Of Sawako Nakayasu’s many literary endeavors—poetry, translation, performance art—it is hard to know where one begins and another ends. They each seem to not only be talking to each other but Sawako’s work also blurs the boundaries between them, nesting each within the next in a way that illuminates something about all three. Her latest poetry collection, Pink Waves, is a perfect example of this, poetry written within a durational performance, one that involves “microtranslations” of the syntax of the works of others. As Fred Moten says about Pink Waves: “In a deliberate lyricism of regathering, tethering, and receding precedence, in a perpetual canon that keeps spilling and sifting and replenishing what feels like dancing, in a series of breaks weaving wave and snap into writing that listens, Sawako Nakayasu takes the measure of the enjoyment we derive from sensing and making sense of this wasteland of bandwidth and access. Pink Waves is a delicate instrument. Its spare beauty picks up everything.”
Much of Sawako Nakayasu’s genre-transgressive work calls into question our notions of originality and selfhood, as she herself explores questions of race and gender and sexual orientation within her poems. By bringing together these various elements, Sawako Nakayasu creates generative questions: How can queer theory speak to translation practices? How can we engage with questions of power between nations and languages and cultures by the choices we make in translation? What does performance tell us about ourselves, and the notion of a self to begin with? And how do these performative and translational activities manifest in poetry, in poems?
If you enjoy today’s conversation consider joining the Between the Covers community as a listener-supporter. Each patron receives a resource-rich email with each episode and can participate in the collective brainstorm of who to invite in the future, and choose from a wealth of other rewards and gifts from rare collectibles to writing consultations. There is also the possibility of subscribing to the bonus audio archive which includes contributions from such luminary poets as Rosmarie Waldrop, Forrest Gander, Dionne Brand, Natalie Diaz, Nikky Finney, Arthur Sze, Layli Long Soldier, and many more. Check it all out at the show’s Patreon page.
And don’t miss today’s Bookshop!
The post Sawako Nakayasu : Pink Waves appeared first on Tin House.
JoAnna Novak : Contradiction Days
Jorie Graham : To 2040
Tin House Live : Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah on Surrealism
Roger Reeves : Dark Days
Isabella Hammad : Enter Ghost
Tin House Live : Max Porter on Shy
Megan Fernandes : I Do Everything I’m Told
Johanna Hedva : Your Love Is Not Good
Tin House Live : Katie Holten on The Language of Trees
Tin House Live: Richard Powers on The Overstory
Melanie Rae Thon : As If Fire Could Hide Us
Christina Sharpe : Ordinary Notes
Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o : The Language of Languages
Charif Shanahan : Trace Evidence
Sabrina Orah Mark : Happily
Monica Youn : From From
Jai Chakrabarti : A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness
Mariana Enriquez : Our Share of Night
Gabrielle Bates : Judas Goat
Georgi Gospodinov : Time Shelter
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Lit Society: Books and Drama
Ex Libris
Write The Book: Conversations on Craft
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
The Turn of the Screw
Fresh Air
Myths and Legends