The Performance of Becoming Human

I encourage everyone to buy Daniel Borzutzky's The Performance of Becoming Human, a collection of poems linking the United States and Latin America. Borzutzky just won the National Book Award for it. He is also the son of my friend and longtime co-author Silvia Borzutzky. Here's how he sums it up:

When I wrote this book, I was thinking about Chicago, a city I’ve lived in for nearly 20 years and care for very deeply. I was thinking of how Chicago destroys itself, abolishes public services, closes psychiatric hospitals, privatizes or shutters its public schools, and militarizes its police,” said Borzutzky, who is of Chilean ancestry. “I was thinking about how Chicago is like the Chile my parents left behind in the 1970s, which destroyed itself in many of the same ways. I was thinking about immigrants, refugees, and workers in the U.S. and abroad who give up their lives to survive in economies that exploit them and make them invisible.”

Go check it out!