Customer Reviews

I Knew a Phoenix: Sketches for an Autobiography

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May Sarton's life alone is as inspiring as her work. This graceful and fluid journey through her young life gives us a glimpse of the experiences and ideas that formed her later work. She's truly a gem.

I started reading May Sarton's journals after a knee replacement kept me in bed for a while. (After physical therapy, I "crashed".)

I loved them, and read them all. They came at a good time for me. Thank goodness for Amazon; where else would I have obtained them so easily.

May makes reference to so many people, that it is hard to keep them straight, or to know how she met them and who they actually are, and why they remained such good friends.

I Knew a Phoenix is a good reference point for May's early life (from birth, actually) and how she met the people that appear in the journals. Some of these people are: Cora DuBois, Eva Le Gallienne, Juliette and Julian Huxley, Marie Closset, Basil de Selincourt, SS Koteliansky, Eleanor Blair, Virginia Woolf....... There is also the story of her "Repertory Theater", and a lot about her parents. I just wish I had read I Knew a Phoenix first, and had it for a reference. (I got it after I read "Recovering".) No matter, this summer, I am going to re-read all May's journals, and also expand my collection of her fiction and poetry.

To me, May Sarton is a treasure, and "I Knew a Phoenix", along with "Among the Usual Days" is an invaluable addition to my Sarton library.