The Crown Ain't Worth Much
Hanif Abdurraqib
(Author)
21,000+ Reviews
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Description
2017 Eric Hoffer Book Award - Poetry Honorable Mention 2017 Eric Hoffer Book Award - Grand Prize Short List
2017 Hurston/Wright Legacy Award Nominee
The Crown Ain't Worth Much, Hanif Abdurraqib's first full-length collection, is a sharp and vulnerable portrayal of city life in the United States. A regular columnist for MTV.com, Abdurraqib brings his interest in pop culture to these poems, analyzing race, gender, family, and the love that finally holds us together even as it threatens to break us. Terrance Hayes writes that Abdurraqib "bridges the bravado and bling of praise with the blood and tears of elegy." The poems in this collection are challenging and accessible at once, as they seek to render real human voices in moments of tragedy and celebration.
Product Details
Price
$16.00
$14.88
Publisher
Button Poetry
Publish Date
July 19, 2016
Pages
124
Dimensions
5.5 X 8.5 X 0.31 inches | 0.4 pounds
Language
English
Type
Paperback
EAN/UPC
9781943735044
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About the Author
Hanif Abdurraqib is a poet, essayist, and cultural critic from Columbus, Ohio. His first poetry collection, The Crown Ain't Worth Much, was named a finalist for the Eric Hoffer Book Prize and was nominated for a Hurston-Wright Legacy Award. His collection of essays, They Can't Kill Us Until They Kill Us, was named a best book of 2017 by Buzzfeed, Esquire, NPR, Oprah Magazine, and Pitchfork, among others.
Reviews
"To pinpoint a highlight of the book is impossible. Every poem is honed, polished, and presented with utter rawness and defiance." Portland Book Review"
"Willis-Abdurraqib possesses a striking gift for merging pop culture with personal narrative." Publishers Weekly"
"Willis-Abdurraqib writes an ode to living, to the making of and the rediscovering of the self, and of home." Emmanuel Oppong-Yeboah, Winter Tangerine"
"THE CROWN AIN'T WORTH MUCH is not so much a book you read, but one you survive with Willis-Abdurraqib's compassionate, elegiac lyric gently pushing you forward through heartbreak and violence." Indiana Review"
"The poems are raw: some passionate, some distant, some laden with fear. But as a collection, they create a life that's almost as arresting as it is moving." Kelsey McKinney, Fusion"
"Hanif Willis-Abdurraqib's THE CROWN AIN'T WORTH MUCH leaves me contemplating the meanings of soul: communal soul (peep the breadth of cultural shout outs), rhythmic soul (peep the breadth of sound and syntax), and spiritual soul (peep the breadth of compassion). As titles like 'Ode to Drake, Ending with Blood in a Field' and 'At the House Party Where We Found Out Whitney Houston Was Dead' suggest, Willis-Abdurraqib bridges the bravado and bling of praise with the blood and tears of elegy. The soul of this magnificent book is dynamic, distinguished, and when called for, down and dirty. What a fresh, remarkable debut." Terrance Hayes"
"Willis-Abdurraqib possesses a striking gift for merging pop culture with personal narrative." Publishers Weekly"
"Willis-Abdurraqib writes an ode to living, to the making of and the rediscovering of the self, and of home." Emmanuel Oppong-Yeboah, Winter Tangerine"
"THE CROWN AIN'T WORTH MUCH is not so much a book you read, but one you survive with Willis-Abdurraqib's compassionate, elegiac lyric gently pushing you forward through heartbreak and violence." Indiana Review"
"The poems are raw: some passionate, some distant, some laden with fear. But as a collection, they create a life that's almost as arresting as it is moving." Kelsey McKinney, Fusion"
"Hanif Willis-Abdurraqib's THE CROWN AIN'T WORTH MUCH leaves me contemplating the meanings of soul: communal soul (peep the breadth of cultural shout outs), rhythmic soul (peep the breadth of sound and syntax), and spiritual soul (peep the breadth of compassion). As titles like 'Ode to Drake, Ending with Blood in a Field' and 'At the House Party Where We Found Out Whitney Houston Was Dead' suggest, Willis-Abdurraqib bridges the bravado and bling of praise with the blood and tears of elegy. The soul of this magnificent book is dynamic, distinguished, and when called for, down and dirty. What a fresh, remarkable debut." Terrance Hayes"
