Portable Famine, The [Paperback]

Rane Arroyo (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1886157537 | ISBN-13: 978-1886157538 | Publication Date: November 30, 2005 | Edition: First Edition

The Portable Famine offers poems from Rane Arroyo's years of being an "interior exile" as a gay, Puerto Rican, and Midwestern writer whose travels have taken him throughout American cities such as Chicago, Miami, New York, New Orleans, Pittsburgh, and Toledo; the European cities of Florence, London, and Reykjavik; and locations across the Carribean, including Puerto Rico.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Proudly Puerto Rican and gay, well-traveled in the U.S. and Europe, and devoted to the modernist projects begun by Wallace Stevens and Hart Crane, Arroyo (Home Movies of Narcissus, etc.) makes all those identities and commitments evident in his compact, intelligent and sometimes sexy seventh book. Arroyo directs many poems here at artists and writers, among them Stevens; the Cuban poet Reinaldo Arenas (subject of the film Before Night Falls); and, in the opening lyric, "The Singer Enrique Iglesias as My Muse in These Troubled Times": in Iglesias's song, "Music yields to the yes underneath breath." Arroyo's well-controlled stanzas describe mourning, love and especially travel: New Orleans (before the hurricane); Chicago (where he grew up); Florence, Italy; London; Miami; Pittsburgh, Pa.; Provo, Utah; Palm Springs, Fla.; Reykjavik, Iceland; Ohio (where he teaches) and Puerto Rico offer subjects for solid poems. Arroyo's goals of modernist density and erotic immediacy sometimes get in each other's way. At his best, though, Arroyo (like Timothy Liu) can depict desire, frustration, a high culture heritage and an unwilling distance from that heritage, all in the same few lines: "My body," Arroyo writes, "wants/ to be someone else's history," even as he continues to show his readers his own. (Nov.)
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About the Author

Rane Arroyo was born in Chicago and began his writing career as a performance artist. He is also a playwright and fiction writer. He received a Ph.D. from the University of Pittsburgh. His awards include the Carl Sandburg Poetry Prize, a Pushcart Prize, the Stonewall Books National Chapbook Prize, The Sonora Review Chapbook Award, the George Houston Bass Award for Drama, and the Hart Crane Memorial Award. He is professor of English at the University of Toledo, where he directs the creative writing program.

Product Details

• Paperback: 63 pages
• Publisher: BkMk Press, University of Missouri-Kansas City; First Edition edition (November 30, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1886157537
• ISBN-13: 978-1886157538
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.7 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.2 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: #2,856,388 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Rane Arroyo (Ph.D., University of Pittsburgh) began his writing career as a performance artist. He is also a playwright, fiction writer and poet. He teaches creative writing at the University of Toledo and serves on the Board of Directors for the Association of Writers & Writing Programs (AWP). Arroyo's work has earned several awards, including the John Ciardi Poetry Prize, the Carl Sandburg Poetry Prize, an Ohio Arts Council Award for Excellence in Poetry, a Pushcart Prize and the Hart Crane Poetry Prize.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An eclectic collection of the great poet Rane Arroyo's most astute and memorable work, April 3, 2006

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Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Portable Famine, The (Paperback)

The Portable Famine is an eclectic collection of the great poet Rane Arroyo's most astute and memorable work. Among other great poets of modern day, Arroyo depicts an incredible perspective of the human condition, American mentality, and his intimate encounters with life itself. Mayberry, RFD: Not even one illegal Mexican/in the body shop? No Guatemalan/maid at One Hour Motel? Not//a Puertorriquena owning/a Tex-Mex restaurant? How/white is white? Poor Opie,//taught to fear jalapeños./Even in imaginary America,/America has to be imagined.