The Fat Kid [Paperback]

Paul Vermeersch (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1550225154 | ISBN-13: 978-1550225150 | Publication Date: April 1, 2002

Chronicling a childhood troubled by obesity, poor body image, and low self-esteem, this collection of poetry reveals how the media's perfect faces, societal expectations, family concerns, and primitive socialization rituals collide with the physical and emotional tribulations of adolescence to drive Calvin Little over the edge. He'll stop at nothing to become beautiful and weightless, but he must conceal his battle with what the world has come to know as a girl's disease. Is there redemption in social acceptance, in romantic love, in escaping gravity? Is it enough to learn to love oneself? Calvin's journey is told in a sequence of poems steeped in both the physical and psychological worlds, in voices that range from the bawdy to the elegiac. Through these poems, Calvin Little becomes the ideal antihero for a shallow culture obsessed with thin.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Paul Vermeersch is a Toronto-based poet and editor who is currently the poetry editor for Insomniac Press. His first collection of poems, Burn, was a finalist for the 2001 Gerald Lampert Memorial Award for the best English language poetic debut in Canada. In 1998 he founded the I.V. Lounge Reading Series, where he continues to curate and host readings on a regular basis. His anthology The I.V. Lounge Reader was published in 2001.

Product Details

• Paperback: 80 pages
• Publisher: ECW Press (April 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1550225154
• ISBN-13: 978-1550225150
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 6.1 x 0.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,317,098 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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