{"product_id":"iron-goddess-of-mercy-by-larissa-lai-9781551528441","title":"Iron Goddess of Mercy","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFrom Lambda Literary Award winner Larissa Lai: a long poem full of rage, love, and despair seeking justice, seeking roots, seeking a 'po-ethics' by which to live.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eIron Goddess of Mercy\u003c\/em\u003e by Lambda Literary Award winner Larissa Lai (for the novel \u003cem\u003eThe Tiger Flu\u003c\/em\u003e) is a long poem that captures the vengeful yet hopeful movement of the Furies mid-whirl and dances with them through the horror of the long now. Inspired by the tumultuous history of Hong Kong, from the Japanese and British occupations to the ongoing pro-democracy protests, the poem interrogates the complicated notion of identity, offering a prism through which the term \"Asian\" can be understood to make sense of a complex set of relations. The self crystallises in moments of solidity, only to dissolve and whirl away again. The poet is a windsock, catching all the affect that blows at her and ballooning to fullness, only to empty again when the wind changes direction. \u003cem\u003eIron Goddess of Mercy\u003c\/em\u003e is a game of mah jong played deep into the night, an endless gamble.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003ePresented in sixty-four fragments to honour the sixty-four hexagrams of the I Ching, \u003cem\u003eIron Goddess of Mercy\u003c\/em\u003e also borrows from haibun, a traditional Japanese form of travel writing in which each diary entry closes with a haiku. The poem dizzies, turns on itself. It rants, it curses, it writes love letters, but as the Iron Goddess is ever-changing, so is the object of her address: a maenad, Kool-Aid, Chiang Kai-shek, the economy, a clown, freedom of speech, a brother, a bother, a typist, a monster, a machine, Iris Chang, Hannah Arendt, the Greek warrior Achilles, or a deer caught in the headlights.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eFinally, a balm to the poem's devastating passion and fury, \u003cem\u003eIron Goddess of Mercy\u003c\/em\u003e is also a type of oolong tea, a most fragrant infusion said to have been a gift from the compassionate bodhisattva Guan Yin.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eSummoning the ghosts of history and politics, \u003cem\u003eIron Goddess of Mercy\u003c\/em\u003e explores the complexities of identity through the lens of rage and empowerment.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Hachette Aotearoa New Zealand","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47470909915372,"sku":"9781551528441","price":39.99,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/9781551528441-iron-goddess-of-mercy.jpg?v=1775230150","url":"https:\/\/bookhero.co.nz\/products\/iron-goddess-of-mercy-by-larissa-lai-9781551528441","provider":"Book Hero","version":"1.0","type":"link"}