Bringing Sexy Back (To Valentine’s Day): 15 Steamy Poems by Esteemed Poets

Desire, frustration, and jewelry. Also: socioeconomic tension. (And the first overtly lesbian poem I read as a teenager. Bit of a lightbulb moment, there.)

Carol Ann Duffy, “Warming her Pearls”

Difficult to choose just one Donne poem, but hey, let’s go with the salute to nakedness:

John Donne, “To His Mistress Going to Bed”

Restraint and abandonment, all at once:

Emily Dickinson, “Wild Nights – Wild Nights! (269)”

For the Dear Readers who are also parents:

Galway Kinnel, “After Making Love We Hear Footsteps”

Maybe this is where they got the title for Blue is the Warmest Color:

May Swenson, “Blue”

I hate birds, but this poem is still amazing:

Henri Cole, “Loons”

You’ll never look at roses the same way again, I promise:

D.H. Lawrence, “Gloire de Dijon”

And yes, a Neruda poem. But I can’t find it anywhere on the interwebs, so you’ll have to go find a copy of World’s End or Late and Posthumous Poems for yourself.

Pablo Neruda, “Física”/”Physics”

Your turn: what’s the sexiest poem you’ve ever read?

“Full nakedness! All joys are due to thee”: John Donne, Sexy Poetry, and Making Valentine’s Day Fun Again

February 4, 2014February 3, 2014 / Carolyn O / 30 Comments

Back in the waning days of 2013, I promised that I’d devote February’s Tuesday poetry posts to sexy poems by dead poets.

I’m here to deliver.

I kinda hate Valentine’s Day, for all the usual reasons, I suppose. Pink looks sickly to me, overpriced roses do not smell as nice as regularly priced roses, and Victoria’s Secret is pretty gross.It’s all so generic and impersonal, and nothing epitomizes the sorry state of Valentine’s Day like the Hallmark card.

So I propose that we bring sexy back with real, honest-to-goodness poetry. Grab some steamy lines from some esteemed wordsmiths and write those in your card to your significant person.

Love poem anthologies there are a-plenty (just search for wedding poems and prepare for the deluge), so I shall take it upon myself this month to point you toward the sexiest poems in English. No hearts, no mushy stuff.

There may even be a list.

To start things off, here’s John Donne’s elegy “To His Mistress Going to Bed” (I know I wrote about John Donne last year, but that was a Holy Sonnet. This is not.).

In the poem, the speaker encourages his inamorata to shed her clothes, piece by piece, because, well, being naked is fun. And only John Donne can manage to convey that the woman being seduced is rich (she has a pocket watch and a tres chic outfit), refer to England’s new colonies, and bring up a midwife in an erotic poem that sparkles with wit, puns, and the most charming sophistry you’ve ever read. Bonus: women are compared to books to explain their sex appeal.

What a guy.

For those who don’t want to write out the whole poem in their Valentine’s Day cards, I’ve excerpted the funniest/raunchiest bit at the end of the post.

Elegy XIX: To His Mistress Going to Bed
John Donne

Come, Madam, come, all rest my powers defy,
Until I labour, I in labour lie.
The foe oft-times having the foe in sight,
Is tir’d with standing though he never fight.
Off with that girdle, like heaven’s Zone glistering,
But a far fairer world encompassing.
Unpin that spangled breastplate which you wear,
That th’eyes of busy fools may be stopped there.
Unlace yourself, for that harmonious chime,
Tells me from you, that now it is bed time.
Off with that happy busk, which I envy,
That still can be, and still can stand so nigh.
Your gown going off, such beauteous state reveals,
As when from flowery meads th’hill’s shadow steals.
Off with that wiry Coronet and shew
The hairy Diadem which on you doth grow:
Now off with those shoes, and then safely tread
In this love’s hallow’d temple, this soft bed.
In such white robes, heaven’s Angels used to be
Received by men; Thou Angel bringst with thee
A heaven like Mahomet’s Paradise; and though
Ill spirits walk in white, we easily know,
By this these Angels from an evil sprite,
Those set our hairs, but these our flesh upright.
Licence my roving hands, and let them go,
Before, behind, between, above, below.
O my America! my new-found-land,
My kingdom, safeliest when with one man mann’d,
My Mine of precious stones, My Empirie,
How blest am I in this discovering thee!
To enter in these bonds, is to be free;
Then where my hand is set, my seal shall be.
Full nakedness! All joys are due to thee,
As souls unbodied, bodies uncloth’d must be,
To taste whole joys. Gems which you women use
Are like Atlanta’s balls, cast in men’s views,
That when a fool’s eye lighteth on a Gem,
His earthly soul may covet theirs, not them.
Like pictures, or like books’ gay coverings made
For lay-men, are all women thus array’d;
Themselves are mystic books, which only we
(Whom their imputed grace will dignify)
Must see reveal’d. Then since that I may know;
As liberally, as to a Midwife, shew
Thy self: cast all, yea, this white linen hence,
There is no penance due to innocence.
To teach thee, I am naked first; why then
What needst thou have more covering than a man?

As promised, the funniest/naughtiest lines (you may need to alter some pronouns to fit your situation. I won’t tell John Donne, but give him a h/t, ok?)

Licence my roving hands, and let them go,
Before, behind, between, above, below.
O my America! my new-found-land,
My kingdom, safeliest when with one man mann’d,
My Mine of precious stones, My Empirie,
How blest am I in this discovering thee!

Literary Wives: The Inquisitor’s Wife, by Jeanne Kalogridis

February 3, 2014February 1, 2014 / Carolyn O / 10 Comments

If you missed the Literary Wives introductory post, here’s the summary: I’ll be joining bloggers Ariel, Audra, Cecilia, Kay, and Lynn as we post every other month about a different book with the word “wife” in the title. When we read these books, we have two questions in mind:

1. What does this book say about wives or the experience of being a wife?

2. In what way does this woman define “wife”—or in what way is she defined by “wife”?

This month, we’re talking about Jeanne Kalogridis’s novel The Inquisitor’s Wife, which was published in 2013. We invite you to join the discussion by commenting on our blogs (links below) or posting your own review on our shiny new Facebook page, which you can find here.

Readers take note: Although I usually refrain from spoilers, what follows is a consideration of one aspect of the novel, and so I shall be spoiling away. Beware!

Here’s part of the Goodreads summary of The Inquisitor’s Wife:

In 1480 Seville, Marisol, a fearful young conversa (descendant of Spanish Jews forced to convert to Christianity), is ashamed of her Jewish blood. Forced into a sham marriage with a prosecutor for the new Inquisition, Marisol soon discovers that her childhood sweetheart, Antonio, has just returned to Seville and is also working for the inquisitors. When Marisol’s father is arrested and tortured during Spain’s first auto da fe, Marisol comes to value her Jewish heritage and vows to fight the Inquisition.

What I liked best about this novel: the period details (a family’s palace fallen on hard times, the bearing and sartorial choices of Isabella of Castile, the gruesome ritual of public penance) and its attempt to correct misconceptions about the Spanish Inquisition. Ms. Kalogridis focuses on the plight of conversos — those who converted to Catholicism from Judaism, as well as their descendants — in the city of Seville, and I liked the specificity of the city’s history and geography.

Contemporary scholarship suggests several different motivations behind the Inquisition, and Ms. Kalogridis comes down solidly on the side of Isabella’s desire to acquire the wealth and property of convicted conversos. It’s a convincing performance; Isabella is the most charismatic and dangerous character in the novel.

However, the book suffers when it comes to the “fiction” half of historical fiction. Marisol, the novel’s protagonist and narrator, is thoroughly unlikable, despite her family’s suffering. Now, I don’t mind an unlikable narrator or main character in the right circumstances (Gone Girl, for example, or Shakespeare’s Coriolanus), but we are supposed to empathize with Marisol, and for most of the book, it’s nearly impossible to do so. She’s sullen, selfish, and insensible to her mother’s feelings and heritage and her father’s delicate political position.

When she suddenly stops receiving letters from her childhood sweetheart and devoted fiance, Antonio, does she seek him out or ask her parents to find out what’s going on? No. She sends letters for months and then gives up on him. Clearly she hasn’t read enough novels. When her father subsequently arranges her marriage to their hulking, creepy (and stooge of the Inquisition) neighbor, Gabriel, Marisol doesn’t do what any self-respecting heroine would do (run away, or at least attempt escape) — she merely fumes in silence and refuses to kiss her father goodbye.

This sulky teenager performance is all the worse when we learn that Marisol’s mother is indeed a crypto-Jew, attempting to keep her faith alive after a horrific incident of savagery took her family from her when she was a young child. Marisol’s arranged marriage is obviously an attempt to protect her from the offices of the Inquisition, and the price for that protection turns out to be her father’s life, freely given in exchange for hers. Marisol only finds her courage (and accepts her heritage) when it’s much too late to save her father.

Instead, the novel closes with the revelation of Marisol’s mother’s identity a half-hearted resumption of Marisol’s romance with Antonio (who, obviously to the reader, if not to Marisol, has been working to subvert the Inquisition from within and never stopped loving her.). I think I understand why Ms. Kalogridis chose to write the novel from the perspective of a conversa who must discover her own heritage, but the secondary characters — particularly Marisol’s mother and Mariam, her friend and servant — have far more interesting stories and perspectives.

And now on to our discussion questions:

1. What does this book say about wives or about the experience of being a wife?

The book considers the very specific position of wives in fifteenth-century Seville. Women are expected to be obedient to their fathers and husbands, accepting orders, chastisement, and arranged marriages without complaint. Even Marisol’s father, generally portrayed as sympathetic, does not hesitate to strike Marisol’s mother or command her to obey him.

A notable contrast with the wives of Seville is the queen, Isabella, who never appears with her husband in the novel. Powerful, wily, and ruthless, Isabella changes her outward appearance to conform to the expectations of her audience (rich adornment for a private court party, simple black with a crucifix for public occasions or audiences with monks). It’s politically useful for her to appear as a dutiful wife, and so she takes on that appearance — all the while remaining completely independent.

2. In what way does this woman define “wife”—or in what way is she defined by “wife”?

As Gabriel’s wife, Marisol expects to follow her mother’s example and submit to her husband’s wishes. Gabriel repulses her, not only because of his creepy fixation on her since childhood, but because he’s cruel and brutal (he beat a defenseless elderly man as a teenager, and as an adult he works for the Inquisition and shows no compunction about having people tortured — including Marisol, late in the book).

However, thanks to Gabriel’s brother’s machinations (and later, Gabriel’s apparent unfamiliarity with female anatomy), the marriage goes unconsummated. According to church doctrine, consummation is required to make the marriage complete; perhaps this is yet another reason why Marisol feels no loyalty to Gabriel. Conveniently, it also makes possible annulment and remarriage to Antonio feasible.

Still, because Marisol is Gabriel’s wife — and a conversa — Gabriel manipulates her for his own political and personal purposes, and Marisol only thwarts him with subterfuge and help from Mariam. She is obliged by circumstance to fear Gabriel, even though she does not respect him.

Please visit the other Literary Wives bloggers to get their takes on the book!

Audra at Unabridged Chick

Ariel at One Little Library

Cecilia at Only You

Kay at WhatMeRead

Lynn at Smoke and Mirrors

(Emily’s on hiatus for awhile.)

We’ll be reading The Zookeeper’s Wife next, so we hope you’ll stop by again for the next Literary Wives discussion on the first Monday in April.

An Interview with Melissa Pritchard, author of Palmerino

January 31, 2014January 28, 2014 / Carolyn O / 3 Comments

Yesterday, I reviewed Palmerino, Ms. Pritchard’s latest novel, out now from Bellevue Press. Ms. Pritchard graciously consented to be interviewed via email.

How did you first learn about Violet Paget/Vernon Lee, and what led you to write a novel about V.’s life?

Melissa Pritchard
photo (c) John Beckett

MP: In July 2008, while visiting Florence, I was introduced by an Italian friend, Giuditta Viceconte, to Federica Paretti, a member of the Angeli family, current owners of Villa il Palmerino, Vernon Lee’s former home. At the time, I had been thinking of starting a writer’s residency, and Giuditta immediately decided I should meet Federica to discuss possibilities. On the afternoon I met Federica, I felt an immediate kinship with her and strangely, with the Villa itself. I had a deeply comforting sense of having “come home.” As I learned of Vernon Lee from Federica, I began to sense and to “see” things around the villa and the property that caused Federica to regard me strangely, until she finally said, “You may be meant to write a book about Vernon Lee. Perhaps that is the real reason you have come here.” For example, as I was looking out of a upstairs window onto the terrace, I “saw,” as in a film, a puppet show for children being performed there. I turned to Federica, saying “this would make a wonderful space for a children’s puppet show!” She then told me that was the exact place where Vernon Lee performed puppet shows for the children of the peasants or contadini. But it was after I learned about Vernon Lee’s supernatural tales, about her fascination with genius loci or spirit of place, and about her being one of the first writers to explore the notion of empathy in art, that I began to connect with her on a deeper level, and feel “called” to write about her. It’s also true that I fell in love with Villa il Palmerino itself before I fully committed to researching and writing about Vernon Lee. After our first meeting, Federica invited me to return, and one year later I did, renting out one of the spacious rooms. I would return three more times, each time for a longer period, to do research on Vernon Lee and to write the first and subsequent drafts of the novel. I completed Palmerino in Switzerland, at Chateau Lavigny, a writer’s residence, in the autumn of 2012.

What was the writing process for Palmerino like? Do you share writing traits with Sylvia?

MP: I embarked upon over a year of research, visiting the Vernon Lee archives at Colby College, Maine, and returning to Florence several more times. Once I felt prepared, I then had to begin to shape the novel’s perimeters, determine its structure. Once I decided to largely focus on Vernon Lee’s emotional life, specifically her two great love affairs, I began the actual writing. I designed the novel in three alternating threads, Vernon Lee’s ghostly voice, Sylvia’s voice, and the story that Sylvia was telling. Writing is a risk, a gamble, a running through the darkness, so I could only hope this unconventional design would work. One of my literary inspirations was Henry James’s The Turn of the Screw, the other Vernon Lee’s own highly regarded supernatural tales, particularly “Amor Dure.”

If I share any writing traits with Sylvia, it may be that I always write in longhand first, and that I love to have food around me when I write. I also tend to isolate myself when I’m writing, particularly when working on a first draft – it’s the only way I can “hear” the book. It is a lonely phase, but also a thrilling kind of pilgrimage into the life of the imagination, into other lives and worlds.

V. dismisses modern scholarship about her life and, particularly, her sexuality (pages 127-28). Do you share her assessment of current scholarly efforts to understand, or analyze, Vernon Lee’s/Violet Paget’s life?

MP: In the last ten or so years, there has been a tremendous resurgence of scholarly interest in Vernon Lee. There is a wonderful online journal, The Sibyl, that is richly and entirely devoted to current studies on Vernon Lee. In September, 2012, I was fortunate to be a part of the first international seminar on Vernon Lee, held in Florence. I went to many talks by scholars dedicating their academic lives to aspects of Vernon Lee’s extraordinary and prolific life. I was honored to close the seminar with a reading from Palmerino, a reading held at twilight, in one of the many hidden gardens on the grounds of Villa il Palmerino. It was a magical way to close a scholarly seminar, and while reading,I seemed to feel Vernon Lee’s presence nearby. My sense is that she would both be critical of all the research being done on her, the published books, papers and articles, the seminars, but that she would also be deeply pleased.

How did you go about conducting research for Palmerino?

I started with Vernon Lee biographies, relying mainly on two, then read many of the books Vernon herself had read and admired. I visited Colby College, Maine and in the archives room, sat for hours poring through correspondence between Henry James, John Singer Sargent, Edith Wharton, Clementina “Kit” Anstruther Thompson and Vernon Lee. I cannot describe the feeling of holding a letter written by Henry James, addressed to Vernon, in my hands. And while reading Kit’s immensely charming letters, illustrated with whimsical figures, I understood exactly how and why Vernon fell in love with her, needed her, and was devastated when she left Vernon. In Florence, I found the two places Vernon and her family had lived before moving to Villa il Palmerino. I visited the British Institute where there is a room filled entirely with a large portion of Vernon Lee’s extensive library, and was able to look through her books, see her pencilled annotations and marginalia, written with a bold, energetic hand. And at the famous Gabinetto Vieusseux, I was able to read more of her letters, many in Italian or German, and see the progression of her emotional state through her handwriting from the firm, bold hand of her middle years to the weak scrawl of later years, the intelligence still evident but the infirmity of a failing body sadly taking hold. And of course, I found much to read online, scholarly papers, other references.

Which writers do you read while you’re writing, if any? Do they change from book to book?

As part of my research for Palmerino, I read a great many of the books Vernon had been strongly influenced by. I also read books and articles relating to that time period in Florence, to the Anglo-American cultural community of 19th century Florence. On my author website, on the Palmerino page, I have put a partial list of these books. I also listened to classical music, particularly music Vernon Lee had liked. She was, among other things, a respected authority on eighteenth century Italian music.

When I write a book, it becomes an immersion experience. If it is an historically based novel or short story, I intentionally surround myself with the books, art and music of that time period, as a way of spelling myself back into that time and place. In writing contemporary fiction, I mainly read poetry and contemporary fiction I find compelling and hugely exciting. Steeping myself in the best literature is, I have found, a pleasant way to keep standards for my own writing as high as possible.

What kinds of projects are you planning next?

I’d like to finish editing a book-length collection of essays I’ve written, all of which have been individually published. After writing historically inspired fiction and a few humanitarian journalism pieces for the last three or so years, I’m starved to return to writing contemporary fiction – as a way of balancing, I think. But my next big project will be another historically based novel about a nineteenth century British Shakespearean actress who was also an abolitionist. The big, ambitious plan is to write a series of historically inspired novels, beginning with Vernon Lee, on three nineteenth century British women, a writer, an actress, a medical reformer. All three of these women defied the constraints and conventions of their time and forged, not without sacrifice, accomplished and brave lives.

My thanks again to Ms. Pritchard for her time and generous, thoughtful answers. You can read more about Palmerino, and Melissa Pritchard’s other published works, on her website, and you can follow Ms. Pritchard on Twitter: @PritchardMeliss.

Paradise Lost, Books V and VI: The Books in Danger of a Michael Bay Adaptation

January 30, 2014January 29, 2014 / Carolyn O / 20 Comments

We’ve made it halfway in the Paradise Lost ReadAlong, so here are some links if you’d like to catch up:

Introduction
Books I and II
Books III and IV

Books V and VI find Raphael relating recent celestial history to Adam as part of a mission from the Father. He tells Adam of the war in Heaven between the rebellious and loyal angels, effectively bringing us, by the end of Book VI, up to the starting point of the poem in Book I: Satan’s fall, with his cohort, from Heaven into Hell.

In a departure from my usual practice, I’m going to let Milton himself give you the synopsis of these two books (Yes, he’s considerate enough to provide a synopsis for each book before the verse starts. Isn’t he great?). Also, I’m writing this late at night, so things may get, shall we say, irreverent?

Book V:

Morning approacht, Eve relates to Adam her troublesome dream; he likes it not, yet comforts her: They come forth to their day labours: Their Morning Hymn at the Door of their Bower. God to render Man inexcusable sends Raphael to admonish him of his obedience, of his free estate, of his enemy near at hand; who he is, and why his enemy, and whatever else may avail Adam to know. Raphael comes down to Paradise, his appearance describ’d, his coming discern’d by Adam afar off sitting at the door of his Bower; he goes out to meet him, brings him to his lodge, entertains him with the choycest fruits of Paradise got together by Eve; their discourse at Table: Raphael performs his message, minds Adam of his state and of his enemy; relates at Adams request who that enemy is, and how he came to be so, beginning from his first revolt in Heaven, and the occasion thereof; how he drew his Legions after him to the parts of the North, and there incited them to rebel with him, perswading all but only Abdiel a Seraph, who in Argument diswades and opposes him, then forsakes him.

Book VI:

Raphael continues to relate how Michael and Gabriel were sent forth to battle against Satan and his Angels. The first Fight describ’d: Satan and his Powers retire under Night: He calls a Councel, invents devilish Engines, which in the second day’s Fight put Michael and his Angels to some disorder; But, they at length pulling up Mountains overwhelm’d both the force and Machines of Satan: Yet the Tumult not so ending, God on the third day sends Messiah his Son, for whom he had reserv’d the glory of that Victory: He in the Power of his Father coming to the place, and causing all his Legions to stand still on either side, with his Chariot and Thunder driving into the midst of his Enemies, pursues them unable to resist towards the wall of Heaven; which opening, they leap down with horrur and confusion into the place of punishment prepar’d for them in the Deep: Messiah returns with triumph to his Father.

Neat, huh? I’ve cleaned up a bit of the spelling. (These “Arguments,” as Milton called them, aren’t pulled from Gordon Teskey’s edition of the poem, since I thought it might be nice to give you delightful readers a better taste of seventeenth-century phrasing.)

As you can tell, Books V and VI are heavy on action (hence today’s post title. Which was a joke. I hope.) Book V features a particularly Miltonic moment, however: a lone voice raised against wrong action, in the form of Abdiel’s resistance to Satan’s call for rebellion and war.

On the surface, Satan’s initial raillery against the Father’s elevation of the Son might seem appealing to a republican (small-r) revolutionary like Milton: Satan objects to being asked to prostrate himself to a new master (especially one whose power seems to derive from nepotism) who promises to hand down new laws that must be obeyed.

However, Milton (via Abdiel) neatly refutes Satan by revealing his error — the assumption that the Son and the angels are equals:

Canst thou with impious obloquy condemn
The just decree of God pronounced and sworn
That to his only Son by right endued
With regal scepter every soul in Heav’n
Shall bend the knee and in that honor due
Confess him rightful King? Unjust thou say’st,
Flatly unjust, to bind with laws the free
And equal over equals to let reign,
One over all with unsucceeded pow’r.
Shalt thou give law to God, shalt thou dispute
With Him the points of liberty who made
Thee what thou art and formed the pow’rs of Heav’n
Such as He pleased and circumscribed their being? (5.813-25)

Scorned by Satan and Satan’s fellows, Abdiel remains steadfast, and in one of the poem’s best images, he walks fearlessly away from the rebellious to join the righteous:

So spake the seraph Abdiel faithful found
Among the faithless, faithful only he
Among innumerable false. Unmoved,
Unshaken, unseduced, unterrified
His loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal.
Nor number nor example with him wrought
To swerve from truth or change his constant mind
Though single. From amidst them forth he passed
Long way through hostile scorn which he sustained
Superior, nor of violence feared aught
And with retorted scorn his back he turned
On those proud tow’rs to swift destruction doomed. (8.597-907)

A powerful passage, isn’t it? And particularly poignant, given Milton’s own part in the failed (though initially righteous, in his eyes) English revolution. Like Abdiel, “his loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal.”

I won’t quote lengthy passages from Book VI, but it’s one of the most entertaining books of the poem, in which Raphael describes to Adam (Eve being noticeably absent, having fulfilled her womanly serving duties *grumble grumble feminist grumble*) the progress of the war. On the first day, Michael leads the loyal angels against Satan and his followers. Angels on both sides are injured, but only the rebel angels feel pain (and we also learn that they’ve lost the ability to feel pleasure). Angelic bodies heal themselves, it turns out. Michael faces Satan in single combat, and Satan, to his dismay, is bested and forced to retreat.

During the night, the rebel angels invent cannon (often regarded as devilish in the Renaissance) and surprise the heavenly hosts, who respond by hurling mountains at their foes. The imagery here is so fantastic — it just cries out for Guillermo del Toro. (Michael Bay, in the unlikely event you’re reading this blog: STAY AWAY FROM MILTON.) Plus Satan engages in some tricky non-diplomacy and witty banter with his pals, so now I’m envisioning a del Toro/ Aaron Sorkin collaboration . . . But I digress.

On the third day, the Father decides that enough is enough. Michael’s done excellent work at QB, but it’s time to bring out the Son, who says, basically, “Hold up. I got this.” The loyal angels line up and watch as the Son, with thunder blaring and chariot blazing, charges the rebel angels alone and so terrifies them that they throw themselves out of Heaven (h/t to obliging self-opening, self-healing heavenly wall) and into a nine-day fall to Hell. That’s what George Lucas would call aggressive negotiation. (Now that I’ve quoted possibly the worst screenplay of all time, I’m done with movies now, I promise.)

But it’s not all fun and demon defeat in Book VI. The point of Raphael’s tale is to warn Adam, lest he think about disobeying God:

Let it profit thee t’have heard
By terrible example the reward
Of disobedience! Firm they might have stood,
Yet fell. Remember, and fear to transgress! (6.909-12)

Fear will keep the local systems in line. Fear of this battle Son. Wait. Where have I heard that before?

Really done now.

Coming up on February 10: Books VII and VII — Adam’s Edenic education continues.
A programming note: Today features a rare double post here on Rosemary and Reading Glasses, so you might like to scroll down or click over to today’s earlier post, a review of Melissa Pritchard’s fascinating novel Palmerino.

“Sweetbitter”: The Complete Poems of Sappho, translated by Willis Barnstone

January 28, 2014January 25, 2014 / Carolyn O / 3 Comments

Plato called her “the tenth muse,” and yet Sappho remains an elusive figure. The outlines of her biography are sketchy, and nearly all her extant poems are fragmentary. Still, the lines we have are some of the most beautiful ever written, hungry and haunted as they are by love and loss.

Acclaimed poet and translator Willis Barnstone’s edition of the poems is grouped thematically, and he makes the interesting choice to title the poems. I’m still on the fence about the effect. In some cases, the titles merely refer to a personage named in the poem; in others, the titles reflect the obvious subject of the poem (“Old Age,” for example). With a few of the poems, however, I would have preferred an untitled version in order to better draw my own conclusions. But this is a small complaint; the volume is beautifully done, and I highly recommend it. (I’d also love to compare it with Anne Carson’s If Not, Winter, which I haven’t read yet — if you have, will you tell me what you think?)

It’s difficult to choose which poem to highlight this week, so I’ll leave you with Mr. Barnstone’s translation of fragment 130, which he titles “Sweetbitter”:

Eros loosener of limbs once again trembles me,
a sweetbitter beast irrepressibly creeping in

An Interview with Rachel Pastan, Author of Alena

January 24, 2014January 21, 2014 / Carolyn O / 7 Comments

Yesterday I reviewed Alena, Rachel Pastan’s latest novel. Ms. Pastan graciously agreed to be interviewed via email about the novel and her writing.

Rachel Pastan
(c) Carina Romano

When and how did you conceive of writing a book that responds to Rebecca? Was the writing process long?

RP: I had taken a nine-to-five office job—a different kind of job than I’d ever had before. The woman who’d worked there before me, Elysa, had left months before, so I didn’t have anyone to train to me, and I kept making mistakes. People would say, “Elysa used to do it this way.” I felt inadequate, and a little in awe of this unknown Elysa. And then I thought: It’s just like Rebecca, only in the workplace! And then I thought: That’s a good idea for a novel. I wasn’t able to start writing it for a while, but once I did, it went quickly. It took me only about eighteen months to finish a draft.

Much of Alena‘s action takes place on Cape Cod. Was there a particular reason (or reasons) for this choice?

RP: My family used to spend a month in Cape Cod every summer when I was little, and the landscape has always stayed with me. For years I used to have dreams about the ocean there. Rebecca takes place on a coast—probably of Cornwall. The atmosphere of Cape Cod seemed like a good parallel to me, and I was happy to revisit its beaches in my imagination.

Was it challenging to avoid giving the narrator a name?

RP: Actually I gave her a name while I was writing—I figured I just wouldn’t be faithful to that part of Rebecca. But afterwards I saw I could take the name out. Du Maurier had a few advantages; people could call her narrator “Mrs. de Winter.” After I took out the name, I did go back and make one of the characters call my narrator Cara—Italian for “darling.” That helped.

How did you go about learning about contemporary art, which is so critical to Alena? Did you discover a favorite contemporary artist along the way?

RP: For last few years I have worked at the ICA—the Institute of Contemporary Art—in Philadelphia, writing and editing. This has been a fabulous immersion course in contemporary art. I don’t have a favorite contemporary artist—any more than I have a favorite contemporary writer—but the discovery of Anne Truitt was a wonderful and memorable moment. She made very simple, tall sculptures that are somehow incredibly moving and evocative. She wrote a terrific memoir, too, called Daybook, The Journal of an Artist, which talks about her struggles in her work, and with trying to combine work and family life.

Which writers do you read while you’re writing, if any? Do they change from book to book?

RP: I often read a little every morning before I start working, a few pages by someone whose sentences I love. Alice Munro is a favorite, as is Margaret Drabble. Other than that, I might read books that address a subject I’m writing about to see how other people handle it. When I was writing Alena I read a bunch of novels that deal with contemporary art in one way or another: By Nightfall by Michael Cunningham and “A Thing of Beauty” by Steve Martin were a couple.

What kinds of projects are you planning next?

RP: I have a very different project in mind: a novel based on the life of a real person, which is something I’ve never done before. It’s exciting—and daunting—to think about how to shape a real life into a compelling narrative.

Many thanks to Ms. Pastan for her time and thoughtful answers!

Out Today: Rachel Pastan’s Alena

January 23, 2014January 21, 2014 / Carolyn O / 12 Comments

From its first line — “Last night I dreamed of Nauquasset again” — Alena, Rachel Pastan’s new novel, echoes its inspiration, Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca. However, Ms. Pastan’s interpretation of Rebecca‘s plot rejects recapitulation in favor of a refreshing focus on the workplace and contemporary art.

Alena‘s narrator, like du Maurier’s original, is an unnamed young woman from a modest background. Here, she is from the outset identified as a curator of contemporary art. On a trip to the Venice Biennale, she meets Bernard Augustin, the elegant, wealthy, and mysterious founder of a small museum on Cape Cod devoted to contemporary art — the Nauquasset, or Nauk. Bernard sees in her a fine sensibility and eye, and offers her the job of curator.

Arriving at the Nauk, the new curator finds that the staff, particularly the black-clad Agnes, still devoted to the previous (and presumed dead) curator, Alena. Alena’s touch and vision suffuses the small museum’s rooms and atmosphere, and soon the new curator must decide between reopening the museum with an exhibit of her own choice — or Alena’s choice, the grotesque art of a man named Morgan McManus. Meanwhile, clues to Alena’s disappearance linger in the shadows, waiting for their moment to appear.

One of the major differences between Alena and Rebecca is Alena’s shift of focus from the domestic environment to the workplace, a change wrought for the better (meaning no disrespect to Rebecca, of course). By raising the stakes (for example, from a country house party to the opening of a contemporary art museum), Alena pushes its focus outward from the personal into the world of art and the non-domestic workplace, without losing sight of the personal. The relationship between Bernard and his new curator, we learn quickly, cannot possibly be sexual, and doesn’t carry the erotic charge between Maxim and the second Mrs. de Winter, but that does not diminish its intensity.

The novel is wonderfully evocative of Cape Cod in the summer (I speak from experience, here — my husband grew up on the Cape and we spend time with his family who live there), and lucid in matters of contemporary art. I’m not a contemporary art aficionado by any stretch of the imagination (on a college trip to Paris, I skipped the Centre Pompidou to spend the day at the Louvre, a trade I’d still make any day); I have a passing familiarity with Damien Hirst and Marina Abramovic, and I like Chihuly’s work very much, but that’s about it. Ms. Pastan refers to a great many more artists, but her descriptions of art are so finely crafted that it’s easy to imagine the art she describes.

Death, lying side by side with art, is the novel’s other fascination. Like Rebecca, Alena is suffused with creepiness, a sense of something malevolent lurking just around the next corner, biding its time. Add that sensation to the narrator’s overwhelming anxiety, and the result is a suspenseful read, daring in both its departure from and adherence to its source material.

Note: I received this book through LibraryThing’s Early Reviewers program.

Tomorrow on the blog: An interview with Rachel Pastan, author of Alena