Regaining Unconsciousness - by Harryette Mullen (Paperback)

About the Book

Book Synopsis

Harryette Mullen is one of contemporary poetry's most influential voices, for her inventive language play, keen wit, formal experimentation, and pointed critique of American culture. In Regaining Unconsciousness, her first new collection in twelve years, Mullen confronts the imminent dangers of our present to sound an alarm for our future, to wake us out of our complicity and despondency: Can we, even still, find our way to our unconscious selves, beyond our capacity to harm, subdue, and consume?

In eleven taut sections written in the eleventh hour of our collective being, these poems address climate change, corporate greed, racist violence, artificial intelligence, the pollution of our oceans, individualism at the cost of mutual wellness, and the consequences of not addressing these pressing issues. Mullen imagines, as we must, our apocalypse, and yet, in an astounding feat, she does so with playfulness and wry referentiality that make these poems surprisingly buoyant, funny, and readable. Our end may be inevitable, Mullen admits, but maybe we begin with gratitude.

Review Quotes

Publishers Weekly Best Books of 2025 (Poetry)

Praise for Regaining Unconsciousness:

"This wildly imaginative work speaks to the present times with a powerful urgency."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"A triumphant return of a key authority on compressed, dazzling, and true poems."--Cindy Juyoung Ok, Poetry Northwest

"Harryette Mullen's poems are little marvels of aerodynamics--seemingly equal parts tension and structure, held together by the very vectors that pull us apart. In Regaining Unconsciousness, we see her maneuver through the perilous atmospheres of this late-capitalist landscape, slipping between deadly downdrafts, surfing riptides and red tides, surveying factory farms and server farms while, in the cities, sparks fly from block to block. With her deft manipulations of form and tone, language takes on frequencies--low-pitched but penetrating--that show us the fissures and instabilities of the structures in which we shelter. One of our most influential poets, Mullen is an American original, as indispensable as she is uncompromising, whose cold comforts offer a bracing antidote to these overheated times."--Monica Youn, author of From From

"In Harryette Mullen's furious drylongso salvo, Regaining Unconsciousness, the poet rolls as solo mysterioso performing 'doom indigo, ' foot to the una corda pedal. Ahead: the heedless hunger that both chauffeurs and rides the super consumer Death Drive. Athwart: Brooks, Brecht, and Bugs blur under billboards that shill blood spillage, nanoplastic, and digital clouds. Mullen, lexical genius she is, still ain't playing even when she plays, ears attuned to ruin's rubato, eyes on a burning city on a burning world. And she is unamused."--Douglas Kearney, author of Sho

"Harryette Mullen's Regaining Unconsciousness is just the poetry collection we need for an unstable, unpredictable world--and possibly her best book yet. Mullen treats us to a characteristically rich feast of sonic surprises and wicked wordplay as she navigates the territory of electoral politics and AI, loneliness and marine life, capitalism and climate change. There is a lot of amuse-bouche in this food for thought, but be forewarned: some of these poems have 'pointy teeth' and real bite."--Evie Shockley, author of Suddenly We

"Regaining Unconsciousness unfolds like wisdoms written on the walls of a maze of mirrors. Straightforward passages turn into figurative reflections and allusive pathways. Brain fog, existential robot anxiety, a vanity plate reading 'LUVTOFU' every illumination casts or throws a variety of shade. No poet is more mercurial while frank, more understated while exacting, or more enlightened while inquisitive. Regaining Unconsciousness is every bit as virtuosic and singular as the great Harryette Mullen."--Terrance Hayes, author of So to Speak

Praise for Harryette Mullen:

"Mullen's is a stunningly lyrical voice, rich and resonant, engaged and engaging."―Henry Louis Gates Jr.

"Harryette Mullen oftentimes engages language as a kind of a plaything, but is always aware that it's volatile, like somebody juggling nitroglycerin."--Douglas Kearney

About the Author