Cool for You (Paperback)

Eileen Myles

ISBN 10: 1619029170 / ISBN 13: 9781619029170

Published by Counterpoint, Berkeley, 2017

About this Item

Paperback. Grainy and stripped down, this gritty novel traces the downbeat progress of a tough, queer girl growing up in working-class Boston by "a cult figure to a generation of post-punk females forming their own literary avant-garde" (The New York Times).Why can't I live right now. Because I am not rich, I am not a saint. But I do know this- not all of us were sent here to work.The first published novel of legendary poet and performer Eileen Myles follows a queer female growing up in working-class Boston, straining against the institutions that hold her- family, Catholic school, jobs at a camp, at a nursing home, at a school for developmentally disabled adult males.She wants to be an astronaut. Instead, she becomes a poet and journeys through a series of low-end schools, pathetic jobs, and unmade beds. Schooled by mean and memorable Catholic nuns, this tomboy heroine stumbles and dreams her way through the painful corridors of family, early sexual encounters, and an eye-opening series of jobs caring for the sick and insane--the abandoned wards of the state. This is a book hell-bent on telling the truth about poor women, and how they do (and do not) get out of the hands of their families and the state. Without artifice or pseudonym, protagonist Eileen Myles boldly sets down a rich and graphic account of female experience in this world.Free-ranging and deadpan, tragic and joyful, this is a book about women, gender, class, bodies, escape, and what it means to be "inside." Never more relevant, and now with an introduction by Chris Kraus."Eileen Myles is a genius!"--Dorothy AllisonGrainy and stripped down, this gritty novel traces the downbeat progress of a tough, queer girl growing up in working-class Boston by "a cult figure to a generation of post-punk females forming their own literary avant-garde" (The New York Times).Why can't I live right now. Because I am not rich, I am not a saint. But I do know this- not all of us were sent here to work.The first published novel of legendary poet and performer Eileen Myles follows a queer female growing up in working-class Boston, straining against the institutions that hold her- family, Catholic school, jobs at a camp, at a nursing home, at a school for developmentally disabled adult males.She wants to be an astronaut. Instead, she becomes a poet and journeys through a series of low-end schools, pathetic jobs, and unmade beds. Schooled by mean and memorable Catholic nuns, this tomboy heroine stumbles and dreams her way through the painful corridors of family, early sexual encounters, and an eye-opening series of jobs caring for the sick and insane--the abandoned wards of the state. This is a book hell-bent on telling the truth about poor women, and how they do (and do not) get out of the hands of their families and the state. Without artifice or pseudonym, protagonist Eileen Myles boldly sets down a rich and graphic account of female experience in this world.Free-ranging and deadpan, tragic and joyful, this is a book about women, gender, class, bodies, escape, and what it means to be "inside." Never more relevant, and now with an introduction by Chris Kraus."Eileen Myles is a genius!"--Dorothy Allison Eileen Myles, the popular author of Chelsea Girls and Not Me, the poet who ran an openly female campaign for president in 1992, now gives us a talking masterpiece of a novel that scratches out and rewrites the picture of what fifty years of female life looks like today. Cool For You is a darkly comic novel that traces the downbeat progress of an I Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.

Seller Inventory # 9781619029170

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Cool for You (Paperback)
• Publisher: Counterpoint, Berkeley
• Publication Date: 2017
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1619029170
• ISBN 13: 9781619029170
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: new

About this title

Synopsis

“A cult figure to a generation of post-punk females forming their own literary avant-garde.”―The New York Times Why can’t I live right now. Because I am not rich, I am not a saint. But I do know this: not all of us were sent here to work. The first published novel of legendary poet and performer Eileen Myles follows a queer female growing up in working-class Boston, straining against the institutions that hold her: family, Catholic school, jobs at a camp, at a nursing home, at a school for developmentally disabled adult males. Free-ranging and deadpan, tragic and joyful, this is a book about women, gender, class, bodies, escape, and what it means to be “inside.” Never more relevant, and now with an introduction by Chris Kraus.

About the Authors

Eileen Myles has published twenty books of poetry, art journalism, and fiction and libretti. She's a Guggenheim Fellow, has received the Shelley Prize from the Poetry Society of America and a Lambda Award for lesbian fiction, and was named to the Whiting/Slate Second Novel List. She also received an arts writers grant from Creative Capital/ the Warhol Foundation and a Foundation for Contemporary Arts grant. She lives in Marfa, Texas, and New York.

​Chris Kraus is the author of four novels​, including I Love Dick​ and Summer of Hate, two books of cultural criticism,​ ​and​, ​most recently, a critical biography of Kathy Acker. She is a co-editor​ ​of Semiotexte and lives in Los Angeles.