UnMythed

By Chris Wind

A collection of poems exposing the myths within the myth: what might Pandora, Circe, Penelope, Eurydice, Persephone, the Gorgons, and others have thought and done if they had not been the creations of a male supremacy?

 

For (feminist) poetry fans; of interest to scholars of Greek and Roman mythology; and a valuable resource for

• Language: English
• Publisher: Magenta
• Release date: Oct 6, 2011
• ISBN: 9781926891064

Chris Wind

Visit my website (http://www.chriswind.net) for more info.This is what happens is her latest work: How is it that the girl who got the top marks in high school ends up, at fifty, scrubbing floors and cleaning toilets for minimum wage, living in a room above Vera’s Hairstyling, in a god-forsaken town called Powassan?"An incisive reflection on how social forces constrain women’s lives. ... Great for fans of Sylvia Plath, Doris Lessing’s The Golden Notebook." Booklife/Publishers' WeeklySoliloquies: The Lady Doth Indeed Protest is a collection of soliloquies delivered by Shakespeare's women, protesting the role given to them. The soliloquies formed the basis of a recent theatrical production, "Not Such Stuff", by Venus Theatre in Laurel, Maryland, and have also been used as audition pieces by many aspiring actresses. High school English teachers might also be interested in using the soliloquies in their Shakespeare units.Thus Saith Eve is the second in a series of ebooks featuring women from various traditions. In "Thus Saith Eve", women from The Bible deliver critiques of their stories -- as if they had a feminist consciousness.UnMythed is the third in the series. This collection of poems reveals the myths within the myths revealed: what might Pandora, Circe, Penelope, Eurydice, Persephone, the Gorgons, and others have thought and done if they had not been the creations of a chauvinist patriarchy? For poetry fans, especially feminist; of interest to scholars of Greek and Roman mythology; a good resource for English teachers who teach a Mythology unit.Deare Sister is the fourth in the series, a collection of letters that might have been written by by Lady Godiva, Milton's daughter, Rubens' model, Mozart's mother, Freud's wife, Plato's students, and others -- assuming a feminist consciousness. (What would they say?)Snow White Gets Her Say, the last in the series, is a collection of the classic fairy tales retold - what would have happened if Gretel, Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, and others had been strong and critical girls and women living today?The five ebook collections above appear in a single book (available in print as well as e-formats) titled Satellites Out of Orbit.dreaming of kaleidoscopes is a selected 'best of' collection of wind's poetry spanning about fifteen years from the poet's late teens in the 70s to her early thirties in the 90s.Paintings and Sculptures is a collection of feminist and socially conscious poetry, each piece describing a painting or a sculpture: some, a re-vision of a classic; others, an original work not yet realized. Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Dali, Botticelli, Monet, Rodin are among the artists whose work is re-imagined.Particivision and other stories is a collection of short stories presenting a socially conscious critique of various issues in our society by re-visioning significant attitudes and activities: watching tv, going to school, shopping, advertising, hunting, environmentalism, militarism, suicide, the news, competition, sex, religion, government. Social commentary and activism via fiction.Excerpts is a miscellaneous collection of early prose and poetry.***Actors looking for fresh, new audition pieces -- check out Soliloquies: The Lady Doth Indeed Protest (Shakespeareanesque soliloquies with a twist), Thus Saith Eve (monologues), Deare Sister, and Snow White Gets Her Say.Also, "Amelia's Nocturne" (see http://www.chriswind.com/for_ Amelia.htm) can be performed as a theatrical piece: a simple set consisting of a writing table with an inkwell and note paper, the music (live piano and voice in the corner) woven into the monologue.Painters and sculptors -- I've been looking for the longest time for artists to 'actualize' the paintings and sculptures in Paintings and Sculptures for exhibit...if anyone's interested, contact me!English teachers – consider using Soliloquies: The Lady Doth Indeed Protest for your Shakespeare unit and UnMythed for your myths unit.Women's history scholars -- you might be interested in Deare Sister.***chris wind has degrees in Literature, Education, and Philosophy.Her poetry has been published in Alpha, The Antigonish Review, Ariel, Atlantis, Bite, Bogg, Canadian Author and Bookman, Canadian Dimension, Canadian Woman Studies, Contemporary Verse 2, The Free Verse Anthology, Girlistic Magazine, grain, Interior Voice, Kola, Mamashee, The New Quarterly, Next Exit, Onionhead, Poetry Toronto, Prism International, Rampike, Shard, The University of Toronto Review, The Wascana Review, Whetstone, White Wall Review, Women's Education des femmes, and three anthologies (Clever Cats, ed. Ann Dubras; Going for Coffee, ed. Tom Wayman; Visions of Poesy, ed. Dennis Gould). “Luncheon on the Grass" was the motive poem for an exhibit by Brooks Bercovitch and Colton at the Galerie Schorer, Montreal (1998).Her prose has been read on CBC Radio and published in ACT, Alpha, American Atheist, The Antigonish Review, Canadian Woman Studies, event, Existere, (f.)Lip, Herizons, Herstoria, The Humanist, Humanist in Canada, Hysteria, The New Quarterly, Other Voices, Secular Nation, and Waves.Her theatrical works have been performed by Laurel Theater, Alumnae Theatre, Theatre Resource Center, Theatre Asylum, Buddies in Bad Times, and A Company of Sirens.chris wind has received thirteen Ontario Arts Council Writers’ Reserve grants based on publisher and theatre recommendation.chris wind was a panellist at the Canadian National Feminist Poetry Conference (Winnipeg, 1992), and featured in an article in The Montreal Gazette (1994).Lastly, chris wind is listed in “Who’s Who in Hell” (probably because of “Faith,” “The Great Jump-Off,” and Thus Saith Eve).

Book preview

CONTENTS

Gaia

Narcissus

Pandora

Daphne

Daedalus

Ismene

Poseidon

Athena and Orestes

Circe

The Muses

Omphale

Hyacinth

Philomel

Clytie

Eurydice

The Danaids

Amphion

Galatea

Gorgons

Dido

Menelaus

Psyche

Hylas

Atalanta

Penelope

Macha

Jason—I

Penthisilea

Persephone

Adonis

Ares

Siren

Acrisius

Iphigenia—I

Thetis

Chryseis and Briseis

Jason—II

Chiron

Artemis

Bellerophon

Iphigenia—II

Prometheus

Sisyphus

Gaia

for centuries

I scraped the Sistine Chapel

where God reaches out,

touches,

transfers,

and Adam is born.

flake by flake,

layer by layer,

(one has to be careful

to leave the original intact)

the work was slow,

tedious,

painful.

but eventually

through ages of oil and acrylic

I uncovered the truth:

a tiny head crowning

between warm soft thighs.

•

Gaia is the Greek goddess, Mother Earth, believed to be the Creator.

~~~

Narcissus

she unwraps the traditional gifts:

first, the brush-comb-and-mirror set,

pale pink marbling

with gilded edges—

they lie heavy in her hand;

then the jewelry box,

gold and cream

lined with velvet—

it plays Fascination

the new thirteen-year-old

hands them back to her mother and says

Narcissus was a man.

•

Narcissus was a man who fell in love with his own appearance—he spent all of his time gazing at his reflection in a pool of water.

~~~

Pandora

everyone thinks yours is just another Eve story

the first woman

punished for desiring knowledge

and for disobedience

but people forget you were created by the gods

as a gift of revenge for men,

all beauty and mischief—

no, not ‘and’

but ‘therefore’:

it’s boring to be bait:

    after a minimal amount of effort and imagination

to maximize god-given qualities

(the male sexual response being far from complex,

this was far from challenging)

what is there?

it’s not easy to be satisfied with attracting men

as a raison d’être—

so that’s why.

•

As a punishment for the possession of fire, Zeus ordered that a beautiful woman be made and given to mankind—she was named Pandora, ‘the gift of all’. Each of the gods had given her some quality that would prove ruinous to man. In one version, these ‘gifts’ were her incredible beauty, her goodness, and her youthful, shy, demeanour, which alone destroyed man for their power to distract and delight. In another version, the gods put the ‘gifts’ in a box and forbid her to open

Reviews for UnMythed

[kristincedar · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

UnMythed, Chris Wind. Just about 50 poems based around well-known ancient myths. A bit feminist for this reader’s tastes, and altogether, these poems has a bit of different goals, but there are some gems within the pages.