REVIEW POTPOURRI – Author: Judith Thurman

Judith Thurman

by Peter Cates

I Became Alone

I Became Alone is a 1975 book by Judith Thurman on five major woman poets. They are Sappho from ancient Greece; Louise Labe of the 16th century French Renaissance; Anne Bradstreet, who wrote out of her own experience living among fellow Puritans in 17th century Boston; Juana Ines de la Cruz dwelling in 17th century Mexico; and finally the 19th century Amherst, Massachusetts, recluse Emily Dickinson whose poems were posthumously published after being found by the hundreds in her bureau drawers.

The common thread among them, whatever their unique gifts, is their identities, their need to achieve focus and fuse their life and work as one.

To quote Thurman:

“If we read their work because they are women, we also read it because it is good poetry – good in the absolute, not good ‘for women.’ Quality has no gender: there are no ‘poetesses.’ These five poets wrote, and are, for everyone.”

A few words from each of the poets:

Sappho – “What my heart most hopes will happen, make happen; you yourself join forces on my side!”

Louise Labe – “Observing, then he loved me fatally,/I pitied his sad, amorous mischance,/and urged my nature on relentlessly,/till I loved with the same extravagance.”

Anne Bradstreet – “All things within this fading world hath end,/Adversity doth still our joyes attend;/No types so strong, no friends so dear and sweet,/But with deaths parting blow is sure to meet.”

Juana Ines de la Cruz – “I can’t hold you and I can’t leave you,/and sorting the reasons to leave you or hold you,/I find an intangible one to love you,/and many tangible ones to forgo you.”

Emily Dickinson – “I’m Nobody! Who are you?/Are you-Nobody-Too?/Then there’s a pair of us?/Don’t tell! they’d advertise-you know!”

All five women were literary artists in a patriarchal society in which women literary artists were considered weird and against what that society considered normal. Hence, a good adjective for them would be subversive.

The Agency

Recently I saw the first two episodes of a new series, The Agency, starring Richard Gere and a fine supporting cast. It casts a different, non-clichéd perspective on the CIA. The two episodes stream for free on Paramount until January 24. Additional ones mean 12 extra dollars monthly for the upgrade. Highly recommended, however.