Living in Language brings together reflections on the craft and purpose of poetry, by 21 leading poets from around the world. The lyric essays, fragments, letters and new poems in this groundbreaking anthology shed light on topics as diverse and vital as writing the body, writing in exile, writing as witness, writing as a shamanic act, grappling with traditional forms, discovering your own voice, and even translation and self-translation. This is an essential resource for anyone looking to broaden their horizons and engage with the cutting edge of poetry as it is practised, around the world, in the 21st century.

Diana Bellessi’s trail-blazing poetry has been a source of inspiration for successive generations of Argentine poets. For fifty years, her work has confronted social, ecological and colonial exploitation with poetry of ethical and lyrical integrity. This is the first single-author selection of her work to appear in English, drawing on six of her most vital collections. At the heart of the book is a sequence of sensual love poems that helped to establish a new directness in Latin American queer poetics. Includes an afterword by Mary Jean Chan.

“The apparent simplicity of Bellessi’s verse often belies a keen attention to imagery and musicality that Leo Boix brings vividly to life in the English translation.”- Mary Jean Chan

Living in Language brings together reflections on the craft and purpose of poetry, by 21 leading poets from around the world. The lyric essays, fragments, letters and new poems in this groundbreaking anthology shed light on topics as diverse and vital as writing the body, writing in exile, writing as witness, writing as a shamanic act, grappling with traditional forms, discovering your own voice, and even translation and self-translation. This is an essential resource for anyone looking to broaden their horizons and engage with the cutting edge of poetry as it is practised, around the world, in the 21st century.

Diana Bellessi’s trail-blazing poetry has been a source of inspiration for successive generations of Argentine poets. For fifty years, her work has confronted social, ecological and colonial exploitation with poetry of ethical and lyrical integrity. This is the first single-author selection of her work to appear in English, drawing on six of her most vital collections. At the heart of the book is a sequence of sensual love poems that helped to establish a new directness in Latin American queer poetics. Includes an afterword by Mary Jean Chan.

“The apparent simplicity of Bellessi’s verse often belies a keen attention to imagery and musicality that Leo Boix brings vividly to life in the English translation.”- Mary Jean Chan