Details

ISBN-10: 194964118X
ISBN-13: 9781949641189
Publisher: Two Lines Press
Publish Date: 09/28/2021
Dimensions: 6.93" L, 5.91" W, 1.02" H

Cuíer

Paperback

Price: $16.95

Overview

For the first time, and against the backdrop of Bolsonaro’s emboldened far-right regime, Brazil’s legendary and pioneering queer writers appear together in English translation.

This far-reaching, bilingual assortment of fiction, poetry, nonfiction, and photography–erotic and personal, revolutionary, hopeful, joyous, and bitter–continues the legacy of defiant queer expression in Brazil and demands its prolific, unapologetic future.

In fresh and poetic prose, Raimundo Neto brings us lesser-known narratives of queer life in rural Brazil, including the story of a boy determined to become the “harvest bride” at a the local annual harvest dance. Poet Angélica Freitas details a disturbingly familiar world in which women are divided into rigid binaries–clean or dirty, good or bad–with stark language that builds into utter absurdity. And Caio Fernando Abreu sits in a hospital dying of AIDS, meeting with angels and writing letters in which he repeats “all I can do is write” like a mantra. Spanning four decades, and featuring a total of thirteen writers, Cuíer reminds us again, as Natalia Affonso says in her translation of Tatiana Nascimento’s poem:

…what we make

lying down is

also

revolution.

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Reviews

"A valuable addition to the significant body of gay, lesbian, and queer Brazilian literature, foremost because of the outstanding selection of writers it brings together...Cuíer's very diverse voices not only represent male gay or lesbian desire but, moving way beyond binary limitations, give expression to the full spectrum of human sexuality and queer identities, including those that refuse any such identification....A precious gem." World Literature Today

"The latest offering from Two Lines Press' chic Calico series is, like all its predecessors, expansively and thoughtfully curated...it will not deign to explain itself to us, if it does not want to. And this quality might well characterise all of the books in Two Lines' Calico series, but I find it especially apt here–in the lives of people for whom mystery might be a form of survival." Asymptote

"This anthology of translations is as much a gift as a collection, attempting to encapsulate the multitude of experiences that make up queer Brazil. Poetry and prose from some of Brazil's most profound writers appears on the page in the original Portuguese and in English translation, underscoring the importance of translation as an act of seeing and understanding....A must-read for those seeking to expand their global world view of queer life and literature." –Emily Dziuban, Booklist

"This eclectic bilingual anthology from queer Brazilian writers, both living and dead, is as expansive and full of life as the country itself...enticing and poignant." Publishers Weekly

P>"A lively collection...American readers will easily connect with the universality of queer experiences portrayed, from romance, to coming out, to struggling with identity and with AIDS, but will find them enlivened and made fresh again by uniquely Brazilian details." –Passport

"A concise and enlightening overview of the last fifty years of LGBTQ literature from South America's largest country. Spanning Brazil's regional boundaries and including legends such as Ana Cristina Cesar, Caio Fernando Abreu, and Wilson Bueno, as well as newer voices such as Marcio Junqueira, Cristina Judar, and Angélica Freitas among many others, Cuíer is nothing less than divine!" –John Keene, author of Counternarratives

"Fabulously queer in both senses of the word: it's unlike anything you've encountered before, yet ever familiar." –Rabih Alameddine, author of The Wrong End of the Telescope

"Oppression and liberation, struggle and joy, lots of sex and community, complicated childhood awakenings, coming-out euphorias, adulthood analyses–Cuier merges the universality of queer experiences with the specificity of the Brazilian culture, creating an an inspiring collection of angles and stances, forms and attitudes, that carries through to the very last, moving piece." –Michelle Tea, author of Against Memoir

"Cuíer: Queer Brazil is a thrilling collection of joyous and ruinous life in all of its contradictions. Like Kafka's parables or Lispector's The Passion According to G.H., the work in this volume makes a profound ethical statement: to depict honestly one's life at oblique angles, often beautiful, often terrifying, can be both personal and revolutionary." –Patrick Cottrell, editor of McSweeney's 62: The Queer Fiction Issue

Praise for the Calico Series

"Stone, earth, water, ice, wind, and burning heat. The stories here dig deep and unexpectedly into life's fundamentals–the elements and the passions–bringing into English, many for the first time, writers of stature from across the globe. A celebration of both storytelling and translation, Elemental is essential; a gift that opens up the pleasures of new worlds." –Hugh Raffles, author of The Book of Unconformities, on Elemental

"Marvelous...a credit to the art of both poets and translators." –Cynthia Hogue, author of In June the Labyrinth and co-translator of Joan Darc, by Nathalie Quintane, on Home

"This remarkable anthology of Chinese speculative fiction offers seven tales of societal responsibility and individual freedom.... By turns cryptic and revealing, phantasmagorical and straightforward, these tales balance reality and fantasy on the edge of a knife."Publishers Weekly, starred review of That We May Live

"With enthralling and precise language, this first book in Two Lines Press' Calico series of collected translated literature impresses...This collection of speculative Chinese fiction is compelling and provocative, exploring the thin line between reality and absurdity. " Booklist, starred review of That We May Live

More Reviews

Details

ISBN-10: 194964118X
ISBN-13: 9781949641189
Publisher: Two Lines Press
Publish Date: 09/28/2021
Dimensions: 6.93" L, 5.91" W, 1.02" H
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