Fruits & Vegetables [Hardcover]

Erica Jong (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: 1971

Here is thetwenty-fifth anniversary edition of Erica Jong's very first book: a surrealistic, funny, gastronomic, erotic, serious look at being human and female and American.

Erica Jong, the best-selling author of Fear of Flying, and more recently, Fear of Fifty, began her literary life as a poet. Fruits & Vegetables, originally published in 1971, offers a glimpse into the daring, erotic imagination of a young author of great promise. Here is a writer who puts metaphors in her oven, fruits and vegetables in her bed. In her tide poem, Jong considers the character of the onion: "Not self-righteous like the proletarian potato, nor a siren like the apple. No show-off like the banana. But a modest, self-effacing vegetable, questioning, introspective, peeling itself away . . ."

Throughout her debut collection, Erica Jong demonstrates a remarkable adventurousness, erudition, lyricism, and command of the poetic form. At the same time, she examines many of the themes she will pursue in years to come. On the subject of desire, she writes: "The corruption begins with the eyes, / the page, the hunger. / It hangs on the first hook / of the first comma.... The corruption begins with the mouth, / the tongue, the wanting. / The first poem in the world / is I want to eat.

For the many fans who have yet to discover-or rediscover-where the literary career of Erica Jong began, this special anniversary edition of Fruits & Vegetables, complete with a new preface by the author, is a must.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Erica Jong is all woman, but, more important, all human." -- -- Anne Sexton

"Erica Jong is all woman, but, more important, all human." -- Anne Sexton

"I read these poems the way you watch a trapeze act, with held breath, marvelling at the agility, the lightness of touch, the brilliant demonstration of the difficult made to look easy." -- Margaret Atwood

"Original, seductive, marvelous, powerful!" -- -- Cosmopolitan

Aging
Arse Poetica
Bitter Pills For The Dark Ladies
The Book
Books
Cheese
The Commandments
Digging The Chinese Cemetery
Downward
The Ecological Apocalypse As Foretold To Adam & Eve
Flower Eaters
Flying You Home
Fracture
Fruits & Vegetables
The Heidelberg Landlady
Here Comes
His Silence
Imaginary Landscapes
In Sylvia Plath Country
Living In
The Man Giving Birth In The Dark
The Man Under The Bed
Narcissus, Photographer
The Objective Woman: 1.
The Objective Woman: 2. The Nose
The Objective Woman: 3. The Rings
The Objective Woman: 4. The Dryer
The Objective Woman: 5. Ob-gyn
The Quarrel
A Reading
The Saturday Market
Seven
The Sheets
Student Revolution
The Teacher
Touch
Two More Scenes From The Lives Of The Vegetables: 1. Borscht
Two More Scenes From The Lives Of The Vegetables: 2. Carrot
Walking Through The Upper East Side
Where It Begins
With Silk
You Operate
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder® --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Erica Jong, award-winning poet, novelist, and essayist, is best known for seven bestselling novels, including her most recent, Inventing Memory, and her midlife memoir, Fear of Fifty. She is a former president of the Authors Guild and frequent lecturer on women's rights, authors' rights, and free expression both here and abroad. She lives in New York City and Connecticut. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 86 pages
• Publisher: Holt, Rinehart and Winston; 1st edition (1971)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0030859980
• ISBN-13: 978-0030859984
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.2 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,715,637 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

ERICA JONG
(Bio used www.ericajong.com)
Erica Jong--novelist, poet, and essayist--has consistently used her craft to help provide women with a powerful and rational voice in forging a feminist consciousness. She has published 21 books, including eight novels, seven volumes of poetry, six books of non-fiction and numerous articles in magazines and newspapers such as The New York Times, The Sunday Times of London, Elle, Vogue, The New York Times Book Review and The Wall Street Journal.
In her groundbreaking first novel, Fear of Flying (20 million in print around the world in more than forty languages), she introduced Isadora Wing, who also plays a central part in three subsequent novels--How to Save Your Own Life, Parachutes and Kisses, and Any Woman's Blues. In her three historical novels--Fanny, Shylock's Daughter, and Sappho's Leap--she demonstrates her mastery of eighteenth-century British literature, the verses of Shakespeare, and ancient Greek lyric, respectively. Erica's latest book, a memoir of her life as a writer, Seducing the Demon: Writing for My Life, came out in March 2006. It was a national bestseller in the US and many other countries.
A graduate of Barnard College and Columbia University's Graduate Faculties where she received her M.A. in 18th Century English Literature, Erica Jong also attended Columbia's graduate writing program where she studied poetry with Stanley Kunitz and Mark Strand. In 2008, continuing her long-standing relationship with the university, a large collection of Erica's archival material was acquired by Columbia University's Rare Book & Manuscript Library, where it will be available to graduate and undergraduate students. Ms. Jong plans to teach master classes at Columbia and also advise the Rare Book Library on the acquisition of other women writers' archives.

Calling herself "a defrocked academic," Ms. Jong has partly returned to her roots as a scholar. She has taught at Ben Gurion University in Israel, Bennington College in the U.S., Breadloaf Writers' Conference in Vermont and many other distinguished writing programs and universities. She loves to teach and lecture, though her skill in these areas has sometimes crowded her writing projects. "As long as I am communicating the gift of literature, I'm happy," Jong says. A poet at heart, Ms. Jong believes that words can save the world.

Known for her commitment to women's rights, authors' rights and free expression, Ms. Jong is a frequent lecturer in the U.S. and abroad. She served as president of The Authors' Guild from 1991 to 1993 and still serves on the Board. She established a program for young writers at her alma mater, Barnard College. The Erica Mann Jong Writing Center at Barnard teaches students the art of peer tutoring and editing.
Erica Jong was honored with the United Nations Award for Excellence in Literature. She has also received Poetry magazine's Bess Hokin Prize, also won by W.S. Merwin and Sylvia Plath. In France, she received the Deauville Award for Literary Excellence and in Italy, she received the Sigmund Freud Award for Literature. The City University of New York awarded Ms. Jong an honorary PhD at the College of Staten Island. In June 2009, Erica won the first Fernanda Pivano Prize for Literature in Italy.

Currently Ms. Jong is working on a novel featuring "a woman of a certain age." Its working title is secret. Fear of Flying is in preparation as a BBC mini-series. Her first anthology, Sugar In My Bowl: Real Women Write About Real Sex, will be published on June 14th, 2011.
Erica Jong lives in New York City and Weston, CT with her husband, attorney Ken Burrows, and standard poodle, Belinda Barkowitz. Her daughter, Molly Jong-Fast, is also a writer.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A MUST READ FOR ALL POETRY LOVERS!, February 19, 2000

By 

Marion "[e-mail]" (Louisiana) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Fruits And Vegetables (Hardcover)

Erica takes the ordinary and makes it extraordinary in this her first book of her poetry. I am sick and tired of reading poetry in textbooks by dead white male windbags that have absolutely no relation to my life as a female.

Erica writes lovingly of the lowly Onion! "I am thinking of the onion again, with it's two O mouths, like the gaping holes in nobody. . . . " and it is pure ecstasy! I highly recommend this book to all poetry lovers. Also visite her website for even more inspriation: ericajong.com.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Erica Jong has created another masterpiece collection!, October 1, 2005

By 

NSJ "marathon reader" (Hamilton, ON Canada) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Fruits And Vegetables (Hardcover)

It's hard to find poetry like this that is at once both erotic and sensual while remaining highly opinionated. Erica proudly wears her belief that women are just as fragile as men and yet can be just as hard as men. In her hands, the word "feminist" becomes a finely edged tool that can reshape how we think of ourselves and our interaction with each other in relationships. She begins the book with a series of poems that compare different vegetables and fruits to the anatomy of men and women. The book then goes on to talk about a variety of subjects. In "His Silence" there's an undercurrent of sadness as she explores the idea of someone you love still controlled by events in thier past. In "With Silk" she talks about a lover as if he were a spectral agent instead of a man made of mere flesh.

Never afraid to show her displeasure with life and love or her sheer delight of it, Erica's work is provacative and a joy to read. She calls to mind such other poets as Pablo Neruda and Sylvia Plath, both of whom are excellent in their own right.

As a male I find her work refreshing and brutally honest and in a age where those qualities are looked down on I'm delighted that Erica has remained true to that inner voice.

1 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars excellent debut, June 7, 2000

By 

[e-mail] "[e-mail]" (Beaumont, tx USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Fruits And Vegetables (Hardcover)

Erica Jong's debute book of poetry is quite a fine collection of work. to be honest, i didn't realize a person could allude to so much with vegetables, especially onions.