Maggie Nelson is a poet, critic, and nonfiction author of books such as The Art of Cruelty: A Reckoning, Bluets, and Jane: A Murder. She teaches in the School of Critical Studies at CalArts and lives in Los Angeles, California.
*Winner of the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award in
Criticism*"It's Nelson's articulation of her many selves--the poet
who writes prose; the memoirist who considers the truth specious;
the essayist whose books amount to a kind of fairy tale, in which
the protagonist goes from darkness to light, and then falls in love
with a singular knight--that makes her readers feel
hopeful."--Hilton Als, The New Yorker
"Maggie Nelson's The Argonauts exists in its own universe. My first
reaction to Nelson's book was awestruck silence, such as one might
experience when confronted with some dazzling supernatural
phenomenon. Nelson is so outrageously gifted a writer and thinker
that The Argonauts seems to operate in some astral dimension where
the rules of normal physics have been suspended. Her book is an
elegant, powerful, deeply discursive examination of gender,
sexuality, queerness, pregnancy and motherhood, all conveyed in
language that is intellectually potent and poetically
expressive."--Michael Lindgren, The Washington Post"[Nelson's]
book-part memoir, part critical inquiry touching on desire, love,
and family-is a superb exploration of the risk and the excitement
of change. Thinking and feeling are, for Nelson, mutually necessary
processes; the result is an exceptional portrait both of a romantic
partnership and of the collaboration between Nelson's mind and
heart."--The New Yorker"Maggie Nelson slays entrenched notions of
gender, marriage, and sexuality with lyricism, intellectual brass,
and soul-ringing honesty in The Argonauts."--Vanity Fair"Reading
Maggie Nelson is like watching a high-wire act. Her books are
inspiring. . . . Because of her dazzling sentences, I will read
whatever the daredevil writes. She cozies up to ideas unlike any
other American writer."--The Boston Globe"Maggie Nelson has proven
her brilliance-a special blend of poeticism and philosophy, of
theorizing and prose-weaving-in her eight previous nonfiction
releases. But in The Argonauts, the gifted critic and scholar
breaks generic ground with her work of 'auto theory, ' which offers
a glimpse into the writer's mind, body, and home. . . . The
Argonauts is a must-read."--Bustle"So much writing about motherhood
makes the world seem smaller after the child arrives, more
circumscribed, as if in tacit fealty to the larger cultural
assumptions about moms and domesticity; Nelson's book does the
opposite"--The New York Times Book Review
"Maggie Nelson is one of the most electrifying writers at work in
America today, among the sharpest and most supple thinkers of her
generation."--Olivia Laing, The Guardian"In The Argonauts, Maggie
Nelson turns 'making the personal public' into a romantic,
intellectual wet dream. A gorgeous book, inventive, fearless, and
full of heart."--Kim Gordon
"[Nelson's] is a radicalism that looks like the future of common
sense. . . . A singular book."--Vulture"A loose yet intricate
tapestry of memoir, art criticism and gently polemic. . . . It's a
book about using the writings of smart, even difficult writers to
help us find clarity and precision in our intimate lives, and it's
a book about the no less intimate pleasures of the life of the
mind. . . . The Argonauts is a magnificent achievement of thought,
care and art."--Los Angeles Times"A daring, intelligent, strange,
and beautiful book. . . . [Nelson] has created an essential thing,
a guide to the first years of the queer 21st Century, and a hymn to
love in all its forms."--The Gay & Lesbian Review "Nelson's writing
is fluid-to read her story is to drift dreamily among her thoughts.
. . . She masterfully analyzes the way we talk about sex and
gender."--Huffington Post"Nelson's vibrant, probing and, most of
all, outstanding book is also a philosophical look at motherhood,
transitioning, partnership, parenting, and family-an examination of
the restrictive way we've approached these terms in the past and
the ongoing struggle to arrive at more inclusive and expansive
definitions for them."--NPR
"Brilliant like nothing else you've ever read, Maggie Nelson's The
Argonauts is as hard to pin down as it is stunning. In sharp,
intense bursts of language, Nelson melds critical theory with her
most personal musings, as she navigates falling in lust and love,
explores gender, sexuality, and motherhood, and builds a family
with artist Harry Dodge. Although slim, The Argonauts contains
worlds of thought and feeling, challenging our assumptions and
moving our hearts. This book is the first must-read of the
summer."--BuzzFeed"In a culture still too quick to ask people to
pick a side-to be male or female, to be an assimilationist or a
revolutionary, to be totally straight or totally gay, totally
hetero- or totally homo-normative-Nelson's book is a beautiful,
passionate and shatteringly intelligent meditation on what it means
not to accept binaries but to improvise an individual life that
says, without fear, yes, and."--Chicago Tribune"Reading Nelson is
like sweeping the leaves out of your mental driveway: by the end of
one of her books, you have a better understanding of how the world
works...The result is one of the most intelligent, generous, and
moving books of the year."--Publishers Weekly, "Best Summer Books
2015"
"The Argonauts finds Nelson at her most vulnerable, arguing for a
radical rethinking of the terms in which we express love."--The
Paris Review, "Staff Picks""What a dazzlingly generous, gloriously
unpredictable book! Maggie Nelson shows us what it means to be
real, offering a way of thinking that is as challenging as it is
liberating. She invites us to 'pay homage to the transitive' and
enjoy 'a becoming in which one never becomes.' Reading The
Argonauts made me happier and freer."--Eula Biss"Maggie Nelson cuts
through our culture's prefabricated structures of thought and
feeling with an intelligence whose ferocity is ultimately in the
service of love. No piety is safe, no orthodoxy, no easy irony. The
scare quotes burn off like fog."--Ben Lerner
"There isn't another critic alive like Maggie Nelson-who writes
with such passion, clarity, explicitness, fluidity, playfulness,
and generosity that she redefines what thinking can do
today."--Wayne Koestenbaum"Once again, Maggie Nelson has created
awe-inspiring work, one that smartly calls bullshit on the places
culture--radical subcultures included--stigmatize and misunderstand
both maternity and queer family-making. With a fiercely vulnerable
intelligence, Nelson leaves no area un-investigated, including her
own heart. I know of no other book like this, and I know how
crucially the culture needs it."--Michelle Tea"One of the greatest
books I've ever read."--Annie Sprinkle"Reading Maggie Nelson's The
Argonauts helped me to feel some things I've long thought about but
hardly been able to express regarding the socialization of the
maternal function, which is the dispersed, dispersive essence of
the futurity we present to one another until one is not another
anymore. There's the violence I commit in making a claim for that
futurity, and the violence I endure when that claim is granted.
There's the exhaustive sharing that takes form as writing. There's
the 'orgy of specificity' when the inexpressible is held and
released in each expression 'cause I just want to sing your name
even when I don't want to sing your name. There's the love story
buried in every 'I love you, ' and in every 'I love you' there's a
contract for destruction and rebuilding. There's The Argonauts,
which is one of the greatest books I've ever read."--Fred Moten"In
the 17th century a book like Maggie Nelson's The Argonauts might
have been called an anatomy, by which I mean it's a learned,
quirky, open-hearted, often beautiful naming-of-parts. The anatomy
never forgets the fragile embodied world-its carnality or its
finitude. And such is The Argonauts a memoir (debriefing, really)
at once raw, pensive, exhilarating, sad, funny, and embodied in the
same profound way."--Terry Castle
*Winner of the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award in
Criticism* It s Nelson s articulation of her many selves the poet
who writes prose; the memoirist who considers the truth specious;
the essayist whose books amount to a kind of fairy tale, in which
the protagonist goes from darkness to light, and then falls in love
with a singular knight that makes her readers feel hopeful. Hilton
Als, The New Yorker
Maggie Nelson s The Argonauts exists in its own universe. My first
reaction to Nelson s book was awestruck silence, such as one might
experience when confronted with some dazzling supernatural
phenomenon. Nelson is so outrageously gifted a writer and thinker
that The Argonauts seems to operate in some astral dimension where
the rules of normal physics have been suspended. Her book is an
elegant, powerful, deeply discursive examination of gender,
sexuality, queerness, pregnancy and motherhood, all conveyed in
language that is intellectually potent and poetically expressive.
Michael Lindgren, The Washington Post [Nelson's] book-part memoir,
part critical inquiry touching on desire, love, and family-is a
superb exploration of the risk and the excitement of change.
Thinking and feeling are, for Nelson, mutually necessary processes;
the result is an exceptional portrait both of a romantic
partnership and of the collaboration between Nelson's mind and
heart. The New Yorker Maggie Nelson slays entrenched notions of
gender, marriage, and sexuality with lyricism, intellectual brass,
and soul-ringing honesty in The Argonauts. Vanity Fair Reading
Maggie Nelson is like watching a high-wire act. Her books are
inspiring. . . . Because of her dazzling sentences, I will read
whatever the daredevil writes. She cozies up to ideas unlike any
other American writer. The Boston Globe Maggie Nelson has proven
her brilliance-a special blend of poeticism and philosophy, of
theorizing and prose-weaving-in her eight previous nonfiction
releases. But in The Argonauts, the gifted critic and scholar
breaks generic ground with her work of 'auto theory, ' which offers
a glimpse into the writer's mind, body, and home. . . . The
Argonauts is a must-read. Bustle So much writing about motherhood
makes the world seem smaller after the child arrives, more
circumscribed, as if in tacit fealty to the larger cultural
assumptions about moms and domesticity; Nelson's book does the
opposite The New York Times Book Review
Maggie Nelson is one of the most electrifying writers at work in
America today, among the sharpest and most supple thinkers of her
generation. Olivia Laing, The Guardian In The Argonauts, Maggie
Nelson turns making the personal public' into a romantic,
intellectual wet dream. A gorgeous book, inventive, fearless, and
full of heart. Kim Gordon
[Nelson's] is a radicalism that looks like the future of common
sense. . . . A singular book. Vulture A loose yet intricate
tapestry of memoir, art criticism and gently polemic. . . . It's a
book about using the writings of smart, even difficult writers to
help us find clarity and precision in our intimate lives, and it's
a book about the no less intimate pleasures of the life of the
mind. . . . The Argonauts is a magnificent achievement of thought,
care and art. Los Angeles Times A daring, intelligent, strange, and
beautiful book. . . . [Nelson] has created an essential thing, a
guide to the first years of the queer 21st Century, and a hymn to
love in all its forms. The Gay & Lesbian Review Nelson's writing is
fluid-to read her story is to drift dreamily among her thoughts. .
. . She masterfully analyzes the way we talk about sex and gender.
Huffington Post Nelson's vibrant, probing and, most of all,
outstanding book is also a philosophical look at motherhood,
transitioning, partnership, parenting, and family-an examination of
the restrictive way we've approached these terms in the past and
the ongoing struggle to arrive at more inclusive and expansive
definitions for them. NPR
Brilliant like nothing else you've ever read, Maggie Nelson's The
Argonauts is as hard to pin down as it is stunning. In sharp,
intense bursts of language, Nelson melds critical theory with her
most personal musings, as she navigates falling in lust and love,
explores gender, sexuality, and motherhood, and builds a family
with artist Harry Dodge. Although slim, The Argonauts contains
worlds of thought and feeling, challenging our assumptions and
moving our hearts. This book is the first must-read of the summer.
BuzzFeed In a culture still too quick to ask people to pick a
side-to be male or female, to be an assimilationist or a
revolutionary, to be totally straight or totally gay, totally
hetero- or totally homo-normative-Nelson's book is a beautiful,
passionate and shatteringly intelligent meditation on what it means
not to accept binaries but to improvise an individual life that
says, without fear, yes, and. Chicago Tribune Reading Nelson is
like sweeping the leaves out of your mental driveway: by the end of
one of her books, you have a better understanding of how the world
works...The result is one of the most intelligent, generous, and
moving books of the year. Publishers Weekly, "Best Summer Books
2015"
The Argonauts finds Nelson at her most vulnerable, arguing for a
radical rethinking of the terms in which we express love. The Paris
Review, "Staff Picks" What a dazzlingly generous, gloriously
unpredictable book! Maggie Nelson shows us what it means to be
real, offering a way of thinking that is as challenging as it is
liberating. She invites us to 'pay homage to the transitive' and
enjoy 'a becoming in which one never becomes.' Reading The
Argonauts made me happier and freer. Eula Biss Maggie Nelson cuts
through our culture's prefabricated structures of thought and
feeling with an intelligence whose ferocity is ultimately in the
service of love. No piety is safe, no orthodoxy, no easy irony. The
scare quotes burn off like fog. Ben Lerner
There isn't another critic alive like Maggie Nelson-who writes with
such passion, clarity, explicitness, fluidity, playfulness, and
generosity that she redefines what thinking can do today. Wayne
Koestenbaum Once again, Maggie Nelson has created awe-inspiring
work, one that smartly calls bullshit on the places
culture--radical subcultures included--stigmatize and misunderstand
both maternity and queer family-making. With a fiercely vulnerable
intelligence, Nelson leaves no area un-investigated, including her
own heart. I know of no other book like this, and I know how
crucially the culture needs it. Michelle Tea One of the greatest
books I've ever read. Annie Sprinkle Reading Maggie Nelson's The
Argonauts helped me to feel some things I've long thought about but
hardly been able to express regarding the socialization of the
maternal function, which is the dispersed, dispersive essence of
the futurity we present to one another until one is not another
anymore. There's the violence I commit in making a claim for that
futurity, and the violence I endure when that claim is granted.
There's the exhaustive sharing that takes form as writing. There's
the 'orgy of specificity' when the inexpressible is held and
released in each expression 'cause I just want to sing your name
even when I don't want to sing your name. There's the love story
buried in every 'I love you, ' and in every 'I love you' there's a
contract for destruction and rebuilding. There's The Argonauts,
which is one of the greatest books I've ever read. Fred Moten In
the 17th century a book like Maggie Nelson's The Argonauts might
have been called an anatomy, by which I mean it's a learned,
quirky, open-hearted, often beautiful naming-of-parts. The anatomy
never forgets the fragile embodied world-its carnality or its
finitude. And such is The Argonauts a memoir (debriefing, really)
at once raw, pensive, exhilarating, sad, funny, and embodied in the
same profound way. Terry Castle"
*Winner of the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award in
Criticism* It s Nelson s articulation of her many selves the poet
who writes prose; the memoirist who considers the truth specious;
the essayist whose books amount to a kind of fairy tale, in which
the protagonist goes from darkness to light, and then falls in love
with a singular knight that makes her readers feel hopeful. Hilton
Als, "The New Yorker " Maggie Nelson s "The Argonauts "exists in
its own universe. My first reaction to Nelson s book was awestruck
silence, such as one might experience when confronted with some
dazzling supernatural phenomenon. Nelson is so outrageously gifted
a writer and thinker that "The Argonauts" seems to operate in some
astral dimension where the rules of normal physics have been
suspended. Her book is an elegant, powerful, deeply discursive
examination of gender, sexuality, queerness, pregnancy and
motherhood, all conveyed in language that is intellectually potent
and poetically expressive. Michael Lindgren, "The Washington Post"
[Nelson's] book-part memoir, part critical inquiry touching on
desire, love, and family-is a superb exploration of the risk and
the excitement of change. Thinking and feeling are, for Nelson,
mutually necessary processes; the result is an exceptional portrait
both of a romantic partnership and of the collaboration between
Nelson's mind and heart. "The New Yorker" Maggie Nelson slays
entrenched notions of gender, marriage, and sexuality with
lyricism, intellectual brass, and soul-ringing honesty in "The
Argonauts." "Vanity Fair" Reading Maggie Nelson is like watching a
high-wire act. Her books are inspiring. . . . Because of her
dazzling sentences, I will read whatever the daredevil writes. She
cozies up to ideas unlike any other American writer. "The Boston
Globe" Maggie Nelson has proven her brilliance-a special blend of
poeticism and philosophy, of theorizing and prose-weaving-in her
eight previous nonfiction releases. But in "The Argonauts," the
gifted critic and scholar breaks generic ground with her work of
'auto theory, ' which offers a glimpse into the writer's mind,
body, and home. . . . "The Argonauts" is a must-read. "Bustle" So
much writing about motherhood makes the world seem smaller after
the child arrives, more circumscribed, as if in tacit fealty to the
larger cultural assumptions about moms and domesticity; Nelson's
book does the opposite "The New York Times Book Review" Maggie
Nelson is one of the most electrifying writers at work in America
today, among the sharpest and most supple thinkers of her
generation. Olivia Laing, "The Guardian" In "The Argonauts," Maggie
Nelson turns making the personal public' into a romantic,
intellectual wet dream. A gorgeous book, inventive, fearless, and
full of heart. "Kim Gordon" [Nelson's] is a radicalism that looks
like the future of common sense. . . . A singular book. "Vulture" A
loose yet intricate tapestry of memoir, art criticism and gently
polemic. . . . It's a book about using the writings of smart, even
difficult writers to help us find clarity and precision in our
intimate lives, and it's a book about the no less intimate
pleasures of the life of the mind. . . . "The Argonauts" is a
magnificent achievement of thought, care and art. "Los Angeles
Times" Nelson's writing is fluid-to read her story is to drift
dreamily among her thoughts. . . . She masterfully analyzes the way
we talk about sex and gender. "Huffington Post" Nelson's vibrant,
probing and, most of all, outstanding book is also a philosophical
look at motherhood, transitioning, partnership, parenting, and
family-an examination of the restrictive way we've approached these
terms in the past and the ongoing struggle to arrive at more
inclusive and expansive definitions for them. NPR Brilliant like
nothing else you've ever read, Maggie Nelson's "The Argonauts" is
as hard to pin down as it is stunning. In sharp, intense bursts of
language, Nelson melds critical theory with her most personal
musings, as she navigates falling in lust and love, explores
gender, sexuality, and motherhood, and builds a family with artist
Harry Dodge. Although slim, "The Argonauts" contains worlds of
thought and feeling, challenging our assumptions and moving our
hearts. This book is the first must-read of the summer. "BuzzFeed"
In a culture still too quick to ask people to pick a side-to be
male or female, to be an assimilationist or a revolutionary, to be
totally straight or totally gay, totally hetero- or totally
homo-normative-Nelson's book is a beautiful, passionate and
shatteringly intelligent meditation on what it means not to accept
binaries but to improvise an individual life that says, without
fear, "yes," "and." "Chicago Tribune" Reading Nelson is like
sweeping the leaves out of your mental driveway: by the end of one
of her books, you have a better understanding of how the world
works...The result is one of the most intelligent, generous, and
moving books of the year. "Publishers Weekly, "Best Summer Books
2015"" "The Argonauts" finds Nelson at her most vulnerable, arguing
for a radical rethinking of the terms in which we express love.
"The Paris Review, "Staff Picks"" What a dazzlingly generous,
gloriously unpredictable book! Maggie Nelson shows us what it means
to be real, offering a way of thinking that is as challenging as it
is liberating. She invites us to 'pay homage to the transitive' and
enjoy 'a becoming in which one never becomes.' Reading "The
Argonauts" made me happier and freer. Eula Biss Maggie Nelson cuts
through our culture's prefabricated structures of thought and
feeling with an intelligence whose ferocity is ultimately in the
service of love. No piety is safe, no orthodoxy, no easy irony. The
scare quotes burn off like fog. Ben Lerner There isn't another
critic alive like Maggie Nelson-who writes with such passion,
clarity, explicitness, fluidity, playfulness, and generosity that
she redefines what "thinking" can do today. Wayne Koestenbaum Once
again, Maggie Nelson has created awe-inspiring work, one that
smartly calls bullshit on the places culture--radical subcultures
included--stigmatize and misunderstand both maternity and queer
family-making. With a fiercely vulnerable intelligence, Nelson
leaves no area un-investigated, including her own heart. I know of
no other book like this, and I know how crucially the culture needs
it. Michelle Tea One of the greatest books I've ever read. Annie
Sprinkle Reading Maggie Nelson's" The Argonauts" helped me to feel
some things I've long thought about but hardly been able to express
regarding the socialization of the maternal function, which is the
dispersed, dispersive essence of the futurity we present to one
another until one is not another anymore. There's the violence I
commit in making a claim for that futurity, and the violence I
endure when that claim is granted. There's the exhaustive sharing
that takes form as writing. There's the 'orgy of specificity' when
the inexpressible is held and released in each expression 'cause I
just want to sing your name even when I don't want to sing your
name. There's the love story buried in every 'I love you, ' and in
every 'I love you' there's a contract for destruction and
rebuilding. There's" The Argonauts," which is one of the greatest
books I've ever read. Fred Moten In the 17th century a book like
Maggie Nelson's "The Argonauts" might have been called an anatomy,
by which I mean it's a learned, quirky, open-hearted, often
beautiful naming-of-parts. The anatomy never forgets the fragile
embodied world-its carnality or its finitude. And such is "The
Argonauts" a memoir (debriefing, really) at once raw, pensive,
exhilarating, sad, funny, and embodied in the same profound way.
Terry Castle"
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