Eating in the Underworld (Wesleyan Poetry Series) [Paperback]

Rachel Zucker (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 26, 2003 | Series: Wesleyan Poetry Series

In Rachel Zucker's re-imagining of the Greek myth, Persephone is a daughter struggling to become a woman. Unlike the classical portrait of a maiden kidnapped by a tyrant, Zucker's Persephone chooses to travel to the Underworld and assume her role as Hades' queen. Caught between worlds--light and dark, innocence and power, a mother's protection and a lover's appeal--Persephone describes the strangeness of the Underworld and the problems of transformation and transgression. The arrangement of Zucker's poems reflects Persephone's travels between the Underworld and the Surface. Both spare and lyrical, they are written as entries in Persephone's diary and as letters between Persephone, Demeter, and Hades. The language--strange, urgent, direct--is pulled and changed as Persephone journeys from one world to another revealing the struggle of unmaking and remaking the self.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Evocative and mysterious, the poems hint at the faraway... the poems flow and involve the reader in the writer's journey, whether to the real underworld or not. Zucker indeed leads us 'swimming through chaos to find the world.'"--Library Journal

Review

"Zucker's art enacts unexpected, necessary syntheses of modern and postmodern practices. She makes a new style, bearing the beauties of many into the beautiful simplicity of one. And surely, surely, she is an Original. She makes myth immediate, embodied and useful. This is a marvelous collection, a real find." (Donald Revell, author of Arcady )

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Product Details

• Paperback: 80 pages
• Publisher: Wesleyan; 1st edition (February 26, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0819566284
• ISBN-13: 978-0819566287
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 6 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.7 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,423,600 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The mythpunk revolution continues, strong as ever., April 21, 2006

By 

Robert P. Beveridge "xterminal" (Lakewood, OH) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Eating in the Underworld (Wesleyan Poetry Series) (Paperback)

Rachel Zucker, Eating in the Underworld (Wesleyan, 2003)

This small but powerful volume is really one long poem, meditating on the Persephone/Demeter/Hades story, told in fragments of diary entries, notes, and letters between the three principals.

"Am I the only one to notice the soft layer of haze above the snow?

Yo say you see butterflies in the skeleton pelvis, well,

what about the larger hand of the clock?

Or a cauldron for boiling water?"

(--"Letter: Demeter to Persephone")

Concise, image-laden, with a fine sense of observation and wisdom, Eating in the Underworld satisfies on every level save one; you wish it were longer. ****

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Persephone, April 17, 2003

By 

Lydia C. B. - See all my reviews

This review is from: Eating in the Underworld (Wesleyan Poetry Series) (Paperback)

These poems were a wonderful example of combining an old myth with the society and culture of modern times.
The poet explores several aspects of the life of Persephone beyond what the mythology tells us. She uses the mythology as an inspired lead-in to what she has to say about the world; about a woman. Very thought provoking!
Many of the poems appear to be simple blocked out references, and then one comes to find that each phrase can hold so much meaning. I can get a different interpretation every time I read the poems in this book.