C.D. Wright,Deborah Luster
"For a long while now, C. D. Wright has been writing some of the greatest poetry-cum-prose you can find in American literature. ,One Big Self, does to the contemporary prison-industrial complex what James Agee did to poverty â€” it reacts passionately and lyrically (and idiosyncratically) to a sociopolitical abomination. This book, while angry and sorrowful and bewildered, has humor, constant levity and candor, and countless moments of incredible beauty." â€”Dave Eggers, ,The New York Times Book Review,â€œWright has found a way to wed fragments of an iconic America to a luminously strange idiom, eerie as a tin whistle, which she uses to evoke the haunted quality of our carnal existence.â€â€”,The New Yorker,Inspired by numerous visits inside Louisiana state prisonsâ€”where MacArthur Fellow C.D. Wright served as a â€œfactotumâ€ for a portrait photographerâ€”,One Big Self, bears witness to incarcerated men and women and speaks to the psychic toll of protracted time passed in constricted space. It is a riveting mosaic of distinct voices, epistolary pieces, elements from a moralistic board game, road signage, prison data, inmate correspondence, and â€œcountsâ€ of thingsâ€”from babyâ€™s teeth to chigger bites:,Count your folding money,Count the times you said you wouldnâ€™t go back,Count your debts,Count the roaches when the light comes on,Count your kids after the housefire,One Big Self,â€”originally published as a large-format limited edition that featured photographs and textâ€”was selected by ,The New York Times, and ,The Village Voice, as a notable book of the year. This edition features the poem exclusively.,C.D. Wright, is the author of ten books of poetry, including several collaborations with photographer Deborah Luster. She is a professor at Brown University.
Poetry,Nonfiction,Academic,College,Academic,Grad School
One Big Self: An Investigation