WINNER OF THE 2021 CLMP FIRECRACKER AWARD FOR POETRY • FINALIST FOR THE 2021 LAMBDA LITERARY AWARD IN GAY POETRY • A WASHINGTON POST BEST POETRY COLLECTION OF 2020 • AN NPR FAVORITE BOOK OF 2020 • A NEW YORK TIMES NEW AND NOTEWORTHY BOOK • A BUZZFEED MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF 2020 • A LITERARY HUB MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF 2020
THE MALEVOLENT VOLUME EXPLORES THE MYTHS AND TRANSFORMATIONS OF BLACK BEING, ON A CONTINUUM BETWEEN THE MONSTROUS AND THE SUBLIME.
Subverting celebrated classics of poetry and mythology and examining horrors from contemporary film and cultural fact, National Book Award winner Justin Phillip Reed engages darkness as an aesthetic to conjure the revenant animus that lurks beneath the exploited civilities of marginalized people. In these poems, Reed finds agency in the other-than-human identities assigned to those assaulted by savageries of the state. In doing so, he summons a retaliatory, counter-violent Black spirit to revolt and to inhabit the revolting.
“Reed blends intersectional politics and bodily hunger in precise, thorny language.”—New York Times
