Description

To be human is to want to participate, even if it means opening yourself up to the world’s violent, hurtful treatment. To be a citizen is to be expected to participate, even when the society you live in imprisons, harms and kills bodies that look like yours. Citizen is a literary testimony to how racism permeates our daily lives and one of the most widely read and talked-about American poetry collections of recent years. Through a blend of poetry, prose, essays and imagery, Rankine pinpoints the difficulties of being the ‘other’ and challenges our understanding of the concept of citizenship.

Translators: Marie Silkeberg and Jenny Tunedal