Relative to Wind
On Sailing, Craft, and Community
- Publisher
- Assembly Press
- Initial publish date
- Oct 2024
- Category
- Sailing, Essays, Asian & Asian American
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9781738009824
- Publish Date
- Oct 2024
- List Price
- $24.95
Classroom Resources
Where to buy it
Description
A lingering, long-haul collection of writing about sailing for readers of Julietta Singh and Kyo Maclear.
Humans
have sailed for centuries, but as poet Phoebe Wang discovers, when you
step on a boat for the first time, the learning curve is steep. Relative to Wind documents
Wang’s decade-long journey of learning to sail, becoming an avid racer
and volunteer race organizer, and interrogating what it means to be a
relative newcomer to an old tradition.
Drawing literary inspiration from books like Jessica Lee’s Turning, Kyo Maclear’s Birds Art Life, and Leanne Shapton’s Swimming Studies, Wang
delivers thoughtful renderings of her experiences—from colonial echoes
in sailing language to a beautiful look at what it means like to work
alongside crewmates in tempestuous conditions, to battling the
desire to quit or gender equity in the sporting world.
Following
the motif of a race course and structured to help readers apply sailing
lessons and techniques to their relationships, to their art, their
careers, to community, and to place, these essays recognize the
parallels between sailing and a creative life, and between sailing and a
sense of belonging and relationship with the land, inspiring both
sailors and would-be sailors to embrace restoration and wonder.
About the author
Phoebe Wang was born in Ottawa and currently lives in Toronto, where she writes and teaches. She holds a BA in English from York University and a MA in Creative Writing from the University of Toronto. She is the author of two chapbooks, Occasional Emergencies (2013) and Hanging Exhibits (2016), and was the 2015 winner of Prism international's Poetry Contest. Admission Requirements is her debut collection of poetry.
Editorial Reviews
“A riveting book about our parallel lives, the side passions that steer our hearts and right our balance. I am not a good sailor, have honestly rarely sailed, but I can say without hesitation that you will not find a book that better captures the sport—or the vagaries of wind, collaboration and creative practice. Phoebe Wang’s expansive prose is wise and guiding, and I was very happy to have travelled with her.”—Kyo Maclear, author of Unearthing
“For readers like me who are unfamiliar with the intricacies of sailboat culture and its boat speak, poet Phoebe Wang offers a headlong introduction into the world of winches and jib sheets. Relative to Wind is an obsession turned lyrical meets technical that sails into the gust with no looking back.”—Amy Fung, author of Before I Was a Critic I Was a Human Being