{"product_id":"9781609381271","title":"Meme","description":"\u003cp\u003eAcclaimed poet Susan Wheeler, whose last individual collection predicted the spiritual losses of the economic collapse, turns her attention to the most intimate of subjects: the absence or loss of love.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eA meme is a unit of thought replicated by imitation; examples of memes, Richard Dawkins wrote, “are tunes, ideas, catch-phrases, clothes fashions, ways of making pots or of building arches.” Occupy Wall Street is a meme, as are internet ideas and images that go viral. What could be more potent memes than those passed down by parents to their children?\u003cbr\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWheeler reconstructs her mother’s voice—down to its cynicism and its mid twentieth-century midwestern vernacular—in “The Maud Poems,” a voice that takes a more aggressive, vituperative turn in “The Devil—or—The Introjects.” In the book’s third long sequence, a generational inheritance feeds cultural transmission in “The Split.” A set of variations on losses and break-ups—wildly, darkly funny throughout and, in places, devastatingly sad—“The Split” brings Wheeler’s lauded inventiveness, wit, and insight to the profound loss of love. One read, and the meme “Should I stay or should I go?” will be altered in your head forever. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"University of Iowa Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47041736999152,"sku":"9781609381271","price":18.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9781609381271_p0.jpg?v=1763841286","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9781609381271","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}