Sign-In
Cart
Signals Across Vast Distances: Essays and Tales
Hardcover
Biographies GeneralLetters & EssaysFiction Anthologies
Publisher Price: $26.99
ISBN13: 9781324118008
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Published: Sep 15 2026
Pages: 144
Weight: 0.85
Height: 0.70 Width: 5.60 Depth: 8.40
Language: English
In this deeply personal book, Elizabeth Alexander gives us profound and galvanizing lessons from culture and life to move through challenging times. In close readings of visionary and beloved poets and writers--Muriel Rukeyser, Gwendolyn Brooks, Audre Lorde, James Baldwin, and June Jordan, among others--Dr. Alexander meditates on how words and values can sustain and inspire us, interweaving her voice with revelatory works of art by some of our most extraordinary visual artists, richly reproduced in the book's pages.
Her stories of connection--as a daughter, wife, widow, and mother of two sons; reflecting at midlife on her younger days as an aspiring dancer;? as a poet at President Obama's inauguration on the dais alongside her father, a civil rights pioneer; urging radical welcome in our families, communities, and country--engage and move us. Her reflections on the public project of acknowledging historical truths, a focus of her leadership at the Mellon Foundation, model courageous action.
Throughout the book, Alexander poses questions, encouraging readers to recognize the abundant resources we carry within or can access: language, history, art, community, family, our bodies, our stories, and love itself. In luminous and powerful prose, Signals Across Vast Distances calls us to imagine possibilities, take courage, and--in Alexander's closing words--lead with love.
Also from
Alexander, Elizabeth
Also in
Letters & Essays
Essays V2: Moral And Entertaining On The Various Faculties And Passions Of The Human Mind (1815)
Clarendon, Edward Hyde Earl of
Paperback
But Have You Read the Book? Romance Edition: 40 Love Stories That Inspired Our Favorite Films
Lopez, Kristen
Hardcover
Sez I to Myself: The Collected Essays of Frank and Malachy McCourt
McCourt, Malachy
McCourt, Frank
Hardcover
World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments
Nezhukumatathil, Aimee
Paperback
Little Apocalypses: Essays on Motherhood, Climate Change, and Hope at the End of the World
Teer, Kaitlyn
Paperback
Corazón Migrante. Ensayos Sobre Lo Que No Puedo Olvidar / Migrant Heart: Essays on What I Cannot Forget
Grande, Reyna
Paperback
Glimmerings: Letters on Faith Between a Poet and a Theologian
Volf, Miroslav
Wiman, Christian
Hardcover
Love in the Afternoon, and Evening: Essays and Conversations on Soap Operas
Sen, Mayukh
Druckman, Charlotte
Paperback
Wonderbook (Revised and Expanded): The Illustrated Guide to Creating Imaginative Fiction
VanderMeer, Jeff
Paperback
Mon Cher Amour: The Love Letters of Albert Camus and Maria Casares, 1944-1959
Camus, Albert
Hardcover
Languages of Home: Essays on Writing, Hoop, and American Lives 1975-2025
Wideman, John Edgar
Hardcover
Wonder Is a Lovely Place to Be: 365 Days of Wit, Wisdom, and Irrepressible Imagination
Doyle, Brian
Hardcover