In the Realms of the Unreal: Insane Writings - Softcover

Oakes, John

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0941423573 ISBN 13: 9780941423571

Publisher: Da Capo Press, 1993

Synopsis

"Demanding but mind expanding . . . A fascinating study of language's slippery relation to reality."--Publishers Weekly

A selection of prose and poetry written by those whom society has deemed mentally unbalanced, In the Realms of the Unreal is an international compilation involving the active participation of individuals and institutions in the U.S., Switzerland, Austria, Germany, and France. This anthology is meant to be a window on alternative ways of seeing, a beginner's guide to what the "insane" can offer those of us with more conventional outlooks.

Introduced by Kurt Vonnegut and with a foreword by the editor, In the Realms of the Unreal contains more than three hundred works--including short essays, poems, and stories--by nearly one hundred individuals. Most of the contributors to the anthology have never before been published, and currently are institutionalized.

About this title

Review:

In the introduction to this startling collection of "insane writings," Kurt Vonnegut makes the point that " creative people have thoughts unlike those of the general population." He adds that talent in writing must accompany those thoughts, as they do in these brilliant poems, essays, and stories by unique individuals who have been "culled" by society and who exist in institutions or under the label of "insane." From wordplay such as that of the Language poets to speculation on the meaning of life and chance, expression of alternative visions by previously unheard and unpublished writers makes the collection mind-expanding and very real.

From Publishers Weekly:

In presenting these writings--all by individuals institutionalized for insanity--"for their intrinsic worth" rather than as "clues to someone's 'illness,' " the editors (Oakes is copublisher of Four Walls and Kennison is a freelance editor) take a bold step. They require readers to respond to these poems and prose pieces, written over the last 100 years in various countries, without assimilating them as aberrations. Given the profoundly strange uses of language that characterize most of them, the works make for demanding but mind-expanding reading. German Gustav Sievers's extraordinary essay conflates race and geography through profuse punning. The Black Sea, he explains, "linguistically lacked only an nstet roman on the end of Sea ( See ), in order to make the Blacks see ." Swiss writer Jules Doudin revels in Joycean variant spellings: "Ide bee blyged iff yoo cood spair a pockit hanker cheef." Doudin's translator, however, renders the work of Frenchman Sylvain Lecocq in suspiciously similar language. For two writers from different countries and times (Doudin wrote in 1927 and Lecocq in 1949) to share so idiosyncratic a style seems unlikely, and one wonders if this is not an instance of the assimilation the editors set out to avoid. Nonetheless, these documents provide a fascinating study of language's slippery relation to reality.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Da Capo Press
• Publication date: 1993
• ISBN 10: 0941423573
• ISBN 13: 9780941423571
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 272