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Order Putinoika by Giannina Braschi
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COMING SEPTEMBER 2024
Praise for Putinoika
“In Giannina Braschi’s churning imagination, in her exuberant, upwelling, hilarious and mortifying performances of wonderment, howl, synchronic time, ethical insistence, and linguistic swirl, it’s not unusual to find words such as ‘generosity’ and ‘spirit’ leading, in the same sentence, to ‘welfare,’ ‘radiation,’ and ‘tax deductions.’ If, as in Ezra Pound’s translation of Aristotle, the ‘swift perception of relations’ is truly the ‘hallmark of genius,’ it’s in the brightly lit halls of Braschi’s books where poetry is tested and stamped with such a mark. Like her character, Frenzy, she’s a provocateur who believes in and pledges her fidelity only to ‘everything that exists.’”
—Forrest Gander, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and author of Mojave Ghost
“This powerful, funny, profound, wise, crazed book is a wild ride. It is a bomb (a poem?, a novel?, a play?, fiction? essay?, comedy?, drama? all of the above?). It is a meditation on poetry, art, the pandemia, politics, Trump, his wall, the Putinas, the author, Puerto Rico, Oedipus, and Baudelaire. I laughed to tears here and there while the book displays one of the cruelest portraits of our times. Bravo, Giannina!”
—Carmen Boullosa, award-winning poet, novelist, and playwright
“Braschi’s Putinoika, like Hegel’s Phenomenology, presents readers with a gallery of voices through which the collective zeitgeist—dominated by the crumbling hegemony of the United States—may come to recollect the chaotic shapes of its barely figurable past. But unlike the Hegelian spirit, the spirits that traverse Braschi’s work urge us to ‘confront the terror that happens in the void where nothing works,’ encouraging us to envision a future beyond the eternal return of the same. Readers familiar with her œuvre will find Putinoika quintessential Braschi: witty, irreverent, and astonishingly lucid!”
—Ronald Mendoza-de Jesús, Associate Professor, Comparative Literature, Emory University
“Braschi’s most audacious and electrifying creation yet! This thrilling ride spans from classical Greece to front page news, where the supernatural dances with the mundane, and the surreal becomes everyday reality. This isn’t just a read; it’s an experience—a whirlwind of recent history where anything can happen and often does. Eccentric, hilarious, and profound, Putinoika is the rara avis of modern literature—a true original that shatters conventions and leaves an indelible mark on your soul. As Tony Kushner gives us Angels in America marking the AIDS epidemic and Perestroika, Braschi gives us Putinas in America amidst the global pandemic with Putinoika. Her fearless storytelling sweeps you off your feet.”
—Nuria Morgado, Director, North American Academy of the Spanish Language and Correspondent, Royal Spanish Academy
“With Putinoika, Braschi makes a quantum leap which takes the novel from an unprecedented level of experimentation and into a new dimension. A polyphony of voices fizz, crackle, and cackle in a tour de force of philosophical poetry and poetical philosophy, offering a biting and hilarious denunciation of Trump’s America.”
—Madelena Gonzalez, Chair, Anglophone Literature, University of Avignon
“Sheer genius. From the tallest rooftops of Manhattan to the greenest pastorals in Empire of Dreams—and from Segismundo’s peekies under Lady Liberty’s skirt to the foulest scents coming out of the funerary processions of sardines in United States of Banana—Braschi’s penned worlds have irresistibly led us readers to great flats and depths. Her latest book, Putinoika, brings us home to another kind of empire of dreams, where debts of all kinds, sizes, and reaches run rampant alongside the magnificent deconstructor that is her poetic narrative mishmash. In impeccable comic mode, this new chapter of the history of empires ushers in the clash of a new round of bizarre titans. Bravo!”
—María M. Carrión, Professor, Comparative Literature and Religion, Emory University
“Braschi teaches us all how the barriers between languages, nationalities, styles, and genres were meant to be torn down. Her ludic intellect and literary innovation have made her a beloved fixture of the global literary ecosystem, and Putinoikawill only cement this status. We are honored to have featured the first published excerpt from the book in Latin American Literature Today, and to share in Braschi’s mission of breaking through the illusory boundaries that now, more than ever, seem determined to keep us apart.”
—Marcelo Rioseco, Editor-in-Chief, Latin American Literature Today
“Putinoika defines quality as ‘experience condensed in a moment.’ The book is pure quality, an explosion of literary genres, from the dithyrambic roots of Greek drama to contemporary narratives. The sudden release of literary boundaries simultaneously exposes inevitable connections between fictional and real characters and affirms the bond between personal fulfillment and socio-political conditions. ‘There is a crack in everything’ thus, Oedipus’s predicament, Antigone’s choice, the rites of Maenads, Trump doubles, the recent pandemic, and biblical fat and lean cows, all sing a handcuffed muses’ song and let light flow. Through brilliant and incessant juxtapositions Putinoika creates its own time. It takes place in the whenever, at whatever time mundane experiences, struggle, passion, and creativity demand that reason be imbued with feeling. The third and final part of the book, perfectly situates the entire work within ‘the No of furies’ and the ‘Yes’ of their blessing. In short, Braschi’s book sublimely calls readers to experience themselves anew, this time, in full context.”
—Anne Ashbaugh, Chair, Philosophy and Religious Studies, Towson University
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