Bibliodeath: My Archives

by Andrei Codrescu

Award-winning author Andrei Codrescu’s My Archives (With Life in Footnotes) surveys the evolutionary relationship between language and technology by examining his own career as a prolific American writer for more than four decades. Born in Transylvania, Romania, Codrescu’s journey spans from his earliest days as a scattered poet in the 1960s to his founding of the journal Exquisite Corpse in 1983 to his ongoing commentary today on National Public Radio’s All Things Considered. Amid the release of some of his most celebrated books, the author’s story is an insightful address of the survival of the literate world and the transformation of print, told through suspenseful reflection and alluring, signature footnotes.

Genres: Nonfiction

168 pages, Paperback

First published November 29, 2012

About the author

Andrei Codrescu is a poet, novelist, essayist, and NPR commentator. His many books include Whatever Gets You through the Night, The Postmodern Dada Guide, and The Poetry Lesson. He was Mac Curdy Distinguished Professor of English at Louisiana State University from 1984 until his retirement in 2009.

Reviews

[John]

3.5ish stars. Incredibly self-indulgent, but this is like listening to your extremely interesting friend ramble on about their reading habits/writing journey and all the minutiae they are fascinated with.

Exquisite Corpses is something I was completely unfamiliar with prior to this book, but I'm down the rabbit hole now.

[Bjorn]

More complete review to come, possibly. Reading Codrescu is a headfuck, not without its annoyances (the fact that he pretty much anticipates them doesn't diminish them) but nevertheless endlessly fascinating. I want to quote half the book here; luckily I read it in Swedish so I won't bother with a re-translation, which means that those quotes will be left in the book. Which will probably please the old bugger, unless it doesn't.

[Kate]

"It was assumed and never mentioned that every person was two people: a public one who smiled and lied, and a private one who cursed and cried."

"Beyond the figures of one's erased self there is nothing."

"Reproduction is forbidden but memorization is encouraged."

"Everything of consequence takes place at a border."