Trespassing in the Archive

In Joyce's Ulysses, Stephen Dedalus declares that 'History is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake.' Nearly a century's worth of nightmares, both factual and refractory, farther along, poetry finds itself once again fascinated with history as a literal substance and real-world destination. And so the works that Kristina Darling has gathered here might more accurately be described as expeditions rather than essays. Each has its particular valor and passionate curiosity. Taken all together, they constitute a marvelous wakefulness and revelation. * Donald Revell, Professor of English, University of Nevada, USA *
Though the essays in this provocative collection cover a tremendous range—from a 17th c. Chinese courtesan to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice to H.D. and Freud—they all speak to our contemporary moment with social and political relevance. Foregrounded in all are the ethical issues that working with an archive inevitably raises, and the forms their responsibility takes are nuanced and penetrating. Full of lively writing and engaging detail, it’s an invaluable document for thinking through our interactions with the past and how they affect our obligations to the future. * Cole Swenson, Professor Emerita of Literary Arts, Brown University, USA *