Spectacular Influence, A
Because I have no voice anymore what I say has no air. Did I strangle you? I killed you to let the wind in.
Chantal Neveu's A Spectacular Influence inclines bodies and worlds, registering their turn as atomized events. This semantic partition distributed into four parts that decline the body's perplexity before the real, inscribes an intimate range of material probabilities and improbabilities.
Written in spare lines and minimalist language, A Spectacular Influence attends to the sensation of motional inertia and celebrates the relational in the human collective experience.
In a graceful, rich translation by acclaimed author and translator Nathanaïl, A Spectacular Influence confirms Neveu's poetic range and extends the elegant musicality of her earlier choreographic poem, Coit.
CHANTAL NEVEU is the author of several books of poetry, including you; La vie radieuse (This Radiant Life, winner of the 2021 Governor General’s Literary Award for Translation and the 2021 Nelson Ball Prize); coït (Coït); and Une spectaculaire influence (A Spectacular Influence). She has created numerous interdisciplinary literary works, in Canada and abroad. Her work has appeared in many magazines and anthologies. She has held residencies at Maison de la poésie de Nantes (France), Passa Porta and Villa Hellebosch (Belgium), and Villa Waldberta (Germany). Neveu lives in Montreal.
NATHANAËL is the author of many books written in English and French, and with variant names. Some titles include We Press Ourselves Plainly, Carnet de désaccords, Absence Where As (Claude Cahun and the Unopened Book). In addition to Catherine Mavrikakis, she has translated Gail Scott, Suzanne Jacob, John Keene as well as Édouard Glissant’s Poetic Intention. She lives in Chicago.
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