“More poetry is said to come from Wisconsin than from any other state in the Union,” read a clipping from an 1885 issue of the Badger State Banner, erstwhile paper of Black River Falls, Wisconsin. Michael Lesy presented the quote in his 1973 book, Wisconsin Death Trip, a grim and otherworldly montage of text and image that would achieve cult-classic status among scholarly bohemians and discerning goths. Now 50-plus years old, the book retains its strange effect, descending into the madness of a small Midwestern town at the turn of the 20th century with a tone as dark and encompassing as Norwegian black metal. It is still hard to say which part of the bookstore it belongs to: Is Lesy’s a work of historical nonfiction, a surrealist art experiment, or a coffee-table object for your local hippie flophouse? “Those who read the book couldn’t decide if it was poetry or history, a fabrication or a discourse, a hoax or a revelation,” the author wrote 14 years later, explaining for the yuppies …