false 61049 7 Anne Carson's <i>Autobiography of Red</i> is a novel in verse, the author's first. A classicist by profession as well as a poet, Carson has drawn on antiquity for her cast, updating the myth of Geryon and Herakles. In the original version, of course, Herakles killed the red-skinned, winged Geryon. In Carson's very contemporary retelling, he merely inspires, but does not return, the monster's passion. By choosing Geryon as her central character, Carson can bring up the questions of existence as if they hadn't been asked before. After all, the monster's instincts have not been numbed by civilization. Fires twist through him. We feel the pain of learning the most elementary things, and then the volcanic intensity that comes with that more advanced thing, love. Yet Carson doesn't so much tell the story of Geryon's love as mediate his very being through semiological surfaces: cafes, video stores, lipstick, a library where he shelves government documents with a "forlorn austerity, / tall and hushed in their ranges as veterans of a forgotten war." Carson seldom satisfies herself with an image of the world. Instead she atomizes the world, leaving it broken down, refracted, and glinting. At times her verbal pyrotechnics manage to render pure <i>energy</i>: <blockquote> A little button at the end of each range activated the fluorescent track above it.<br> A yellowing 5 x 7 index card<br> Scotch-taped below each button said EXTINGUISH LIGHT WHEN NOT IN USE.<br> Geryon went flickering<br> through the ranges like a bit of mercury flipping the switches on and off.<br> The librarians thought him<br> a talented boy with a shadow side.<br> </blockquote> No novelist could have gotten away with that last line. Yet it's very much to the point: Carson's Geryon is, among other things, a camera freak who doesn't understand that an observer must inevitably alter the nature of the thing observed. Here is Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, cheek-by-jowl with the ancients! And indeed, Carson's achievement is to interweave the archaic and the modern so seamlessly that by the time we finish reading <i>Autobiography of Red</i>, the entire landscape looks inside out. <i>--Mark Rudman</i> 1396256 1 8 1998 Autobiography of Red total:1500|5:932|4:387|3:141|2:29|1:11| 1500 6700 2073 223 5 3 false false Mon Jan 28 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Mon Jan 28 15:54:10 -0800 2008 Wed Jan 30 12:07:05 -0800 2008 more...]]> 5 4 false false Tue Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2000 Thu Jul 12 16:58:47 -0700 2007 Thu Jul 12 17:12:25 -0700 2007
There are some clever metafict...more...]]> 5 4 false false Mon Aug 13 11:48:41 -0700 2007 Mon Aug 13 11:43:56 -0700 2007 Mon Aug 13 11:46:44 -0700 2007 more...]]> 5 2 false false Mon Nov 24 13:28:27 -0800 2008 Mon Nov 24 13:28:45 -0800 2008 more...]]> 5 1 false false Tue Dec 02 21:11:49 -0800 2008 Thu Dec 11 20:19:58 -0800 2008
I found a deep visual connection to the imagery in this book. It is much like a series of photographs. Each...more...]]> 5 2 false false Sat Apr 01 00:00:00 -0800 2000 Mon Jul 30 07:16:50 -0700 2007 Sun Aug 05 05:36:55 -0700 2007
Based on the Greek myth of Herakles (Hercules for all you Romans), it recasts Geryon, the slayed, sheepherding red-winged monster, as a protagonist who also takes form as a gay, social...more...]]> 4 0 false false Sun Dec 28 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Sun Dec 28 10:41:23 -0800 2008 Sun Dec 28 10:46:39 -0800 2008
X. SCHOOLING

In t...more...]]> 0 0 false false Mon Sep 21 13:20:48 -0700 2009 Mon Sep 21 13:20:53 -0700 2009
It's a novel! It's a book of poetry! It's a novel and a book of poetry! And like all sturdy volumes, it can also serve as a coaster on a hot summer afternoon. The "Red" of the title is Geryon, red-winged monster and minor ...more...]]> 4 0 false false Mon Jun 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Thu Jun 18 09:43:02 -0700 2009 Thu Jun 18 09:48:53 -0700 2009 more...]]> 2 0 false false Sun May 10 19:53:36 -0700 2009 Tue Sep 01 19:11:53 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Mon Jun 29 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Apr 03 20:28:35 -0700 2009 Mon Jun 29 20:09:40 -0700 2009
What I love about Ste...more...]]> 5 1 false false Tue Jun 24 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Tue May 27 09:59:21 -0700 2008 Tue Jun 24 19:48:27 -0700 2008
I understand Geryon intimately, for I, too am a red creature.
...more...]]> 2 0 false false Sun Mar 23 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Fri Mar 21 12:15:53 -0700 2008 Mon Mar 24 12:35:21 -0700 2008 Autobiography of Red has captured the heart of many of my Goodreads' literary friends. Geryon, the red-winged monster, who is the killed by Herakles’ during his 10th labor to atone for his crime of killing his family in a fit of rage, is recast as...more...]]> 5 0 false false Thu Feb 21 18:42:56 -0800 2008 Thu May 01 18:33:01 -0700 2008
excerpt (the one word or two little word lines should be on the line above):

It was not the fear of ridicule,
to which ...more...]]> 4 0 false false Wed Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Sat Sep 05 07:29:51 -0700 2009 Sat Sep 05 07:42:33 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Tue Jul 07 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Tue Jul 07 02:57:26 -0700 2009 Tue Jul 07 03:35:12 -0700 2009 I found it a bit chilly, though. I think it might be the push on the words, oddly. (I never could trust Stein). Or...more...]]> 5 0 false false Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Wed Sep 30 13:29:22 -0700 2009 Mon Oct 05 14:16:00 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2002 Tue Feb 17 15:44:43 -0800 2009 Tue Feb 17 15:47:49 -0800 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Tue May 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Sun May 20 21:30:12 -0700 2007 Sun May 20 21:35:46 -0700 2007 more...]]> 5 0 false false Mon Nov 05 17:34:37 -0800 2007 Tue Nov 13 17:27:35 -0800 2007 more...]]>