The Field Is Lethal

by Suzanne Doppelt

Poetry. Translated from the French by Cole Swensen. The supernatural, ventriloquism, table-turning, magic carpets, ghosts, THE FIELD IS LETHAL is immersed in a late nineteeth-century spiritualism. Borrowing freely from folklore and anecdote, Doppelt mixes oblique references, catching us in the sound and play of language as much as of ideas. Well-known as a photographer, Doppelt juxtaposes her text with delicate, eerie images. As Avital Ronell writes in her Postface for the book, we appreciate here "her manner, her astonishing modalities, the precision of her cuts."

Genres: Poetry

80 pages, Paperback

First published December 15, 2010

Reviews

[Tory Adkisson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book quite a bit. Non-linear, fragmented, fictive, consumed by the mechanism of the human body and the unusual power of dream logic, interspersed with abstract photography, I thought this was a compelling, prismatic examination of an artist's inner consciousness. A splaying of obsessions, rendered in pictures and lyrical prose. Swensen's translation is fluid and inventive. I highly recommend it.