Tula: Poems
Dec 2016 · Milkweed Editions
5.0star
1 reviewreport
Ebook
119
Pages
family_home
Eligible
info
reportRatings and reviews aren’t verified Learn More
About this ebook
A debut poetry collection exploring themes of family and identity while examining the experiences of a second-generation Filipino immigrant in America.
Tula: a ruined Toltec capital; a Russian city known for its accordions; Tagalog for “poem.”
Prismatic, startling, rich with meaning yet sparely composed, Chris Santiago’s debut collection of poems—selected by A. Van Jordan as the winner of the 2016 Lindquist & Vennum Prize for Poetry—begins with one word and transforms it, in a dazzling sleight of hand, into a multivalent symbol for the immigrant experience. Tula: Santiago reveals to readers a distant land devastated by war. Tula: its music beckons in rhythms, time signatures, and lullabies. Tula: can the poem, he seems to ask, build an imaginative bridge back to a family lost to geography, history, and a forgotten language?
Inspired by the experiences of the second-generation immigrant who does not fully acquire the language of his parents, Tula paints the portrait of a mythic homeland that is part ghostly underworld, part unknowable paradise. Language splinters. Impossible islands form an archipelago across its landscape. A mother sings lullabies and a father works the graveyard shift in Saint Paul—while in the Philippines, two dissident uncles and a grandfather send messages and telegrams from the afterlife.
Deeply ambitious, a collection that examines the shortcomings and possibilities of both language and poetry themselves, Tula introduces a major new literary talent.
Praise for Tula
“A book that both transports us and transforms us.” —Viet Thanh Nguyen
“A debut collection that is a spare, elegant engagement with language. . . . Santiago’s struggles with identity are well-explored, but his linguistic savvy and precision truly stand out.” —Publishers Weekly
“Santiago seems to recognize that words will always hold power, even as their meanings evolve. Through everything, Tula delves into these nuances of language: how it is suppressed, how it is weaponized, how it loves, how it informs, and how it is often as fleeting as a birdsong. Tula is therefore a celebration of the ephemeral and the permanent, a lovely testament to the beauty of contradiction.” —Chicago Review of Books
Tula: a ruined Toltec capital; a Russian city known for its accordions; Tagalog for “poem.”
Prismatic, startling, rich with meaning yet sparely composed, Chris Santiago’s debut collection of poems—selected by A. Van Jordan as the winner of the 2016 Lindquist & Vennum Prize for Poetry—begins with one word and transforms it, in a dazzling sleight of hand, into a multivalent symbol for the immigrant experience. Tula: Santiago reveals to readers a distant land devastated by war. Tula: its music beckons in rhythms, time signatures, and lullabies. Tula: can the poem, he seems to ask, build an imaginative bridge back to a family lost to geography, history, and a forgotten language?
Inspired by the experiences of the second-generation immigrant who does not fully acquire the language of his parents, Tula paints the portrait of a mythic homeland that is part ghostly underworld, part unknowable paradise. Language splinters. Impossible islands form an archipelago across its landscape. A mother sings lullabies and a father works the graveyard shift in Saint Paul—while in the Philippines, two dissident uncles and a grandfather send messages and telegrams from the afterlife.
Deeply ambitious, a collection that examines the shortcomings and possibilities of both language and poetry themselves, Tula introduces a major new literary talent.
Praise for Tula
“A book that both transports us and transforms us.” —Viet Thanh Nguyen
“A debut collection that is a spare, elegant engagement with language. . . . Santiago’s struggles with identity are well-explored, but his linguistic savvy and precision truly stand out.” —Publishers Weekly
“Santiago seems to recognize that words will always hold power, even as their meanings evolve. Through everything, Tula delves into these nuances of language: how it is suppressed, how it is weaponized, how it loves, how it informs, and how it is often as fleeting as a birdsong. Tula is therefore a celebration of the ephemeral and the permanent, a lovely testament to the beauty of contradiction.” —Chicago Review of Books
Ratings and reviews
5.0
1 review
About the author
Chris Santiago’s poems, fiction, and criticism have appeared in FIELD, Copper Nickel, Pleiades, and the Asian American Literary Review. He holds degrees in creative writing and music from Oberlin College and received his PhD in English from the University of Southern California. The recipient of fellowships from Kundiman and the Mellon Foundation/American Council of Learned Societies, Santiago is also a percussionist and amateur jazz pianist. He teaches literature, sound culture, and creative writing at the University of St. Thomas. He lives in Minnesota.A. Van Jordan, who was the judge for the 2016 Lindquist & Vennum Prize, is the author of four poetry collections: Rise, which won the PEN/Oakland Josephine Miles Award; M-A-C-N-O-L-I-A, which was listed as one the Best Books of 2005 by the London Times; Quantum Lyrics; and The Cineaste. Jordan has been awarded a Whiting Writers Award, an Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, and a Pushcart Prize. He is also the recipient of a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, and a United States Artists Fellowship. He is the Henry Rutgers Presidential Professor at Rutgers University-Newark. He lives in Newark, NJ.
Rate this ebook
Tell us what you think.
Reading information
Smartphones and tablets
Install the Google Play Books app for Android and iPad/iPhone. It syncs automatically with your account and allows you to read online or offline wherever you are.
Laptops and computers
You can listen to audiobooks purchased on Google Play using your computer's web browser.
eReaders and other devices
To read on e-ink devices like Kobo eReaders, you'll need to download a file and transfer it to your device. Follow the detailed Help Center instructions to transfer the files to supported eReaders.
