Two-way street: The Paulista Avenue, flux and counter-flux of modernity | Hey, you! Smartypants! Think you got brains?

Today we have a book for people who have minds and like to use them. Does that sound like you?

Fantastic.

Ever stopped to admire some local architecture? Ever been captivated by the lines of buildings as you walked down the street? Ever gazed at the glass, steel, refracted and reflected light of a chain of high rises and pondered its semiotic value in understanding the flux and counter-flux of modern society within an unpredictable urban fabric?

You will after this book.

Two-Way Street, by Marta Vieira Bogéa, critically examines São Paulo's Paulista Avenue as a coded form communication, a network in which metropolitan space becomes message and discourse.

Followers of architecture, contemporary Brazilian theory or Latin American research in semiotics may already be aware of Bogéa and Dr. Samira Chalub of Pontifical Catholic University in São Paulo, who wrote the forward. If you're not, get hip with this book! You won't regret it.

Below is an excerpt from Dr. Chalub's introduction in Two-Way Street:

She [Bogéa] captures the sense of design of the visible space as an architect while also exposing the invisibility of ambiguous spaces: the sensorial-synthetic, the brilliance, the opacity, the paralyzed, the dynamism of nervous-muscular movement, entropic sounds, the whole spectrum of colors, tonalities, antiquities, modernities... an imaginary de-architectonics of the city's architecture. Poetic flaws in the symbolism of modern design.

A labyrinth of almost indescribable surprises imposes itself upon the rectangular and rectilinear surfaces projected by modern intentions between the use and the passage of "Baudelairean" man in the multitudes.

And that's just the forward!

The list price says $20, but buy it direct from SDSU Press and we'll send it to your for $6.95!

SDSU PRESS GEAR! Can You Say San Diego State University Press Branded Boxers? I Knew You Could!

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A Classic Memoir from the Annals of 20th Century American History: Soldier to Ambassador: From the D-Day Normandy Landing to the Persian Gulf War by Charles W. Hostler--SDSU Press

Like some fusion of James Bond and The Man from U.N.C.L.E., this fascinating memoir, Soldier to Ambassador: From the D-Day Normandy Landing to the Persian Gulf War, marks key, life-shaping moments from Charles W. Hostler's amazing odyssey--a remarkable man who began his life as a newsboy during the Great Depression, who developed himself whilst a soldier in the U.S. military, working his way up still further as an agent in the OSS and, finally, as the U.S. Ambassador to Bahrain. 

Hostler describes his 20 year residence in the Middle East, as well as his extensive world travels and dedicated public services.

Click on the book cover image to order now.

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Arguably the Best, Most Affordable Paperback Study of German Expressionism is Back in Print...

Hit the image here to your left for more info and a special offer from SDSU Press via Amazon.com

Attention Italophiles and Poetry Fanatics: the Brain-Popping Genius of Italian Experimental Poetry Now Available for Discovery

When Renato Barilli published his Voyage to the End of the Word in Italy in 1981, it was a huge success.

Now, this brilliant collection of poetry and criticism has been published in English, and is available only from the SDSU Press.

There's more to the book than the mini-anthology of fantastic work by poetic experimenters (though that's pretty awesome). In Voyage, Barilli places Italian experimental poetry in a new context. His criticism combines the linguistic theories of Ferdinand Saussure with the Freudian notions of pre-oedipal bliss. The essays delve deep, revealing the puns, visuality, neologisms and full range of devices that experimental poets utilized to expand the capabilities of expressive language.

Also, it's a steal. Just sayin'.

If you understand Italian, you can check out Barilli below. I have no idea what he's saying, but you might enjoy it!

Autographed Copies of Federman A to X-X-X-X: A Recyclopedic Narrative—Only 14 Left!

Main Entry: Raymond Federman
Pronunciation: /RAY-mund feh-DER-man/
Function: noun
Earliest Usage: 1928
: a French-American wearer of reversible jackets
Synonyms: novelist, poet, academic, critic, translator, deconstructed brilliance

Raymond Federman didn’t buy into “the rules” of writing. Instead, he shredded them (something we’ve all wanted to do to our copies of The Little Brown Handbook and Strunk and White).

Born in Montague, France, this Columbia and UCLA graduate became the foremost expert on Samuel Beckett, founded a publishing company for the avant-garde, wrote criticism, translated, and of course, created incredible work. He eventually moved to San Diego, and many of our University faculty personally knew him. When he passed last October, it was a blow to all.

Federman’s novels and poems defy definition. He deconstructs them, rearranges them, hammers them into the page in the strangest of orders. His poetry, especially, is graphic—not just descriptive, but deliberately placed on the page to form images and patterns, giving the entire piece an added layer of meaning. His wrote about everything, from the impossibility of putting the human debacle down on paper to a potato (it turns into a tomato).

Federman A to X-X-X-X: A Recyclopedic Narrative, covers everything about Federman—and it does so in the same freely chaotic spirit. A joint project of Larry McCaffrey, Thomas Hartl and Douge Rice, this must-have is currently available in a special, autographed, hardcover edition.

One of the few remaining copies can be yours for $34.95 (postage and handling included). Interested? Of course you are, but unlike the paperback version, these collector editions are not available online. To order, make out a check to SDSU Press (for $34.95) and send it to:

Harry Polkinhorn
Director, SDSU PRESS
SDSU mailcode: 8141
San Diego, California 92182.8141

Marco Antonio Samaniego’s Award Winning Novel Available in English Translation

Marco Antonio Samaniego’s Donde las voces se guardan, winner of the 1992 Augustín Yañez award, is now available in English translation from SDSU Press as The Whispering Voices of Atabalpa. Hit the image above to order it right away via Amazon.com (our online distribution lackey!)

The fifth novel in the SDSU Press series “Baja California Literature in Translation," the book centers on La Chueca, the crooked and deformed female. Condemned from birth for her appearance and her inability to cry as a newborn girl ought, La Chueca grows into a woman who flees her small, unforgiving town to experience life, desire and death. 

Following is an excerpt from the novel described by famed Mexican journalist and author Elena Poniatowska as a “great literary effort.” 

From the moment she spied the little clump of flesh, she knew it was deformed, but she said nothing; she kept quiet, not wanting to be accused of having the evil eye. "It’s a girl, it’s a girl!" She ran outside shouting, where the crowd had gathered, gossiping about the slut Vicenta who had gotten involved with the Silerios and stolen the husband of La Manuela, the daughter of the town’s religious zealot. The women crowded in to see her. Her eyes were red and squinty. Her mouth twitched and her skin was the color of the evening sun, The child had hardly cried at all. That’s why the tongues began to wag; she was born during the sofoque: "The child that doesn’t cry is the child that brings evil; the sign of Satan, of the devil, of evil itself."

The Utopian Vision: Seven Essays on the Quincentennial of Sir Thomas More

From the heavenly garden of ancient Sumeria, to the plans of nineteenth-century Latin American positivists, to feminist science fiction—concepts of utopia continue to transfix and inspire the human imagination.

Originally published as a celebration of the quincentennial of the birth of Sir Thomas More, The Utopian Vision consists of seven essays on the “enduring symbol of mankind’s hopes.”

Enhancing this SDSU Press original is a fully annotated bibliography of 500 utopian works and works about utopian thought, one for each year between the birth of Saint Thomas More, advisor to Henry VIII and author of Utopia, and the essays within the book.

And now, in the interest of maintaining our allegiance to the conventions of 21st century blogging, a clip--of Sir Thomas More, of course:

Re-released with a Reduced Price! Everett Gee Jackson’s Four Trips to Antiquity: Adventures of an Artist in Maya Ruined Cities

Everett Gee Jackson, dubbed “San Diego’s most important Modern artist” by the San Diego Museum of Art, creates a travelogue, sketchbook and entirely fascinating work in Four Trips to Antiquity.

With both full-color and black and white illustrations, Jackson’s account of his adventures in Central America remains not only a fine example of the artist’s work--it is filled with a surprising humor and insight.

Available and discounted via the SDSU Press Web Store.

Humor & Eroticism in Advertising by Maria Cristina da Silva Martins Back in Print from SDSU Press

San Diego State University Press is happy to announce that one of our more dynamic cultural studies titles is again available.

Alle Kunstler: War--Revolution--Weimar : German Expressionist Prints, Posters, and Periodicals from the Robert Gore Rifkind Foundation

Visual Arts on the U.S./Mexican Border edited by Harry Polkinhorn, Rogelio Reyes, Gabriel Trujillo Muñoz

Visual Arts on the U.S./Mexican Border edited by Harry Polkinhorn, Rogelio Reyes, Gabriel Trujillo Muñoz | ISBN: 0-916304-93-0 Paper / Pages: 170 / $12.50 Illustrated (1991)

Click the image opposite for more details and to order this back-in-print volume via Amazon.com

BORDER LIVES: PERSONAL ESSAYS ON THE U.S./MEXICO BORDER

surTEXT: San Diego State Univesity Press Titles Focused on Latin America, Mexico, and the American Southwest

...click here for the link!