New World: Infinitesimal Epics

The New World is a collection of miniature epics by Anthony Carellis that explores the idea of grace amid disarray, featuring a pilgrim-poet waiting for his child on the shores of a "disenstoried" land. The poems navigate through darkly comic episodes, alluding to Dante, and offer a unique perspective on the human experience, inviting readers to re-see, lament, and re-sing the stories we tell.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 80 pages
Publication date: 14 September 2021
Publisher: Princeton University Press

The New World, a captivating collection of poems by Anthony Carellis, emerges as an American travelogue, weaving a tapestry of darkly comic episodes that bear allusions to Dante's masterpiece throughout. Within these miniature epics, we encounter a pilgrim-poet, eagerly awaiting the arrival of his child, a would-be Columbus, upon the shores of a land "disenstoried" by explorers both present and past. This land and its people exist largely in the realms of mindscapes and mythscapes, haunted by hazy aspirational visions, misguided misremembering, and an overwhelming sense of emptiness. Despite this, the poet ventures forth to the shore, armed with a song, to sing for the child and the reader, urging them to do what Columbus never accomplished: to "land gently." Constantly challenging the rhetoric of inherited forms, the poet shaping these poems remains bound to the pilgrim, who cannot pretend to dissolve our purgatories but can only invite us, like a modern-day Virgil, deeper into the uncanny encounters that surround us. The New World unfolds a series of extraordinary spaces, allowing us to re-examine, grieve, and re-sing the stories we tell. From the Arizona nursing home, where a grandmother's memory of a stolen golden Schwinn in the occupied Philippines intertwines with the present, to a road trip west through Pennsylvania as sunrise transpires in the wrong sky, this collection opens our eyes to new perspectives, provoking deep emotions, and inspiring renewed appreciation for the rich tapestry of human experience.

Weight: 168g
Dimension: 155 x 234 x 11 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780691218793