Juana I by Ana Arzoumanian and translated by Gabriel Amor

This is poetry from Argentina.

Juana I by Ana Arzoumanian translated by Gabriel Amor is published by Kenning Editions. This is a Book originally written in Spanish. This was published in 2018.0 and has the ISBN of 9.7809997198E12.

Ana Arzoumanian’s Juana I, translated by Gabriel Amor, draws on the historical figure of Juana of Castile while refusing to make history feel clean, obedient, or safely distant. The book enters monarchy, madness, gendered confinement, grief, and power through a lyric intelligence that seems more interested in possession than explanation. Arzoumanian does not simply retell a life. She presses against the archive until the body underneath it starts to speak. Amor’s translation allows the work to retain its feverish density and its theatrical force. I like books like this because they remind us that historical poetry does not need to become costume drama. It can be a way of asking who gets named mad, who gets locked away, and what kinds of speech survive inside that enclosure. Juana I is royal, wounded, intimate, and sharply alive.

If you’d like to see international poetry continue and gain traction, consider requesting this work from your local library, or purchasing it from places like Open Books (a poetry only bookstore), Asterism Books (an independent press distributor), or bookshop.org to connect you with your local bookstores.

Check out more of the always in-progress translated poetry index here.