Written in Wine is a collection of devotional writings dedicated to the ancient Greek god Dionysos by his modern worshippers. The world of Dionysos is one of wildness, freedom, mystery and intoxication, a dangerous and boundary-blurring place where nature is alive with wonder. Come with us as we revel with the god on the mountainside and explore the furthest reaches of our own selves under his frenzied inspiration. Inside these pages you will find essays, poetry, rituals and fiction, as well as personal accounts of Dionysian experiences.
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Bibliotheca Alexandrina is a series of books brought out by Neos Alexandria honoring the gods of Greece and Egypt.
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Bibliotheca Alexandrina is the publishing arm of Neos Alexandria, a syncretic Greco-Egyptian religious group modeled after the ancient city of Alexandria in Egypt. BA publishes single author and anthology titles dedicated to the Gods and Goddesses of Greece, Egypt, and Rome. Each title contains a variety of poems, short fiction, essays, meditations, rituals, and artwork. A portion of the proceeds from the sales of each title are donated to a worthy charity in the name of the Gods.
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9 of 12 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Written in Wine is an incredible anthology of devotional poetry, rituals, and personal stories, dedicated to the modern worship of the Greek God Dionysos. Each page holds more information than the next, and you can read the love and awe felt by each of the writers. I was awed by this collection, and am pleased with my purchase!
6 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is a nicely rounded compilation of information about the "woman's god," the ancient "counterculture" god who broke all the rules of polite and androcentric Greek civil society, and who even had his own oracle (in Thrace), as well known in its day as Apollo's was at Delphi. It includes both prose and poetry, and both objective and subjective accounts of this ancient Greek deity -- as he and his followers existed in both the past and today in the present.
Within its 202 pages (not counting the glossary and bibliography), are roughly 60-70 poems and short prose pieces, and ten longer pieces (essays, one play, one short story, one travel/ethnographic piece, and several less personal and more academic treatises, complete with endnotes).
Although a few of the authors contributed more than one piece, the book still represents a striking variety of voices, all speaking in different tones and cadences, and from a variety of emotional levels about the same subject: the god Dionysos and his relationship to mortals and the other deities in the Greek pantheon.
The piece that probably contributed most to my incipient feelings for this deity was the play: "The City Dionysia: A Trilogy in Four Parts," by Evanne Floyd (pp 136-154). Written in the language of ancient Greece (or, rather, in the language modern English translators use when translating ancient Greek), this play recounts three major events in the life of the god: his birth, his marriage to Ariadne, and his descent into hell to rescue Ariadne and his mother Semele. At their "engagement," Dionysos tells Ariadne that he will never fail to come to her in her hour of need.
I also enjoyed S.A. Victory's "Dion and I: The Dance So Far," in which Victory, an African-American woman, gives this instructive description of her god: "If Apollon inspires the art, Dionysos is the passion that drives it. Apollon is the harmony of a melody, Dionysos is the rhythm. Dionysos has a gentle and teasing side to match His wilder aspects..... He has been there when I have been at my worst.... Dionysos has shown me how to wear my masks and when to remove them. He is the God of freedom -- not just the freedom gained through drinking too much, but the freedom to feel joy in a song, or a sunset, in laughter and in tears, to dream of things that have never been..." (p. 46).
Tim Ward's article, "Dionysos in Skyros," is about Tim's journey to the Greek island of Skyros, specifically to witness firsthand the ancient Dionysian rites still held there annually, the dance of the Geri and Korella. Tim not only witnessed these ancient rites, he developed fairly close relationships with some of the people on Skyros, including a few men who portrayed Geri and one woman who played a Korella in these older-than-the-hills religious rites. In this multi-dimensional article, Tim not only lets us in on what these Skyrosians have to say about their rites, he also ties them in to intimate details in his own private life.
Tim has a remarkable ability to carry his readers along with him wherever he goes. Here for example is his see-it-with-your-own-eyes-and-nose description of the Geri:
"....great hulking beasts, upright, hump-backed, black hooded, their coats shaggy and dark. Their mottled faces seemed to stretch and dangle down to their chests with nothing but black holes for eyes -- a mask made with the fresh hide of an aborted goat fetus. You could smell the stink of them. Their waists bristled with rings of brass goat bells, some as big as teakettles.... Steam rose from their backs.... [T]he bells rang out like three hundred fire alarms gone berserk, deafening...."
These men dance three to four hours a night, wearing many pounds of metal goat bells. Each is supposed to have a female counterpart, or Korella, but for an unspecified time period up to the present generation, the women of Skyros were not allowed to play the Korella role. And even now, according to Ward, if women "dance for ... anyone other than a father or a brother, they will find themselves engaged" [i.e., to be married](77).
Not exactly very Dionysian.
What Tim went looking for -- and didn't quite find -- was a place so steeped in the old pre-patriarchal religions that the relations between the sexes would be idyllic. The problem of course is that the old ways are there only in part for the men who dance under the impossible weight of the bells until "... something goes out of your body ... " and ""you think you're not a human being...." (p. 72).
My guess is that the impossibly loud but rhythmic clanging of the all those bells and the physical exhaustion eventually put the Geri into a trance state.
And women -- even though they're now allowed to play a role -- are not allowed one iota of a chance to escape the ordinary, routine, mundane (and achingly boring) realities of their daily lives on Skyros. Their role: choose a Geros and support him by singing. And these Korella dress up not in wild skins stinking of urine and fetal matter, but in traditional Skyrosian wedding garb. Furthermore, the Korella Ward witnessed were decidedly prim and proper -- as if waltzing as far away as possible from the original meaning of the rites.
Probably the greatest testament to the power of this book, however, is this: I began it not giving much of a fig about Dionysos, and ended feeling not only a personal relationship with this remarkable deity, but a desire to continue that relationship.
Within its 202 pages (not counting the glossary and bibliography), are roughly 60-70 poems and short prose pieces, and ten longer pieces (essays, one play, one short story, one travel/ethnographic piece, and several less personal and more academic treatises, complete with endnotes).
Although a few of the authors contributed more than one piece, the book still represents a striking variety of voices, all speaking in different tones and cadences, and from a variety of emotional levels about the same subject: the god Dionysos and his relationship to mortals and the other deities in the Greek pantheon.
The piece that probably contributed most to my incipient feelings for this deity was the play: "The City Dionysia: A Trilogy in Four Parts," by Evanne Floyd (pp 136-154). Written in the language of ancient Greece (or, rather, in the language modern English translators use when translating ancient Greek), this play recounts three major events in the life of the god: his birth, his marriage to Ariadne, and his descent into hell to rescue Ariadne and his mother Semele. At their "engagement," Dionysos tells Ariadne that he will never fail to come to her in her hour of need.
I also enjoyed S.A. Victory's "Dion and I: The Dance So Far," in which Victory, an African-American woman, gives this instructive description of her god: "If Apollon inspires the art, Dionysos is the passion that drives it. Apollon is the harmony of a melody, Dionysos is the rhythm. Dionysos has a gentle and teasing side to match His wilder aspects..... He has been there when I have been at my worst.... Dionysos has shown me how to wear my masks and when to remove them. He is the God of freedom -- not just the freedom gained through drinking too much, but the freedom to feel joy in a song, or a sunset, in laughter and in tears, to dream of things that have never been..." (p. 46).
Tim Ward's article, "Dionysos in Skyros," is about Tim's journey to the Greek island of Skyros, specifically to witness firsthand the ancient Dionysian rites still held there annually, the dance of the Geri and Korella. Tim not only witnessed these ancient rites, he developed fairly close relationships with some of the people on Skyros, including a few men who portrayed Geri and one woman who played a Korella in these older-than-the-hills religious rites. In this multi-dimensional article, Tim not only lets us in on what these Skyrosians have to say about their rites, he also ties them in to intimate details in his own private life.
Tim has a remarkable ability to carry his readers along with him wherever he goes. Here for example is his see-it-with-your-own-eyes-and-nose description of the Geri:
"....great hulking beasts, upright, hump-backed, black hooded, their coats shaggy and dark. Their mottled faces seemed to stretch and dangle down to their chests with nothing but black holes for eyes -- a mask made with the fresh hide of an aborted goat fetus. You could smell the stink of them. Their waists bristled with rings of brass goat bells, some as big as teakettles.... Steam rose from their backs.... [T]he bells rang out like three hundred fire alarms gone berserk, deafening...."
These men dance three to four hours a night, wearing many pounds of metal goat bells. Each is supposed to have a female counterpart, or Korella, but for an unspecified time period up to the present generation, the women of Skyros were not allowed to play the Korella role. And even now, according to Ward, if women "dance for ... anyone other than a father or a brother, they will find themselves engaged" [i.e., to be married](77).
Not exactly very Dionysian.
What Tim went looking for -- and didn't quite find -- was a place so steeped in the old pre-patriarchal religions that the relations between the sexes would be idyllic. The problem of course is that the old ways are there only in part for the men who dance under the impossible weight of the bells until "... something goes out of your body ... " and ""you think you're not a human being...." (p. 72).
My guess is that the impossibly loud but rhythmic clanging of the all those bells and the physical exhaustion eventually put the Geri into a trance state.
And women -- even though they're now allowed to play a role -- are not allowed one iota of a chance to escape the ordinary, routine, mundane (and achingly boring) realities of their daily lives on Skyros. Their role: choose a Geros and support him by singing. And these Korella dress up not in wild skins stinking of urine and fetal matter, but in traditional Skyrosian wedding garb. Furthermore, the Korella Ward witnessed were decidedly prim and proper -- as if waltzing as far away as possible from the original meaning of the rites.
Probably the greatest testament to the power of this book, however, is this: I began it not giving much of a fig about Dionysos, and ended feeling not only a personal relationship with this remarkable deity, but a desire to continue that relationship.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
A really grassroots, down-home sort of pagan devotional.
Truly captures the rustic, real spirit of Dionysus worship.
Truly captures the rustic, real spirit of Dionysus worship.
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