And We Came Outside and Saw the Stars Again by Ilan Stavans

Net proceeds from And We Came Outside and Saw the Stars Again will go to the Book Industry Charitable Foundation, which helps the passionate booksellers we readers depend upon. Our literary culture depends on bookstores-and those irreplaceable sources of conversation and community, of inspiration and solace, have been decimated by the lockdown. Together they comprise a profound global portrait of the defining moment of our time, and send a clarion call for solidarity across borders. In that spirit, the stories, essays, poems, and artwork in this collection-from beloved authors including Jhumpa Lahiri, Mario Vargas Llosa, Eavan Boland, Daniel Alarcón, Jon Lee Anderson, Claire Messud, Ariel Dorfman, and many more-detail the harrowing experiences of life in the pandemic, while pointing toward a less isolated future. In Queens, after thirteen-hour shifts in the ER, a doctor dons running shoes and makes the long jog home.Īnd We Came Outside and Saw the Stars Again takes its title from the last line of Dante's Inferno, when the poet and his guide emerge from hell to once again behold the beauty of the heavens. In Chile, protesters who prevailed against tear gas and rubber bullets are now halted by a virus. In Paris, a writer struggles to protect his young son from fear. In Mauritius, a journalist contends with denialism and mourns the last days of summer, lost to the lockdown. World Literature Today's 75 Notable Translations of 2020Īs our world is transformed by the coronavirus pandemic, writers offer a powerful antidote to the fearful confines of isolation: a window onto lives and corners of the world beyond our own. A portion of proceeds benefit booksellers in need. In this rich, eye-opening, and uplifting anthology, dozens of esteemed writers, poets, artists, and translators from more than thirty countries send literary dispatches from life during the pandemic.

And We Came Outside and Saw the Stars Again by Ilan Stavans