When Louis Pasteur discovered the process of fermentation in the 1870s, he noted that, while most organisms perished from lack of oxygen, some were able to adapt and even thrive as 'life without air'. In this capricious, dreamlike collection, characters and scenes traverse states of airlessness, from suffocating relationships, religions and institutions to toxic environments and ecstatic asphyxiations. Both compassionate and ecologically nuanced, this innovative collection bridges poetry and prose to interrogate the conditions necessary for survival.
