Brumberg-Kraus, Max: Visions of Divine's Love: A Drag Theoretic

AC Books, paperback

Publication Date: October 31st, 2023

Illustrated by: J C A Freeman

Publisher Marketing: Here, written down "visions" are spliced with "visualizations," mixed media icons that blur the medieval and (post)modern, transforming the book into a pseudo-cinematic experience of text, image, and the movement between them. The loose story framing the poems describes cloistered professor and film buff Dr. Julia Johnson -- a reimagined Julian -- and her nameless teaching assistant, a novice nun, as the former reflects on all that was shown to her in viewing the cult classic. As a queer woman in a conflated 14th/20th century, Johnson's vision is television, her Christs are Dreamlanders, and her revelations are sparked by the spectacular rites of the cinema. Through the theoria of filmic engagement, the poems in VISIONS OF DIVINE'S LOVE uncover secrets about Julia, the viewer, the world, and, indeed, about the divine.   Max Yeshaye Brumberg-Kraus is a writer, drag performer and theopoet in Saint Paul, MN. They are the artistic director of the House of Larva Drag Co-Operative, producing one acts and full-length performances since 2014, while performing as Cicada l'Amour. Max is the author of The(y)ology: Mythopoetics for Queer/Trans Liberation through punctum press and the play Circe:Twilight of a Goddess, produced with Siren Island, which they directed at Point San Pablo, CA in 2021. They are currently in the process of producing for the stage "I Sing for Bathesheba: Drag Monologues from the Hebrew Bible" and have begun a second book on Julina of Norwich adn epkahrasis. J.C.A. Freeman is associate professor and director of the Theology and the Arts Program at United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities. She is the author of The Good Sheppherd: Images, Meaning and Power (Baylor University Press, 2021) and Ashburnham Pentateuch and its Contexts: The Trinity in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages (Boydell & Brewer, 2022). She is also a visual artist with a background in illustation and technical theatre.