The History of Anonymity (The VQR Poetry Series) [Paperback]

Jennifer Chang (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 29, 2008 | Series: The VQR Poetry Series

This debut collection of vivid, lyrical poems explores the emotional landscape of childhood without confession and without straightforward narrative. Chang sweeps together myth and fairy tale, skirting the edges of events to focus on the psychological tenor of experience: the underpinnings of identity and the role of nature in both constructing and erasing a self. From the edge of the ocean, where things constantly shift and dissolve, through "the forest's thick, / where the trees meet the dark," to an imaginary cliffside town of fog, this book makes a journey both natural and psychological, using experiments in language and form to capture the search for personhood and place.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In the face of helplessness, the speaker of Chang's intense poems seeks to harness the power of nature: the mysterious force of the ocean and its often sinister inhabitants, as well as birds, which perhaps Chang overuses. She is at her best and boldest in raw poems such as Innocence Essay, which revisits the terror and desperation felt by an abused child. It's at the center of the book's haunting second section—following the extended title poem that opens the book—in which, with the nighttime forest as a backdrop, Chang ponders just how alive nature really is: every puddle rivers with desire. If nature is no less complex than humanity, it is perhaps less willful in its brutality, which is a small consolation. The final section continues the narrative of the victimized child, her sister, and her mother, with frankness and a refreshing lack of melodrama. (Apr.)
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Review

"In this remarkable first collection, Jennifer Chang writes, 'You don't see the black line of yourself, the vanishing you slowly come to.' Spare yet sinuous; haunted, visionary; these poems continually enact encounters between what vanishes and what burns in the body and mind."--Arthur Sze, author of Quipu

"These poems seem to exist inside the natural world, as if sea and tree were garments that the poet wears as a first skin. The open form therefore allows for ample movement and air, while she tries to shuck off primary human relationships in favor of this first one. The poems are open, easy to read and pleasurable to feel as expressions."--Fanny Howe, author of Lyrics

"[Chang] is at her best and boldest in raw poems . . . The final section continues the narrative of the victimized child, her sister, and her mother, with frankness and a refreshing lack of melodrama."--Publishers Weekly

"Chang's collection is prone to return to mind. It leaves you with a sense of its polish, the sharp observations ("Be silent as the 'e' in house") hidden in the smooth surface of the words, which seem to sit like the title: burned into a mythic landscape, wide as the sea. Even as you read, it both approaches and recedes."--C-ville Weekly

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Product Details

• Paperback: 96 pages
• Publisher: University of Georgia Press (February 29, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0820331163
• ISBN-13: 978-0820331164
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.4 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #995,660 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Finally, a good poetry book! Deep, and with a certain gravity., November 25, 2011

By 

Ravi C. (San Francisco, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The History of Anonymity (The VQR Poetry Series) (Paperback)

I'm partway through HYPHEN magazine's recommended list of Asian American poetry books, and I found many books on the list not to my liking or merely adequate (Perhaps my own poetry would qualify for the dislike of others, but you'll have to be the judge of that. I'm in Indivisible: An Anthology of Contemporary South Asian American Poetry, a really amazing anthology, and my own modest book just came out, a fox peeks out: poems.)

That is to say, I'd been disappointed by many books that have won awards and gained national and even international prominence. My friend suggested that I stop reading award winning poetry books, and read Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet and Alice Fulton's One Continuous Mistake : Four Noble Truths for Writers and Feeling as a Foreign Language and Bayles' Art & Fear: Observations On the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking, as well as write a poem a day. That I will do, but first I have to get through this darn list.

HYPHEN's book editors write of this book, Chang's "poems hinge on the edges of psychological devastation and renewal. Defying straightforward narrative in favor of sprawling, associative impressions, Chang employs abundant natural imagery to explore the dark side of relationships, memory and loss."

I was very pleased and taken with Chang's book. I felt moved by her thoughts, and connected to the losses and difficulties she touches on. She has a comfortable command of technical precision, and I wasn't disappointed in the least by her choices, in fact, just the opposite. There was a lot to hold my attention in her wordings and evocations. There is no hyperdramatic trilling here, only a searching and knowing. I liked the entire experience of this debut volume, and especially the last two poems, "I am in Unction now", and "Can something broken be so beautiful?"

From the first:

"All my life I have known
Mother stood beside a hole.

Some people carry shadows,
bad weather, but she nursed

an emptiness none of us could fill.
She liked the pain of space

and would not let Father walk with her..."

"What else have I lost? If I write a list,
I will lost the thing, the desire

for retrieval. So I tell myself. Unction
is a town of glass, not an escape.

I am tired of the past.
I am so tired."

And the last poems ends thus:

"I raise my arms
into the air. I would like to reach for something."

This is fine quality work. I look forward to reading more from Jennifer Chang.