Virgil Kills

by Ronaldo V. Wilson

Linked stories alighting from a U.S., Black and Filipino imaginary through a central character Virgil, and his accounts on race, sex, and desire.

Virgil kills forms, manifesting a set of poetic investigations—revealing black and brown life, memory, dreams, the sea, the sex-act, the line. Virgil travels in theaters and lots: Manhattan, Guam, Santa Cruz, Sacramento, Berlin, Iloilo, Provincetown, Millington, San Francisco, Long Island, Western Mass. Virgil moves against class, whiteness, on stages, at lecterns, in studios, and a luxury vehicle. Virgil records in the sensorium of cruising lovers, real love, family, T.V., characters—“Butch,” “Stream,” “Clean”—his precise unfurling.

232 pages, Paperback

First published March 6, 2018

Reviews

[Dawn · Rating 3 out of 5]

A book club pick and one of the few books I had to force myself thru. I’m not sure where the difficulty comes from… following the unconventional names? The mixture of dream and memory and art-making? I usually don’t mind these things so perhaps the voice of these intentionally de-centered pieces of prose threw me. Also the sections… also the ending… I feel I know ‘Virgil’ about as well as that dead hummingbird did. Hopefully those at the book club can help.

[Zach Posnik · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book that defines why I love the library, I would have never picked this book up and bought it but I loved it and thought it challenged a lot of my assumptions about fiction and form. A book I could read over and over and continuously glean more from.

[ice_butch .jpg · Rating 5 out of 5]

nightboat edition of Virgil Kills isn't on here, so..
as Josué says: "words on a page" lol. Akin 2 Severo Sarduy, but I'm hot for that... read while traveling, will read again when I'm sitting down more