refrain recounts the author's travels in India as an inexperienced and sensitive young man. The narrative shows wit, intelligence and a facility with words. The style is experimental and literary; and the fascination of the stories told – short stories in verse presenting the anxieties and misfortunes typical of shoestring traveling, and the culture-shock deriving from visiting a very different culture from ones own – carries the careful reader along. A knack for reading this less-than-conventional fast-paced book, which is at once humorous and nightmarish, passionate and detached, is acquired quickly.
"A young man arrives in Delhi with a romanticized view of India, a pocketful of outdated maps, and a money belt begging to be stolen. ... Polley takes us along on a ride that feels cinematic, jammed with sensory explosions that rock the sensibilities.The reader is pulled into the text to experience the chaotic, disordered images of India. The stories work as a sprawling dramatic monologue, one that encompasses numerous states and territories. Polley paints on a large canvas and his brush strokes are fresh, memorable, and cutting edge."
— Kirby Wright, Honolulu, Hawai, Author of Punahou Blues and Moloka'i Nui Ahina
"Polley’s verse betrays the eyes of a true traveler for whom all experience seems new and full of wonder."
-- Review by Zachary Abram, in The Bull Calf, June 2012.
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Jason S Polley
Jason S Polley allocates his time to reading, scuba diving, practicing yoga, and getting tattooed. He began what was to become refrain in early 1997 while a budget traveler on the Indian Subcontinent, but shelved it later that year to devote himself to the study and composition of academic prose. He returned to his lone work of fiction in order to meet the deadline for the 2009 Proverse Prize. Since 1998 he has lived in Guangzhou, Montreal, Bogota, Guayaquil and Hong Kong. At the time of writing he was teaching American Literature and Culture at Hong Kong Baptist University, where he is now (2022) an Associate Professor.
