Customer Reviews

The Search for a Woman-Centered Spirituality (The Cutting Edge : Lesbian Life and Literature)

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I have read a number of feminist works and like the creative explorations often found in them. Some of the feminist literature sometimes falls into rehashing some standard themes, but sometimes a book comes out that does more. I feel this is one of them. I like the way this book draws from fictional writings that many people have felt always had much to say. One thing that is recovered in this book is the art of telling healing stories. I like that there is much discussion about THE MISTS OF AVALON by Marion Zimmer Bradley and how it helps "revision" the Celtic tradition. The essays quote extensively from many sources and brings to life the voices being quoted. I felt that I was reading many books while reading this one. I especially like the chapter called "Curing Ceremonies" which is the authors chapter about exploring the Native American feminist tradition. Here is a passage:

"For the Pueblos, storytelling often functions as a ceremony for curing. Both Silko and Allen continue in this tradition; their novels are offerings to balanced the world and to enact healing rituals for themselves and others. For the Pueblos, story is a connecting medium and, according to Simon J. Ortiz, poet from nearby Acoma Pueblo, ensures the very life of the people: "Story is to engender life, and CEREMONY speaks upon the very process by which story, whether oral or written form, substantiates life, continues it, and creates it....Because of the insistence to keep telling and creating stories, Indian life continues, and it is this resistance against loss that has made that life possible. Silko's novel had even a more personal "curing" function for her. When asked why she wrote CEREMONY, Silko said that it was "a ceremony for her to stay sane." As she worked with her character Tayo and he recovered, so did she."

Although the essays have some flavor of being serious academic feminist literature, the feeling of the book is a story about stories, about feminist storytellers and what they are keeping alive by their stories and what can be learned from them. I enjoyed the book.

This is a superior work for instructors seeking to expand often limited views not only in regard to classes on gender/sexuality and religion but also in regard to classes on literature by prominent women writers of color. Blackthorn Krause, CA