{"product_id":"9781770416611","title":"The Most Charming Creatures: Poems","description":"\u003ctable\u003e\u003ctbody\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAuthor\/Contributor(s):\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003eBarwin, Gary\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eECW Press\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eDate:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003e9\/20\/2022\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBinding:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003ePaperback\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eCondition:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003eNEW\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003c\/tbody\u003e\u003c\/table\u003eWith uncanny wit, inventive beauty, and numinous surprise, \u003ci\u003eThe Most Charming Creatures\u003c\/i\u003e explores the contemporary and its language, considering our wonder, sorrow, bewilderment, anxiety, and tenderness. While these poems energize and connect and “turn the paren- \/ theses inside out so that \/ we mean everything,” they are also alive to the alluring complicity of language and its duplicity and deceptions. “This is the way the world ends \/ Not with a bang but \/ while we watch.”\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eA follow-up to the award-winning author’s acclaimed selected poems, this new collection continues Barwin’s examination of the possibilities of the poem: a celebration, a story, an investigation, a riff, a word machine, a parable, a transformation. But what are the “most charming creatures” of the title? In 1862, scientific illustrator Ernst Haeckel termed radiolarians (ancient single-celled organisms with mineral skeletons) “the most charming creatures,” but here Barwin turns the microscope around to consider something just as strange and mysterious: language, our culture, and the self. From microorganisms, onion rings, grief, and Gerard Manley Hopkins to beetles, neoliberalism, sandwiches, Martin Luther, and stand-up comedy, he offers: “it’s a miracle that we’ve survived \/ it’s a miracle that we’ve survived at all.”","brand":"ECW Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46506369155327,"sku":"9781770416611","price":21.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0452\/0886\/2873\/files\/9781770416611_s600x595.jpg?v=1781621760","url":"https:\/\/massivebookshop.com\/products\/9781770416611","provider":"MASSIVE BOOKSHOP","version":"1.0","type":"link"}