Skylight Books and The Institute for Art and Olfaction are thrilled to present this virtual event for Tanaïs' In Sensorium: Notes for My People!

The Institute for Art and Olfaction is non-profit devoted to education, access and experimentation in the field of perfumery, and the larger world of smell. They do this by initiating and supporting experimental projects with scent, by providing accessible education in their experimental laboratory as well as in partnership with institutions and community groups, by curating art exhibitions that incorporate scent in their gallery and in partnership with institutions, and by raising visibility for independent, artisan and experimental and artistic practices with scent as a whole. Through these efforts, they extend the world of scent beyond its traditional boundaries of appreciation and use.

In Sensorium: Notes for My People (Harper)

Fragrance has long been used to mark who is civilized and who is barbaric, who is pure and who is polluted, who is free and who is damned—

Focusing their gaze on our most primordial sense, writer and perfumer Tanaïs weaves a brilliant and expansive memoir, a reckoning that offers a critical, alternate history of South Asia from an American Bangladeshi Muslim femme perspective. From stories of their childhood in the South, Midwest, and New York; to transcendent experiences with lovers, psychedelics, and fragrances; to trips home to their motherland, Tanaïs builds a universe of memories and scent: a sensorium. Alongside their personal history, and at the very heart of this work, is an interrogation of the ancient violence of caste, rape culture, patriarchy, war, and the inherited ancestral trauma of being from a lush land constantly denuded, a land still threatened and disappearing because of colonization, capitalism, and climate change.

Structured like a perfume—moving from base to heart to head notes—IN SENSORIUM interlaces eons of South Asian perfume history, erotic and religious texts, survivor testimonies, and material culture with memoir. In Sensorium is archive and art, illuminating the great crises of our time with the language of Liberation.

TANAÏS is the author of In Sensorium, and the critically acclaimed novel Bright Lines, which was a finalist for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, the Edmund White Debut Fiction Award, and the Brooklyn Eagles Literary Prize. They are the recipient of residencies at MacDowell, Tin House, and Djerassi. An independent perfumer, their fragrance, beauty and design studio TANAÏS is based in New York City. Follow them on Instagram at @studiotanais.

"In Sensorium is a potently beautiful testimonial of feeling, touching, and breathing beyond the boundaries of empire, patriarchy, and the rule of law. It is a love story for all of us who not only live on the margins, but make magic there. With remarkable sensitivity and frankness, Tanaïs has given us an unforgettable, wise, and sumptuous story. This book will be with me for a very long time."
— Imani Perry, author of Breathe and South to America

"In Sensorium does to the senses, particularly smell, what Toni Cade Bambara did to sound. I have never come close to experiencing a book that reminds us to accept the calcified histories and fluid futures deeply packed in our senses. What an absolutely unique and momentous book! Tanaïs has made a book only they could write, and my body is so, so thankful. Stunning work."
— Kiese Laymon, author of Long Division and Heavy 

"Lyrical, expansive, aching, and alive, In Sensorium invites us to behold and be humbled, to boldly redraw the old maps, to not only recover what has been erased, but to wildly create what has never been and is forever possible. 'I write to imagine freedom, even though I write in the language of power.' In this book, language is a portal and language is a world and language is a syncretic invention. Kaleidoscopic in scope, each page unfolds into a dazzling spiral as Tanaïs weaves personal histories into the history of Bangladesh and South Asia. These meditations on ancestral violence, war, the feminine divine, scent, erotic dreamscapes, rage, belonging, beauty, liberation and familial inheritances pulse with voluptuous longing. This work requires attention and deep devotion."
— Jenny Zhang, author of Sour Heart and My Baby First Birthday

"Novelist and perfumer Tanaïs blends in this beautiful work memoir, history, and notes on perfuming to interrogate love, violence, and generational healing. Throughout, rich imagery and language are married as Tanaïs moves through their ancestral trauma to discover a place of healing...Readers will find more than just their olfactory senses heightened by this beautiful meditation."
— Publishers Weekly

"A lyrical memoir, sensuous and sensual, that crosses decades and continents...Tanaïs, author of the acclaimed novel Bright Lines, brings a millennial sensibility—and a rejection of outmoded mores—to their work as a sharp observer of the world. Refusing old binaries, they move freely among peoples who are bitterly divided...A heady pleasure of language in love with the author’s many subjects, and perfectly suited to them."
— Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"This memoir from writer and perfumer Tanaïs is as ambitious as it is wide-ranging, telling the story of their experience as an American Bangladeshi Muslim femme moving around the world in a wise and engaging manner that asks deeply relevant questions about queerness, gender, colonization and South Asian identity."
— Vogue

Skylit: In Sensorium: Notes for My People by Tanaïs, with Kiese Laymon