Recordings of Dead Languages

What does it mean to lose something? To lose someone? To lose a civilization? Through visceral imagery and powerful narrative, Chad Heltzel’s Recordings of Dead Languages captures this essence of disappearing, and each poem in this book is a cabinet of curiosities. But along with small exotic objects, this collection contains whole species, extinct and newly discovered ones alike, photographic and phonographic technologies, everything from a drowned world remembered only in fossils to the delicate imprints left by those who have passed. Readers will be reminded of the personal and evocative poetry of Gregory Orr and the dreamlike fluidity of Michael Ondaatje’s work, but Heltzel’s mind is unlike any other. As long as our world is in jeopardy, it is necessary to have Recordings of Dead Languages as a companion.