Nox in a Box

Though I hate to say it like this, Nox by Anne Carson seems, to me, to be the closest thing to a work of art of all the books we have read this semester. First of all, it physically transcends the ordinary format of a typical book of poems being words on pages bound together. As it includes numerous sketches, photographs, and other crucial memorabilia, Nox reminds its audience that sometimes the experience that one seeks to capture within a poem surpasses the poem itself and must be expressed in other various media. The physical book itself isn’t even really a book; it has been reproduced and distributed in a box as a continuation of pages that opens up accordion-style, which proves to be one of its most admirable features. It takes up space. It gets in people’s way. It is a burden. I think that Anne Carson expects the reader to take up the tedious activity of reserving an empty hallway or corridor and actually open the entire “book” to its full length. What would result is a timeline of someone’s life with that someone being Anne Carson’s brother who unexpectedly passed away without her knowing for two weeks. With that said, Anne Carson is able to do successfully what she set out to do by writing and publishing this book, which is to pay homage to her brother.

However, what is important to note is that Nox is not just a collection of old memories of someone. Anne Carson did not simply compile things that reminded her of her brother. She actively thought and toiled to create this piece of art in such a way that she thought would resemble her brother. This came to me when I read the New Yorker’s review of her book. At one point in the article, it is revealed that in order to produce the first page of the book, which has a yellowish tinge and is slightly blurred, Carson actually took the time to soak her typescript of the poem in tea overnight. Apparently, Nox is an active piece of work. By simply looking at what it looks like, one can tell that Carson worked hard to produce the actual book. That gives me the idea that in addition to being a finish product that would reach the public eye, Nox was also an experience for Carson herself. While scrolling through each page, one can get the feeling of Carson reminiscing about her brother, who was a rather troubled youth and ran away from home at an early age. Furthermore, the reader can also feel Carson mourning the loss of her brother as well as coping with the dead and trying to make sense of everything. At times, she seems to be in control of the work she is producing: everything is deliberate and well designed. However, at other times, the work transcends Carson’s control, and the reader can feel those momentary breaks when she might stop and reach for a tissue.