The Volcano Sequence

"This is a book written in white-hot passion, the kind of book that enters the writer perhaps once in a lifetime, and its synthesis of intellect and eros, historicism and contemporaneity, make it a major achivement. Whe Garbo went unannounced to visit Eric von Stroheim one afternoon, he said, 'Greta! Please come ind never leave.' After reading 'the volcano sequence, ' you want to say, 'Ostriker! Please write like this forever.' ... In American spiritual poetry, there is nothing to match its sweep and power until you go back to Emily Dickinson writing in the 1860s. This is a book to be cherished, written about, argued over, read and reread for years."
--Women's Review of Books

"In her tenth collection, Ostriker's need to understand a woman's relationship with "ruach" (wind, breath, spirit of God) is a crucial poetic--and human--act, making this is an innovative "book of life" for men and women alike. Recommended for all poetry collections."

--Library Journal

"Every year, I try to recommend a book of poetry, and this year I've found a great one: Alicia Suskin Ostriker's 'the volcano sequence. A mature, philosophical, yet playful voice comes through in these tight poems. Intense and profound, these poems also dazzle with surprising imaginery."

--The Progressive

"the volcano sequence is one of the those poems the world of literature occasionally has the good fortune to receive which doesn't so much sum up a life, as embody it. Ostriker's spiritual consciousness is abundant, complex, she has many moral sympathies and many symbolic selves to enact her curiosities and compassion. Her ruminations and ethical queries range from the world of the bible, to India, classical Greece and most urgently to our own imperfect dominion, as it is lived in the mind and the body, in passion and despair. This is a poem with a voice of its own; it is a prayer to God, and a hymn of accusation for the lapses of divinity; it is a psalm of praise for the life of the flesh, and a mourning for life's fleetingness. Most importantly, Ostriker finds, and offers us, a heartening solace in the rigor of her regard."
--C. K. Williams

"Complex, original, and written with a truly literate and skilled economy of words. 'the volcano sequence' is a compilation of verse that fully showcases Ostriker a master poet in the full vigor of her imagination and wordsmithing talent."

--Midwest Book Review