Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by shimauchiha
Zong! by M. NourbeSe Philip
5.0
This is one of the cases where you absolutely need to have the context in order to really enjoy the book. You'll do better to do a little search and read the story behind the book, however, in a nutshell, Zong was the name of a slave ship which went on the wrong route and because of a shortage of food and water for all its passengers ended up drowning more than 100 of the slaves aboard it. Then the captain tried to get compensation from his insurance company for the "loss of property."
It became a court case and eventually, the request was denied, however, everyone involved also went free. No murder charges, nothing. There is a one-page document from the courtroom which summarises the whole thing.
This entire book is made solely out of the pieces of that document and nothing else.
Now that is pretty freaking badass.
I've been studying formlessness in literature and this one I think is the ultimate example of playing with form. There is something so tragic and absolutely sad in these poems that don't even seem to make sense at first. It seems to be the complete opposite of the courtroom document, even though their entire vocabulary is the same. Where that is an emotionless recount of the event, this is filled to brim with emotions that pour through the empty spaces between words.
It's a book worth studying and as someone who firmly believes books should be worth enjoying, I don't say that lightly.
It became a court case and eventually, the request was denied, however, everyone involved also went free. No murder charges, nothing. There is a one-page document from the courtroom which summarises the whole thing.
This entire book is made solely out of the pieces of that document and nothing else.
Now that is pretty freaking badass.
I've been studying formlessness in literature and this one I think is the ultimate example of playing with form. There is something so tragic and absolutely sad in these poems that don't even seem to make sense at first. It seems to be the complete opposite of the courtroom document, even though their entire vocabulary is the same. Where that is an emotionless recount of the event, this is filled to brim with emotions that pour through the empty spaces between words.
It's a book worth studying and as someone who firmly believes books should be worth enjoying, I don't say that lightly.