In Spite of Everything...

About the Book

For centuries, people have loved tales shared by poets—Homer, Chaucer, and many others. In the late nineteenth century, people were mesmerized by the tales of traversing the Bush Country of Australia as told meticulous detail by a deaf poet named Henry Lawson. In this collection of verses, poet Curtis Robbins—who is himself deaf—shares a tale of a group whom very few hearing people know about or understand.

The poems in this collection present a story told daily among deaf people. They focus on the details and moment-to-moment experiences of what it’s like to be a normal deaf person. Robbins explores the conflicts faced among deaf people, with hearing people, and on our own. He examines the inhibitions and exhibitions that are characteristically ingrained into the lives of deaf people. He also considers the work of deaf Australian poet Henry Lawson, celebrating his legacy.

In this collection of verse, Robbins seeks to embellish, ostracize, epitomize, chastise, advocate, and reflect upon his own observations, thoughts, and visions about what it is about being deaf—without ever resorting to be invective but rather exonerating those realities.

About the Author

Curtis Robbins, a graduate of Gallaudet University, taught American Sign Language and deaf culture for forty years prior to his retirement in 2007. He has published several poems found in three anthologies of deaf poetry. He is married with two grown children and lives in Maryland.