All We Need of Hell (Clipper Studies in the Theatre; 4) - Softcover

Lesser, Rika

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0929398920 ISBN 13: 9780929398921

Publisher: University of North Texas Press, 1995

Synopsis

Much of what Rika Lesser has to say can be compared to the poetry of Robert Lowell, Sylvia Plath, Ann Sexton, Delmore Schwartz, and other poets who have struggled with manic-depressive illness. What sets her poetry apart, according to Richard Howard, is “the plot and purpose of her sequence to take us through the harrowing experiences she creates in her lines, and out the other side . . . this is where her book differs so from the sensational indulgences we are so familiar with.”

The book begins with poems on suicide attempts, clinical depression and mania which will attract readers with a special interest in “poetic madness.” But in the end the poet turns from death to a full engagement and participation in “normal life” and all that it entails.

In addition to the general poetry audience, this book will appeal to medical ethicists, psychiatrists, psychologists, counselors, and others needing insight into manic-depressive illnesses.

About this title

About the Author

Rika Lesser is a prize-winning poet and translator of Swedish and German literature. Among her previous books are Etruscan Things, Rilke: Between Roots, and Guide to the Underworld by Gunnar Ekelof . Her work has appeared in American Poetry Review, The New Yorker, and The New York Times Book Review.

From the Back Cover

Rika Lesser through-composes her books of poems; they are not albums but unities. They are meant to be read in one sitting and can be fearfully intense. In Etruscan Things she followed the circular map of the Etruscan heavens. In All We Need of Hell she seeks to escape the locked boxes of psychiatric wards and medical categorizations. When she succeeds - and she must - it is through art to life. These poems will inevitably be compared to those by other poets who have struggled with depressive illnesses. Rarely, however, does a poet address such topics as illness, mental illness, suicide, and death as singlemindedly as Lesser does here.

Reviews

In her second collection (after Etruscan Things), Lesser leads her readers on an exploration of mental illness that is less a descent into madness than a journey towards emotional health. Detailing her experience with depression?suicide attempts, hospitalizations and the often devastating effects of medication?Lesser demystifies depressive illness in poems that are direct, reflective and instructive (a glossary of pharmaceutical and medical terms is included). These are not highly figurative or dramatic poems like Plath's, to whom Lesser will inevitably be compared. Instead, Lesser rejects ornament and artifice, the "merely beautiful" and "well-made" verses that now leave her cold, in favor of straightforward, often journal-like, narratives that "praise simple/ actions, human/ and possible." Lesser plumbs language (etymologies, sounds, the work of literary predecessors) for its regenerative powers as she faces her own illness and the deaths of friends from AIDS and cancer: "... if there have been no words, no tropes for/ such occasions before, I must find them now."
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of North Texas Press
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0929398920
• ISBN 13: 9780929398921
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 88