Robin Coste Lewis Livres

Exploring themes of Black joy and survival, the author intertwines poetry with a collection of family photographs discovered after her grandmother's death. This work challenges conventional narratives around race and the Great Migration, presenting a fresh perspective on Black culture. Through vivid imagery and personal reflections, the author aims to honor her heritage and reshape the conversation surrounding these historical experiences, offering a powerful alternative to mainstream representations.

Robin Coste Lewis's electrifying collection is a triptych that begins and ends with lyric poems meditating on the roles desire and race play in the construction of the self. In the center of the collection is the title poem, "Voyage of the Sable Venus," an amazing narrative made up entirely of titles of artworks from ancient times to the present-titles that feature or in some way comment on the black female figure in Western art. Bracketed by Lewis's own autobiographical poems, "Voyage" is a tender and shocking meditation on the fragmentary mysteries of stereotype, juxtaposing our names for things with what we actually see and know. A new understanding of biography and the self, this collection questions just where, historically, do ideas about the black female figure truly begin-five hundred years ago, five thousand, or even longer? And what role did art play in this ancient, often heinous story? Here we meet a poet who adores her culture and the beauty to be found within it. Yet she is also a cultural critic alert to the nuances of race and desire-how they define us all, including her own sometimes painful history. Lewis's book is a thrilling aesthetic anthem to the complexity of race-a full embrace of its pleasure and horror, in equal parts.

This National Book Award-winning debut poetry collection is a "powerfully evocative" (The New York Review of Books) meditation on the black female figure through time. Robin Coste Lewis's electrifying collection is a triptych that begins and ends with lyric poems meditating on the roles desire and race play in the construction of the self. In the center of the collection is the title poem, "Voyage of the Sable Venus," an amazing narrative made up entirely of titles of artworks from ancient times to the present—titles that feature or in some way comment on the black female figure in Western art. Bracketed by Lewis's own autobiographical poems, "Voyage" is a tender and shocking meditation on the fragmentary mysteries of stereotype, juxtaposing our names for things with what we actually see and know. A new understanding of biography and the self, this collection questions just where, historically, do ideas about the black female figure truly begin—five hundred years ago, five thousand, or even longer? And what role did art play in this ancient, often heinous story? Here we meet a poet who adores her culture and the beauty to be found within it. Yet she is also a cultural critic alert to the nuances of race and desire—how they define us all, including her own sometimes painful history. Lewis's book is a thrilling aesthetic anthem to the complexity of race—a full embrace of its pleasure and horror, in equal parts.

Dieses Buch widmet Robin Coste Lewis den vergessenen Frauen und Männern, deren Körper lange vor, während und nach der Sklaverei Bilder rahmten, Möbel verzierten, Kunstgegenstände dekorierten. Aus einem Experiment im Archiv entstand diese elektrisierende poetische Reise, die sich an den historischen Beginn von Stereotypen und ethnischer Herabsetzung begibt. Bis in die vorchristliche Zeit reichen die Fundstücke zurück, aus denen Lewis ihr lyrisches Geschichtsbuch montiert, das auf so berührende wie schockierende Weise abbildet, wie Kunst und Sprache sich in den Dienst der Barbarei stellen. Die Reise der Schwarzen Venus führt dabei durch das antike Rom und Griechenland, das Mittelalter, die Kolonial- und Postkolonialzeit bis in die amerikanische Bürgerrechtsbewegung, die Postmoderne und schließlich die Gegenwart. Die Lyrik von Robin Coste Lewis zeigt in betörend schöner Sprache, aber schonungslos in ihren Motiven, wie sich Objektivierung und Rassismus konsequent durch jenen Lebensbereich zogen und ziehen, den wir Kultur nennen.