Street Haunting: The Flâneur in Literature

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Image shows an impressionist painting depicting people strolling down an intersection in Paris

Paris Street; Rainy Day by Gustave Caillebotte (1877), The Art Institute of Chicago

“The crowd is his domain, just as the air is the bird’s, and water that of the fish. His passion and his profession is to merge with the crowd. For the perfect idler, for the passionate observer, it becomes an immense source of enjoyment to establish his dwelling in the throng, in the ebb and flow, the bustle, the fleeting and the infinite. To be away from home and yet to feel at home anywhere; to see the world, to be at the very centre of the world, and yet to be unseen of the world, such are some of the minor pleasures of those independent, intense and impartial spirits, who do not lend themselves easily to linguistic definitions.” –Charles Baudelaire, The Painter of Modern Life, 1863

In his essay, “The Painter of Modern Life,” nineteenth-century French poet and critic, Charles Baudelaire, established his definition of the flâneur, a figure that continues to capture the imagination of writers and artists more than a century later. Literally but imperfectly translated as “stroller” or “idler,” the flâneur is the quintessential observer, the outsider whose meandering path skims along, but does not directly intersect, with the paths of those that surround him or her. In Baudelaire’s eye, the flâneur was inextricably tied with the artist and the poet—the ability to return to one’s home and fashion something immortal out of these passing glimpses of modern city life.

It is not surprising then, that throughout the intervening century and a half, numerous modern and contemporary writers have explored the iconic image of the flaneur, from Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway to Teju Cole’s Open City. In these works, the act of wandering a city often becomes a journey of self-discovery and inward reflection.

And while in Baudelaire’s day, the flâneur was generally assumed to be white and male, more contemporary works have challenged this preconception. Through some writer’s eyes, the act of observing, and the gaze itself, has taken on a new power and potential. Viewing the flâneur through a feminist or postcolonial lens, street haunting (as Virginia Woolf calls it) raises the questions of who is able to be invisible and unobserved in the modern city and what this capability says about modern society.

Today, we’ve highlighted a few works in the library’s collection, both historical and contemporary that explore this lesser-known image of the flâneur in literature. Why not be transported somewhere new today?

Open City by Teju Cole

Nigerian-American writer Teju Cole’s debut novel, Open City is about many things—identity, dislocation, history, and love. But first, it is about a solitary walker setting out from his home in Morningside Heights and learning the city at his feet. While the narrator, a Nigerian doctor doing his residency, wanders the streets of New York, he reflects on his recent breakup with his girlfriend and encounters a string of local immigrants who enrich and complicate his portrait of the city and himself. For Open City, the term “street haunting” is perhaps particularly apt; this post-colonial look at New York City reflects the unique loneliness that stems from isolation in the midst of a crowd.

Quartet by Jean Rhys

Rhys’ debut 1928 novel explores the sometimes squalid but often mesmerizing underbelly of bohemian Paris, a world Rhys herself knew only too well. Quartet is a roman à clef, an autobiographical novel, exploring a quartet of four lovers whose foibles and trials mirror the experiences of Rhys during her marriage to her first husband and her concurrent messy affair and financial entanglement with literary luminary Ford Maddox Ford and his partner, Stella Bowen. Isolated and increasingly troubled amidst the rich literary and artistic culture of a city in bloom, Quartet lays bare the at-times stark realities of Café Society in Paris, particularly for women.

Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf

The titular character of Mrs. Dalloway sets out from her London home with a simple goal in mind—to buy flowers for her party. But what begins as a practical errand quickly diverges as Dalloway’s journey provides an opportunity for the protagonist to consider the complex ways her life intersects with those of the other characters that populate the novel, as well as where the path of her own life might have diverged in the past. A complex modernist classic, Mrs. Dalloway is at times challenging, but infinitely rewarding for its exploration of how a single day, and a single task, can unveil the intricate layers of a person’s life and mind.

NW by Zadie Smith

Traversing the eponymous North Western postcode area in London, NW presents a complicated portrait of the city and modern adulthood. The novel follows four Londoners as they try to make lives and identities outside of Cadwell, the council estate where they grew up. Smith’s writing style immerses its reader in the unique culture of Northwest London—from its immigrant dialects to its cultural landmarks.  This tragicomic novel swings between violence and scandal, but the protagonists’ quests to define and achieve happiness on their own terms will resonate with anyone struggling to navigate life in a modern city.

French Milk by Lucy Knisley

Known for her travelogues and graphic memoirs, French Milk, is one of cartoonist Lucy Knisley’s earliest efforts in the field. This travelogue narrates Knisley’s six-week trip to Paris with her mother as they explore the city and face milestones in life. Blending musings, photographs, and illustrations, Knisley reflects on family, love, and the looming prospect of adulthood as she samples some of the culinary and cultural delights the City of Light has to offer. While it is at times self-indulgent (what travelogue isn’t?), it offers a charming and tempting snapshot of Paris through the eyes of a consummate artist and foodie.

Taipei by Tao Lin

Many of the books that explore the figure of the flâneur traverse the line between fiction and memoir, and Tapei is no exception. Based on the author’s own life, Tapei is an undeniably modern take on the figure of the flâneur—providing an unvarnished portrait of the way we live and love today. The novel follows Paul from Manhattan to Taipei, Taiwan as he navigates his artistic ambitions alongside his cultural heritage. As relationships bloom and fail, the novel’s characters devote much of their time to drugs and screens, numbing agents that distract from the by turns bleak and absurd realities of modern life. While opinions about Tao Lin and his work vary, Taipei is undeniably effective in distilling the tedium, the excitement, and the uncertainty of being alive, young, on the fringes in America. 

Further Reading Suggestions for the Fledgling Flâneur:

The Painter of Modern Life and Other Essays by Charles Baudelaire

Nightwood by Djuna Barnes

Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell

My Year Abroad by Chang-Rae Lee

Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found by Suketu Mehta

20 Fragments of a Ravenous Youth by Xiaolu Guo

People of the City by Cyprian Ekwensi

Sleepless Nights by Elizabeth Hardwick

Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino

Carnet de Voyage by Craig Thompson

New York: A Mod Portrait of the City by Vladimir Fuka

Bibliography

Baudelaire, Charles, and Jonathan Mayne. The Painter of Modern Life, and Other Essays. London: Phaidon, 1964.

Baudelaire, Charles, 1821-1867 2006. Ann Arbor: ProQuest. https://www-proquest-com.proxy2.library.illinois.edu/encyclopedias-reference-works/baudelaire-charles-1821-1867/docview/2137915067/se-2?accountid=14553.

Flâneur 2010., edited by Ian Buchanan. Oxford: Oxford University Press. https://www-proquest-com.proxy2.library.illinois.edu/encyclopedias-reference-works/flâneur/docview/2137953454/se-2?accountid=14553.

Lopate, Phillip. The Art of the Personal Essay : an Anthology from the Classical Era to the Present. New York: Anchor Books, 1994.

Wood, James. “The Arrival of Enigmas.” The New Yorker, February 20, 2011. http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/02/28/the-arrival-of-enigmas.

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The Trauma of War and Displacement in the Poetry of John Guzlowski

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By Marek Sroka

One of the most interesting examples of traumatic experiences of war and displacement are the poems of John Guzlowski, “arguably the most accomplished Polish-American poet on the contemporary scene.”[1]  Guzlowski, who was born in a displaced persons’ camp in Vienenburg, Germany, after World War II, came with his parents and sister to the United States as “DPs” (“displaced persons,’ the term Guzlowski uses to describe their status) in 1951.  Inspired by the wartime experiences of his parents, the author has been writing poems about his parents’ lives addressing the tragedy of war, the trauma of displacement, and the anguish of immigration.  Moreover, the topics he highlights in his poetry did not disappear after World War II.  Instead, new conflicts erupted that resulted in massive displacement of populations in various parts of the world, including present war in Ukraine.                                                                                                                    In one of his most powerful poems, “Landscape with Dead Horses, 1939,” Guzlowski introduces audiences to the Polish experience of Nazi Germany invasion of Poland in 1939 and confronts them with tragedy of all wars.  Here is the opening verse:

War comes down like a hammer, heavy and hard

flattening the earth and killing the soft things:

horses and children, flowers and hope, love

and the smell of the farmers’ earth, the coolness

of the creek, the look of trees as they unfurl

their leaves in late March and early April

(from Echoes of Tattered Tongues)[2]

Another poem worth mentioning is “Cattle Train to Magdeburg,” in which Guzlowski recreates the experience of his mother’s deportation to Nazi Germany where she would work as a slave laborer.  The poem deals with the universal and often lifelong trauma of displacement caused by wars.  Here is a fragment:

My mother still remembers

The long train to Magdeburg

the box cars

bleached gray

by Baltic winters

 

The long twilight journey

to Magdeburg-

four days that became six years

six years that became sixty

 

And always a train of box cars

bleached to Baltic gray

(from Lightning and Ashes)[3]  

Guzlowski’s poems are emotionally powerful and are anchored in his parents experience as forced laborers and country-less refugees.  Yet, his poetry has universal relevance giving voice to countless refugees displaced and traumatized by wars in the past and current centuries.

Cover of John Guzlowski’s book of poetry “Echoes of Tattered Tongues” (2016)

[1] Thomas Napierkowski, “Lightning and Ashes: The Poetry of John Guzlowski,” Polish American Studies, no. 1 (Spring 2008): 86-93.

[2] John Z. Guzlowski, Echoes of Tattered Tongues (Los Angeles, California: Aquila Polonica Publishing, 2016).

[3] John Z. Guzlowski, Lightning and Ashes (Bowling Green, Kentucky: Steel Toe Books, 2007).

 

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Reading Recommendations for Black History Month

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Happy Black History Month from the Literatures and Languages Library!

From Phillis Wheatley to Zora Neale Hurston to Colson Whitehead, Black writers have enriched our country’s literary heritage for centuries. While the Literatures and Languages Library amplifies Black voices all year, Black History Month provides a special opportunity to highlight a few of the many wonderful works in our collection created by Black authors.

The origin of Black History Month dates to 1926 when historian Carter G. Woodson conceived of Negro History Week. Specifically responding to how the American public school system represented the significance of Black history, Woodson envisioned Negro History Week as a national celebration of Black culture (Franklin). Woodson originally chose the second week in February as an apt time to champion Black history because it coincided with the birthdays of both Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass. Following the civil rights movement, the week-long event transformed into the full month celebration that we now recognize.

Our collection is always growing, and this curated list provides just a glimpse of some of the exciting new fiction and poetry we offer. These works are eclectic and explore a diverse spectrum of the Black experience, ranging from the Afro-punk scene of the 1970s to queer life amidst the AIDS epidemic.

The titles featured here are currently on display in our exhibit case but will be available for check-out on March 1st. To see the full exhibit, or to get more reading recommendations for Black History Month, come visit us in the Main Library, Room 200!

Fiction:

The Awkward Black Man (Stories) by Walter Mosley

Walter Mosley is often considered one of America’s greatest crime-fiction writers, winning an Edgar Grand Master Award as well as a Medal for Distinguished Contributions to American Letters from the National Book Foundation. But this collection of 17 short stories displays the broad range of Mosley’s talent. The Awkward Black Man providing fascinating glimpses into a motley collection of protagonists–heroes who are awkward, nerdy, self-defeating, self-involved, and, on the whole, odd. The collection seeks to challenge stereotypes about Black male characters and urges the reader to consider each one on his own merits.

Funeral Diva by Pamela Sneed

Seamlessly weaving together personal essays and poetry, poet, performer, visual artist, and educator Pamela Sneed brings all her talents to bear on this memoir, which depicts the AIDS crisis’ impact on Black queer life in New York City. The winner of the Lambda Award for Lesbian Poetry, Funeral Diva’s poems are in conversation with lost lovers and Black literary forebears from James Baldwin to Audre Lorde, and extend from meditations on the past into the trauma and hope of the present day.

 

Hell of a Book: Or the Altogether Factual, Wholly Bona Fide Story of a Big Dreams, Hard Luck, American-Made Mad Kid by Jason Mott

It’s a hell of a title for a hell of a book. This National Book Award-winning novel bends time and reality to tell the dizzying story of a best-selling Black author’s cross-country publicity tour. His journey intersects and intermingles with the stories of a young black boy named Soot and a possibly mythic child named, simply, The Kid. As their lives converge amidst a series of tragic, magical, and astonishing twists that will have the reader questioning what is real and how can we move forward?

Other Fiction Recommendations:

 

Poetry:

Such Color by Tracy K. Smith

This collection brings together some of the most powerful and esteemed poems from the former Poet Laureate of the United States, Tracy K. Smith. Such Color includes works originally published in volumes including the Pulitzer prize-winning Life On Mars (2011), as well as The Body’s Question (2003), Duende (2007), and Wade in the Water (2018). The collection also includes new poems, which reflect on America’s historical and contemporary racism, while urging the reader towards the radical choice of love and compassion in the face of all that stands in its way.

Exiles of Eden – Ladan Osman

Drawing from Somali storytelling traditions, Exiles of Eden provides a fascinating new perspective on the story of Adam, Eve, and their exile from the Garden of Eden. Seamlessly blending the past and present in hypnotizing, experimental verse, Osman explores the experiences of displaced people across multiple generations. Her characters by turns grapple with trauma, isolation, and the disheartening realization that once you are exiled from Eden, you can never go back.

 

Other Poetry Recommendations:

 

Works Cited

 

Franklin, Jonathan. “Here’s the story behind Black History Month—and why it’s celebrated in February.” NPR, https://www.npr.org/2022/02/01/1075623826/why-is-february-black-history-month. Accessed 4 February 2022.

 

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Proquest One Literature

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One database to rule them all, and, in citations, find them!

The website banner for the OneLiterature databaseThe University Library now provides access to Proquest One Literature. This exciting new acquisition will provide students, faculty, and staff with access to 3 million literature citations from thousands of journals, monographs, dissertations, and more than 500,000 primary works! These include rare and obscure texts, multiple versions, and non-traditional sources like comics, theatre performances, and author readings.

If this sounds like a dizzying amount of content, never fear! One Literature has a user-friendly interface that allows you to browse and search amongst criticism, primary texts, and reference works like The Routledge Companion to Asian American and Pacific Islander Literature, The Cambridge Companion to African American Theatre, The International Companion Encyclopedia of Children’s Literature, and many more!

Banner showing frequently viewed authors and literature collections on the One Literature databaseIf you’d like to learn more about and dive into the works of a single writer, you’re in luck! One Literature greets each visitor with a banner of prominent authors and poets, including Jane Austen, Joy Harjo, and William Carlos Williams. Selecting a specific author will take you to a biography of the writer, direct links to their primary works, pertinent criticism, relevant reference works, links to authors from the same literary movement, and even videos and recordings of adaptations and readings. These author pages will provide wonderful guidance and resources to students and faculty across the English curriculum but may be particularly useful as references for Major Authors classes.

If you’d prefer to browse by topic or subject, or just casually explore, One Literature also allows you to browse by literary movement, literary period, and Literature Collections, which bring together works that showcase unique, definitive electronic collections or demonstrate the breadth of topical electronic collections available on One Literature. Prominent Literature Collections include the African Writers Series, Digitale Bibliothek Deutscher Klassiker [a digital library of classic German works], and Teatro Español del Siglo de Oro [a collection of Spanish theatre from the Golden Age].

If that were not already enough, One Literature also features an expansive array of audio-visual content, including poetry readings, Shakespeare audioplays, and BBC literary adaptations like Emma, Madame Bovary, and David Copperfield.

So, what are you waiting for? Head into to One Literature and start exploring! We can’t wait to hear about what you discover!

To learn more about One Literature or to schedule a demonstration for your class, please contact Matthew Roberts (mjrii@illinois.edu) or Paula Carns (pcarns@illinois.edu).

 

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Reading Recommendations for Hispanic American Heritage Month

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Happy National Hispanic Heritage Month! From September 15 to October 15, our country is honoring the contributions of Hispanic Americans to our culture and nation. Hispanic Americans have positively influenced many aspects of American life, from politics to the arts to civil rights. They have also had a huge impact on our nation’s literature and literary traditions. To celebrate this impact, we are highlighting some of the incredible fiction by Hispanic authors in our collection.

Dominicana by Angie Cruzcover image for Dominicana by Angie Cruz

Fans of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s In the Heights will be captivated by this coming-of-age story which explores immigration, love, and the shifting tides of the American Dream. In 1965, Ana Canción moves from her beloved Dominican Republic to the Washington Heights neighborhood in New York City, so that she can marry and create a path to immigration for her family. Lonely and isolated in her adopted city, she plans to flee until political turmoil back home and a new romantic entanglement open her eyes to what a life in America could be.

cover image for The Spirit of Science FictionThe Spirit of Science Fiction by Roberto Bolaño

Fans of George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London and Jean Rhys’ Quartet will be drawn in by Bolaño’s portrait of 1970s Mexico City. This genre-bending novel follows the romantic and creative escapades of two aspiring Chilean writers as they struggle to carve out a place for themselves in the literary world. While one writer sinks into a dizzying creative oblivion, the other finds himself becoming a flâneur, haunting the dingy and beautiful streets of Mexico City with a circle of extravagant writers.

cover image for the Naked Woman

The Naked Woman by Armonía Somers

The premise for The Naked Woman can be distilled simply: a woman’s feminist awakening drives a hypocritical village to madness in rural Uruguay. But this description can only hint at the brilliant brutality of Somers’ text and Maude’s translation. This intense, surreal novel exposes the violence of the male ego and the destructive power of societal misogyny. Originally published in 1950 to an audience shocked by its graphic eroticism, it is now considered an iconic work of feminism.

 

cover image for fruit of the drunken treeFruit of the Drunken Tree by Ingrid Rojas Contreras

Inspired by Rojas Contreras’ own life, this debut novel explores youth and childhood in Colombia under drug lord Pablo Escobar’s violent reign. Born and raised in a gated community in the city of Bogotá, Colombia, seven-year-old Chula has grown up sheltered from the violence and crime that ravaged the city’s streets. But when she grows close to her family’s new maid, Petrona, Chula finds herself drawn into a new realm of secrecy and betrayal. As the novel rockets to its conclusion, both girls find themselves faced with impossible choices as their world descends into chaos.

What’s on your “To Read” list for Hispanic American Heritage Month? Let us know!

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2021 Pulitzer Prize Winners

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Congratulations to the 2021 Pulitzer Prize Winners! The Pulitzer Prize was established in 1917  through the will of Joseph Pulitzer, a visionary American journalist, who wished to incentivize excellence and innovation in American journalism and letters. 

This year, the literary works recognized demonstrate an increased interest in social justice and honoring the exemplary work of writers addressing the brutal history and complex reality of race in America. Below, we have highlighted a few of the winners currently in our collection. But we encourage you to peruse the full list of finalists and winners here. 

 

Fiction: The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich

The Night Watchman is based on the extraordinary life of National Book Award-winning author Louise Erdrich’s  grandfather, who worked as a night watchman and carried the fight against Native dispossession from rural North Dakota all the way to Washington, D.C. This powerful novel explores themes of love and death with lightness and gravity and unfolds with the elegant prose, sly humor, and depth of feeling of a master craftsman.

History: Franchise: The Golden Arches in Black America by Marcia Chatelain

A nuanced account of the complicated role the fast-food industry plays in African-American communities, Chatelain’s work is a portrait of race and capitalism that masterfully illustrates how the fight for civil rights has been intertwined with the fate of Black businesses. From civil rights to Ferguson, Franchise reveals the untold history of how fast food became one of the greatest generators of black wealth in America.

Biography: The Dead Are Arising: The Life of Malcolm X by Les Payne and Tamara Payne

Les Payne, the renowned Pulitzer Prize–winning investigative journalist, embarked in 1990 on a nearly thirty-year-long quest to interview anyone he could find who had actually known Malcolm X. The Dead are Arising is the result—A powerful and revelatory account of the civil rights activist, which rewrites much of the known narrative and offers insight into his character, beliefs and the forces that shaped him. Les and Tamara Payne have crafted a riveting work that affirms the centrality of Malcolm X to the African American freedom struggle.

Poetry: Postcolonial Love Poem by Natalie Diaz

Postcolonial Love Poem is a collection of tender, heart-wrenching, and defiant poems that explore what it means to love and be loved in an America beset by conflict. It is an anthem of desire against erasure, demanding that every body carried in its pages—bodies of language, land, rivers, suffering brothers, enemies, and lovers—be touched and held as beloved.

 

General Nonfiction: Wilmington’s Lie : The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy by David Zucchino

Wilmington’s Lie is a gripping account of the overthrow of the elected government of a Black-majority North Carolina city after Reconstruction that untangles a complicated set of power dynamics cutting across race, class and gender. It gives an account of a racially-motivated insurrection launched by white supremacists, which halted gains made by Black people and restored racism as official government policy, cementing white rule for another seventy years. 

Pulitzer Prize winner David Zucchino uses contemporary newspaper accounts, diaries, letters and official communications to create a riveting and compelling narrative that weaves together individual stories of hate, fear, and brutality. This is a dramatic and definitive account of a remarkable but forgotten chapter of American history.

–Summaries adapted from the publisher

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Summer of Cinema!

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Keep an eye out for these recent Cinema Studies acquisitions at the Literatures and Languages Library!

Cinematic settlers: the settler colonial world in film Edited by Janne Lahti

In this anthology, the contributing scholars explore examples of settler colonialism in film. Settler colonialism is a method of colonization that displaces the indigenous peoples of a colonized territory and replaces them with new settlers. Taking a broad international approach, scholars analyze specific films, study genres, and examine national trends in film making. This volume seeks to add to the study of settler colonialism by evaluating the ways film contributes to and validates settler narratives.

Projecting the nation: history and ideology on the Israeli screen by Eran Kaplan

This book tackles 70 years of Israeli cinema history. Kaplan analyzes films that cover “the Arab-Israeli conflict, the Ashkenazi-Mizrahi divide, the kibbutz and urban life, the rise of religion,” to examine the way film represents the life and culture of modern Israel. He also questions the ways these films have shaped our understanding of Israeli history.

 

Contemporary Balkan  Cinema: Transnational Exchanges and Global Circuits Edited by Lydia Papadimitriou and Ana Grgić

Looking at key subject characteristics and aesthetics of Balkan films, this book analyzes the impact of transnational links and the role of international film festivals in the production and distribution of films from this region. With each chapter focusing on a different region, scholars examine cross cultural exchange and the importance of Balkan Cinema.

 

A Cultural History of the Disney Fairy Tale: Once Upon an American Dream by Tracey Louise Mollet

“In all of its fairy tales of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, the Walt Disney studios works to sell its audiences the national myth of the United States at any one historical moment.” This book analyzes the shifting ethos of the Disney Fairy tale through time in order to meet changing national viewpoints and keep the utopian myth of the United States alive. Using Disney films and tv shows, Mollet investigates the links between Disney morality and the American Dream.

Experts in Action: Transnational Hong Kong–Style Stunt Work and Performance by Lauren Steimer

In this book Steimer explores the transnational influence and spread of Hong Kong film aesthetics, stunt work, and fighting styles. Analyzing the work of specific stunt people in film and tv, this book explores the mixing of artistic influences, genre, and localities, with Hong Kong style fight work.

 

 

Women in the International Film Industry: Policy, Practice and Power Edited by Susan Liddy

The topic of this series of essays from international scholars is gender-based discrimination in the film industry. Detailing the industry culture in seventeen different countries, these essays argue for an end to gender discrimination and more opportunities for women in film.

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Reading Recommendations for Asian Pacific American Heritage Month

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May is Asian American and Pacific Islander heritage month. As Anti-Asian hate crimes are on the rise and the AAPI community is threatened by ignorance and cruelty, this APAHM feels particularly important. It is a time to reflect on all of the tremendous gifts, literary and otherwise, that the Asian-American community has contributed to our country and the world. With this in mind, we are highlighting some of the incredible new works by Asian-American authors in our collection.

cover art for Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless GirlsLong Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls by T Kira Madden

Literary essayist Madden’s debut memoir pulls no punches in depicting her coming of age as queer, biracial teenager in Boco Raton, Florida. Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls fearlessly lays bare the many contradictions of Madden’s young life–from the immense privileges of her wealthy upbringing, to the trauma and isolation wrought by her parents’ drug addiction, to the precious and devastating nature of friendship between fatherless girls.

 

cover art for The Color of AirThe Color of Air by Gail Tsukiyama

Tsukiyama’s brilliant historical novel tells the story of a Japanese-American family, set against the backdrop of Hawai’i’s sugar plantations. Just as long-standing family secrets and tensions appear primed to explode, another devastating eruption occurs: that of Mauna Loa volcano.

 

cover art for The Unpassing

 

 

The Unpassing by Chia-Chia Lin

Lin’s gripping debut novel interrogates the myth of the American Dream through a Taiwanese immigrant family struggling to get by in Anchorage, Alaska. When tragedy strikes, the resultant upheaval forces the family to reckon with grief and guilt amidst unfamiliar, and often unforgiving, surroundings.

 

cover art for How Much of These Hills is GoldHow Much of These Hills is Gold by C Pam Zhang

In Zhang’s epic Western set during the American Gold Rush, the orphaned children of Chinese immigrants set out across a harsh and unforgiving landscape in the hopes of burying their father, and their past. The unforgettable sights and adventures they encounter along the way provide a fascinating glimpse of the future that might await them.

 

cover art for Pachinko

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

Lee’s powerful historical novel follows a single Korean family through a dramatic saga of betrayal, sacrifice, ambition, and love. The family’s tumultuous story begins with a young Sunja’s unplanned and potentially devastating pregnancy. Unbeknownst to her, the choices Sunja makes will reverberate through generations to come.

 

 

Anti-Violence and Anti-Racism Resources to Support the AAPI Community:

https://anti-asianviolenceresources.carrd.co/

https://www.advancingjustice-aajc.org/anti-asian-hate

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/anti-racism-resources-support-asian-american-pacific-islander-community-n1260467

https://www.harpersbazaar.com/culture/politics/a35862857/stop-asian-hate-organizations-to-support/

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UIUC Poetry Spotlight: Weston Morrow

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This week, UIUC MFA student Weston Morrow reads “She Decides She Prefers Longing Over Satisfaction” by Maya Jewell Zeller and “I Consider My Grandfather Going Home” by Weston Morrow. Watch his readings on our Instagram here and here, and read his reflections below:

Both the poems I’ve chosen to read here consider the landscape—of both nature and the self. I was sitting at my desk recording these this morning with the aid of the increasing natural light and, for the first time in what feels like forever, I worried whether the birds outside might sing loud enough to interrupt my audio.

Like the speakers in both these poems, I’ve felt a sense of dread, of loss, and loneliness, these past twelve months. I’ve sat inside my house with nothing to do at times but look out the window by my desk. I watched the trees shed their leaves and my world shrink with the winter light as I slipped further into myself and further away from others.

I haven’t found myself able to read for fun in months, but the dogwood across the street is blushing pink, the light is finding its way back into my room through the curtains, and I’m reading again. Maya Jewell Zeller’s poem reminds me that the world is always there, awaiting my return, and no matter how calloused I become, the grass will come back each spring, and give my feet a soft place to land.

Poetry, like nature, can recede from my consciousness at times. It can feel frivolous in the face of loss — as people I love, and the world we call home, are dying. Eighty years ago, W.H. Auden wrote a line quoted still today, by lovers and haters of poetry alike, “[P]oetry makes nothing happen…” But, consider, if you will, the rest of the section:

For poetry makes nothing happen: it survives
In the valley of its making where executives
Would never want to tamper, flows on south
From ranches of isolation and the busy griefs,
Raw towns that we believe and die in; it survives,
A way of happening, a mouth.

As I sit here at this desk, hardly having moved this past year, I’m thinking—finally—like Zeller’s speaker, who “wanted to know / how far the wind went / after it rounded the tool- / shed, the river bend…”

Who knows what lies ahead. I’m nervous, but excited. I think I’ll go outside. I might even take my shoes off.

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Summer Reading in the Classics

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Looking for some classics-inspired reading to sink your teeth into this summer? Check out this list of fiction set in the ancient world or drawing inspiration from Greco-Roman mythology.

Blue cover with a golden Grecian helmet emblazoned with the book title.

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller. Click for catalog link.

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller

A heartbreaking retelling of the Trojan War from the perspective of Patroclus. Our narrator meets the heroic Achilles at a young age, and we watch alongside him as his companion grows into a seemingly invincible warrior. Throughout their adolescence and preparation for war, their relationship develops into one of profound love. By the time the pair reach the beaches of Troy, the plot churns forward as the audience braces for an inevitably tragic end. Fans of this novel should definitely check out Miller’s Circe and her earlier novella Galatea.

 

 

Purple and gold illustration of the Trojan Horse with five women in front of it.

The Women of Troy by Pat Barker. Release date: June 2021.

The Women of Troy by Pat Barker

Set in the aftermath of the sacking of Troy, this novel gives a voice to the women left behind in the aftermath of a bloody Greek victory. Briseis, a Trojan royal captured by Achilles, navigates the shattered world of her ruined city alongside the other overlooked women of the former court. A gritty, visceral imagining that pairs seamlessly with Barker’s previous novel set during the Trojan War, The Silence of the Girls.

 

 

 

 

Illustration of Roman women in archways with stars in the distance.

The Wolf Den by Elodie Harper. Release date: May 2021.

The Wolf Den by Elodie Harper

A story about Pompeii that fleshes out the people living in the ill-fated town. Amara is a sex worker in a city brothel (a lupanar, or wolf den) attempting to assert her agency in a society that denies her bodily autonomy. An absorbing tale of womanhood and resistance that will resonate with contemporary readers looking for strong female characters in a vivid reimagining of the past.

 

 

 

 

A still life of a Roman feast with a robed figure standing next to it.

Feast of Sorrow by Crystal King. Click for catalog link.

Feast of Sorrow by Crystal King
Enslaved Thrasius navigates a dangerous political climate and the changing whims of his avaricious gourmand of a master, Apicius, as he serves extravagant dishes to Rome’s most powerful patricians in the Augustan age. Richly detailed and emotionally evocative, King presents a sumptuous feast of a novel inspired by a centuries-old collection of recipes. Her world-building is excellent; she instantly draws readers into the past through her sensory-laden prose. May leave you hungry, may not — depends on how deeply you crave peacock meatballs, milk snails, and flamingo tongues.

 

 

A woman underwater covering her face.

The Deep End of the Sea by Heather Lyons.

The Deep End of the Sea by Heather Lyons
A clever reimagining of Medusa that tackles relatable themes of loneliness and companionship. It follows Medusa through her daily life of isolation as she reminisces on her long-lost days of human existence and waits for something to break the monotony of life as a lone monster. She begins to seek solace in visits from the god Hermes, and as the years roll by, their relationship strengthens. A feminist take on Medusa that grants her much more happiness than the myths.

 

 

 

An illustration of a woman in all orange with sun rays radiating from her head.

Ariadne by Jennifer Saint.

Ariadne by Jennifer Saint
Jennifer Saint’s Ariadne is a formidable new force in mythological retellings. It follows Ariadne and Phaedra, princesses of Crete, from the birth of their younger half-brother Asterion (more popularly known as the Minotaur) to their subsequent separations, marriages, and tragic ends. This is a well-written woman-centered story that breathes life into mythical characters. Saint raises questions of women’s autonomy and her characters acknowledge and challenge their own limitations in a world that disproportionately punishes women. Fans of Madeline Miller, Margaret Atwood, and Pat Barker will find much to savor in this bold new story.

 

A girl in a pink coat holds a statuette of the Eiffel Tower.

Lovely War by Julie Berry. Click for catalog link.

Lovely War by Julie Berry
Set against the backdrops of World War I and II, Lovely War follows Aphrodite, Hephaestus, and Ares as they recount the lives of four teenagers finding love during the Great War. Filled with memorable characters, lush prose, and vivid settings, the novel considers how love persists even in immense peril. The Olympian trio provides a timeless framing to the woven narrative of the two young couples fighting for their lives and their happiness amidst a global catastrophe.

 

 

 

A black cover with a bust of a Grecian marble statue with the title "The Maidens" covering the eyes.

The Maidens by Alex Michaelides. Release date June 2021.

The Maidens by Alex Michaelides
One by one, the students of a brilliant, charismatic Cambridge classics professor are found dead. Grieving therapist Mariana receives a panicked call from her niece Zoe, whose friend and classmate is the first to show up brutally murdered in the woods off campus. Rushing to Cambridge – a place imbued with memories, as she recalls meeting her recently deceased husband when they were young students there – Mariana comforts Zoe and starts to pick apart the threads of the mystery unraveling before her. If you’ve read The Secret History by Donna Tartt, this classics-inspired contemporary thriller should definitely be on your to-read shelf.

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