Welcome to our (slightly belated!) selection of some of the new books we’ve had making their way onto the EFL shelves recently. As always, you can view the full list of our latest acquisitions at https://www.librarything.com/catalog/EFLOxford.
Kazim Ali. 2021. The Voice of Sheila Chandra.
The Poetry Book Society’s Summer 2021 Choice and the latest poetry collection from the U.S.-based poet Kazim Ali, The Voice of Sheila Chandra focuses on sound, voice, and the absence of voice. The collection is comprised of three long poems, separated by four shorter poems which act as interludes. The titular poem is named after Sheila Chandra, the London-born singer who in 2010 developed Burning Mouth Syndrome, a painful neurological condition which means she can no longer sing.
Jackson explores African fiction’s relationship with philosophy – as well as the broader connection between philosophy and African intellectualism in general – charting its development from the early twentieth century to the present. The book scrutinises works from South Africa, Ghana, Uganda and Zimbabwe, studying authors such as Imraan Coovadia, J. E. Casely Hayford, Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi and Tendai Huchu.
Luke Kennard. 2021. Notes on the Sonnets.
Kennard reinterprets Shakespeare’s 154 sonnets as prose poems, all set at the same miserable house party where the narrator talks to guests who claim they can recite any Shakespeare sonnet (except for number 66), where bible study groups meet ‘in the dusty space between the landing and the bathroom’, where mathematicians trace letters in the condensation on windows and where two poets are infatuated with the same person. These poems examine love, death, marriage and God, with Kennard’s trademark wry humour.
Kiese Laymon. 2021. Long Division.
Originally published in 2013, this newly revised 2021 edition of Long Division interweaves two stories. In 2013, fourteen-year-old Citoyen “City” Coldson goes to stay with his grandmother on the coast. He learns that a teenage girl called Baize Shephard recently went missing from the area. Before he arrives, City is given an unusual, author-less book set in 1985, entitled Long Division. He discovers that not only is the main character of the book also named City Coldson, but that this fictional City also encounters another version of Baize Shephard in this story-within-a-story. Both narratives ultimately connect and shed light on the mystery behind Baize’s disappearance.
Timothy Shanahan and Paul Smart (eds.). 2020. Blade Runner 2049: A Philosophical Exploration.
Philosophers on Film is a series of books which, acknowledging the increasing importance of films to introduce key philosophical themes, seeks to examine in detail the philosophical questions raised in ground-breaking cinema classics. In Blade Runner 2049: A Philosophical Exploration, twelve specially commissioned chapters written by international contributors each explore a different question posed by the hit sequel to Ridley Scott’s original Blade Runner, including the question of what makes an authentically ‘human’ person.