Manna: For the Mandelstams for the Mandelas

Fiction
A lyrical meditation on political resistance by a preeminent feminist thinker-now in paperback!
A Russian Jewish poet who died in exile in Siberia, a South African political leader who survived his banishment to prison: Osip Mandelstam and Nelson Mandela, so far apart in time and space, are brought together in this story, their shared destinies unraveled in light of the Jewish and African diasporas.
"Cixous draws parallels between two couples-Nelson and Winnie Mandela, who fought a decades-long struggle against South African apartheid, and the Russian poet Osip Mandelstam, who, with his wife, Nadezhda, waged a moral revolt against Stalinism. Each couple faced arbitrary arrests, imprisonment, and banishment for refusing to submit to a corrupt system. Each woman gave her husband hope and inspiration to carry on, yet was also a moving force in her own right. This extraordinary experimental fiction includes passages of astonishing beauty and a deep meditation on the wellsprings of political resistance." Publishers Weekly
Perhaps France's best-known feminist thinker, Hlne Cixous is the author of over thirty volumes of fiction and critical theory.
Catherine A. F. MacGillivray is assistant professor of English and women's studies at the University of Northern Iowa.
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