In Memoriam to Identity

by Kathy Acker

• ISBN13: 9780802135797
• ISBN10: 080213579X
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 1998-08-13
• Publisher: Grove Press

Summary

In this characteristically sexy, daring, and hyperliterate novel, Kathy Acker interweaves the stories of three characters who share the same tragic flaw: a predilection for doomed, obsessive love. Rimbaud, the delinquent symbolist prodigy, is deserted by his lover Verlaine time and time again. Airplane takes a job dancing at Fun City, the seventh tier of the sex industry, in order to support her good-for-nothing boyfriend. And Capitol feels alive only when she's having sex with her brother, Quentin. In Memoriam to Identity is at once a revelatory addition to, and an irreverent critique of, the literature of decadence and self-destruction.

Table of Contents

Rimbaud	3	(96)
The Beginning of the Life of Rimbaud	3	(23)
Easter	26	(17)
A Japanese Interlude	43	(12)
Translations of R's Poems	55	(23)
R's End as a Poet	78	(21)
Airplane	99	(54)
Loss of Virginity	99	(15)
Journey	114	(8)
Loss of Something like Memory	122	(8)
American Eyes	130	(23)
Capitol	153	(62)
Girls Who Like to Fuck	153	(23)
The Last Days of Rimbaud	176	(39)
The Wild Palms	215
The Wild	215	(17)
In Search of Love	232	(12)
Abortions	244	(7)
An End to Childhood	251