I think that Citizen is a very powerful book. The thing that draws me to the book most is the way in which it is written. The writing is very poetic, and I would argue that Citizen is more poetry than prose. I think out of the parts of the book that I have read so far, my favorite line--and a line that perfectly supports my argument--is the first paragraph on the first page of actual writing:
"When you are alone and too tired even to turn on any of your devices, you let yourself linger a past stacked among your pillows. Usually you are nestled under blankets and the house is empty. Sometimes the moon is missing and beyond the windows the low, gray ceiling seems approachable. Its dark light dims in degrees depending on the density of clouds and you fall back into that which gets reconstructed as metaphor," (5).
This, to me, is a perfect example of the amazing way in which Claudia Rankine writes. She immediately draws the reader right into the experience, and many emotions are triggered by the writing. It is exactly like Perrine wrote--poetry is very experiential--and Rankine's seems to emulate all of the aspects that Perrine included in his chapter, "What is Poetry?"
Nice post! That paragraph jumped out at me too. When I was reading it I felt like I was there in that moment, not sitting in the classroom. Rankine's language is so intriguing. I agree that her poetry contains all the aspects that Perrine wrote about.
ReplyDeleteI agree also! I think some of parts of the book are really poetic while some are just written in prose. However, the poetic parts really wouldn't be set up without the prose.
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