Asylum

Fiction & Literature, Poetry, American
Cover of the book Asylum by Quan Barry, University of Pittsburgh Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Quan Barry ISBN: 9780822979319
Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press Publication: September 16, 2001
Imprint: University of Pittsburgh Press Language: English
Author: Quan Barry
ISBN: 9780822979319
Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press
Publication: September 16, 2001
Imprint: University of Pittsburgh Press
Language: English

Winner of the 2000 Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize
2002 finalist in poetry, Society of Midland Authors

Quan Barry’s stunning debut collection has been compared to Sylvia Plath’s Ariel for the startling complexity of craft and the original sophisticated vision behind it. In these poems beauty is just as likely to be discovered on a radioactive atoll as in the existential questions raised by The Matrix.

Asylum  is a work concerned with giving voice to the displaced—both real and fictional. In "some refrains Sam would have played had he been asked" the piano player from Casablanca  is fleshed out in ways the film didn’t allow. Steven Seagal, Yukio Mishima, Tituba of the Salem Witch Trials, and eighteenth-century black poet Phillis Wheatley also populate these poems.

Barry engages with the world—the Tuskegee syphilis experiments, the legacy of the Vietnam war—but also tackles the broad meditative question of the individual’s existence in relation to a higher truth, whether examining rituals or questioning, "Where is it written that we should want to be saved?" Ultimately, Asylum finds a haven by not looking away.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

Winner of the 2000 Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize
2002 finalist in poetry, Society of Midland Authors

Quan Barry’s stunning debut collection has been compared to Sylvia Plath’s Ariel for the startling complexity of craft and the original sophisticated vision behind it. In these poems beauty is just as likely to be discovered on a radioactive atoll as in the existential questions raised by The Matrix.

Asylum  is a work concerned with giving voice to the displaced—both real and fictional. In "some refrains Sam would have played had he been asked" the piano player from Casablanca  is fleshed out in ways the film didn’t allow. Steven Seagal, Yukio Mishima, Tituba of the Salem Witch Trials, and eighteenth-century black poet Phillis Wheatley also populate these poems.

Barry engages with the world—the Tuskegee syphilis experiments, the legacy of the Vietnam war—but also tackles the broad meditative question of the individual’s existence in relation to a higher truth, whether examining rituals or questioning, "Where is it written that we should want to be saved?" Ultimately, Asylum finds a haven by not looking away.

More books from University of Pittsburgh Press

Cover of the book Comics and Memory in Latin America by Quan Barry
Cover of the book The Thin Wall by Quan Barry
Cover of the book My Brother is Getting Arrested Again by Quan Barry
Cover of the book Immigrant Model by Quan Barry
Cover of the book Director Of The World And Other Stories by Quan Barry
Cover of the book Love, Order, and Progress by Quan Barry
Cover of the book Ida Tarbell by Quan Barry
Cover of the book The State of the Art by Quan Barry
Cover of the book Dance Improvisations by Quan Barry
Cover of the book Guns at the Forks by Quan Barry
Cover of the book Star Journal by Quan Barry
Cover of the book Sure Signs by Quan Barry
Cover of the book From The Meadow by Quan Barry
Cover of the book Illness as Narrative by Quan Barry
Cover of the book Milk Black Carbon by Quan Barry
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy