"This collection is one of two manuscripts recently chosen by Susan Stewart for the Princeton Series of Contemporary Poets, which is dedicated to publishing the best work of today's emerging and established poets. We publish one to two titles per year as selected by the series editor. The series began in 1975 with the publication of Sadness and Happiness: Poems by Robert Pinsky, and has published landmark collections by such poets as Ann Lauterbach and Jorie Graham. I entered without words is a new collection of poems by the poet and translator Jody Gladding. Using unusual visual and verbal forms, Gladding constructs poems that, in her words, allow readers 'to move about the page as they please--there is no right or wrong way to proceed. The poem opens into a three-dimensional space where things can happen simultaneously. And differently with each reading.' Creating many paths for readers across the page through word placements and font choices, Gladding constructs scenes that blend the surreal, the domestic, and the natural world to raise questions about language, poetic form, and representation. Some of the poems have facing-page French versions that further extend the reader's sense of exploration"--
