To Compare - by Xuela Zhang (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

A bracing and variegated debut, Xuela Zhang's To Compare inhabits the fraught condition of living in and through translation in the age of globalization, social media, and the Chinese-American neo-Cold War. In To Compare, Zhang navigates the quagmire of transnational life, where one is always both here and away. "Has language/passed you by/like a curvy city/or shielded/and isolated you, /an illuminated vehicle/against the flooding/tenors of light?" Zhang writes in To Compare, reflecting on the nature of translation--both linguistic and otherwise-- as a way of life. Disjunctive, alluring, To Compare poetically represents our contemporary age.

Review Quotes

""In this book of poems packed with questions, some implicit, some explicit--what is it to think, to feel, to be, to have a body, to have a life that becomes "the animal one may slip into"--Xuela Zhang does the impossible: she embeds surprise in every page, sometimes in every line. Along with delightfully odd turns, there is subtle wit: "The park called Forest Park / seemed indeed like a forest." This mix of fun and incisive intelligence is not only persuasive, it is riveting.""--Mary Jo Bang "Mary Jo Bang"

""To Compare is a stunning collection that stitches together the personal, the political, and the powerfully observed. Zhang's poems are sharp lenses, refocusing our understanding of language, identity, and the restless act of translation. With a voice both tender and unsparing, she delivers a book that lingers long after the final line, humming with the quiet electricity of revelation.""--Matthias Göritz "Matthias Göritz"

About the Author

Born and raised in China, Xuela Zhang writes in English and Chinese. Her poems have appeared in Poetry, Oxford Poetry, Gulf Coast, Bennington Review, PROTOTYPE, and 诗刊Shikan, among others. She received her MFA in poetry from Columbia University and PhD in Comparative Literature from Washington University in St. Louis.