{"product_id":"bread-and-circus-9781668011454","title":"Bread and Circus","description":"\u003cb\u003eWinner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"Discerning and significant.\" --\u003ci\u003ePoetry Foundation\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\"A sharp memoir in verse.\" --\u003ci\u003eLitHub\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003eThis powerful and timely collection of autobiographical poems from Yale Young Poets Award Winner and Philadelphia's former Poet Laureate Airea D. Matthews about the economics of class is a brilliant intellectual and artistic contribution to the ongoing conversation about American inequality.\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eAs a former student of economics, Airea D. Matthews was fascinated and disturbed by 18th-century Scottish economist Adam Smith's magnum opus \u003ci\u003eThe Wealth of Nations.\u003c\/i\u003e Now, she presents a direct challenge to Smith's theory of the invisible hand, which claims self-interest is the key to optimal economic outcomes. By juxtaposing redacted texts by Smith and the French Marxist Guy Debord with autobiographical prose and poems, \u003ci\u003eBread and Circus\u003c\/i\u003e personally offers how self-interest fails when it reduces people to commodity and spectacle. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eA layered collection to be read and reread, with poems that range from tragic to humorous, in forms as varied and nuanced as the ideas the book considers, \u003ci\u003eBread and Circus \u003c\/i\u003easks what it is to have survived, indeed to have flourished, and at what cost. \"Full of humane wisdom, this powerful volume forces readers to acknowledge systemic inequity\" (\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e, starred review) and is ideal for fans of Elizabeth Alexander, Natalie Diaz, Eve Ewing, and Gregory Pardlo.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Scribner Book Company","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50719656640786,"sku":"9781668011454","price":18.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_a74eb2c7-8c14-4b6b-b70a-96a6cbf2b1f7.jpg?v=1734669358","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/bread-and-circus-9781668011454","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}