that focuses on the notion of presence and holding onto the body you are in while the world dissipates and rearranges constantly.
“Bro!” Bro!! OMG the newest English-language translation of Beowulf by Maria Dahvana Headley is a feminist respawn made fun, metal, and so full of play I’m beside myself with excitement! I loved The Mere Wife, and after reading and totally loving Emily Wilson’s translation of The Odyssey, I couldn’t help but return to Beowulf. If you’re looking for a book to read socially distanced or over the internet with your friends, read this one! Read it out loud!
I love decomposition and fester! I love lyric. Choi Seungia’s Phone Bells Keep Ringing for Me, translated by Won-Chung Kim and Cathy Park Hong is lyric nature writing put under pressure! If you’re feeling a post-climate apocalypse, these poems are for you.
Alyse Bensel’s Rare Wondrous Things just came in the mail! Look at that cover! I’m so excited to read this poetic biography of Maria Sibylla Merian.
Lucia Estrada’s Katabasis, translated by Olivia Lott is the first poetry collection by a Colombian woman to be translated into English—and it is coming out so soon! You can pre-order from Eulalia Books right now.