Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #732932 in Books
• Published on: 1998-08-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Di Prima's feminist epic, here augmented and reissued, was compared to Allen Ginsberg's Howl by critics when it was first released in 1978. And Loba does resemble Howl?both books can be formless, vatic and breast-beating. But di Prima's lupine protagonist hasn't held up as well as Howl's liberatory speaker, often seeming less an empowering goddess than a vehicle for rainbow-colored mysticism and mythmaking. The older material, here "Book I," contains a great many Clan of the Cave Bear-style musings ("She came to hunt, but I did not/ stay to be hunted"). These are at their best, however, when juxtaposed with a gritty, wayward sensibility: "She sleeps on sheepskins in yr dining room/ shoots smack into her arm, murmurs soothingly/ of the glorious vegetable soup/ she will make, tomorrow."). Poems like "REEDGATHERS: The Loba North," "The Marriage at Cana" and "The Loba Prepares an Amulet for her Daughter" present dreamlike rituals that contain some lovely imagery, but allow for little more than impressionistic glimpses at the mysterious goings-on. The new poems of "Book II" draw more heavily and successfully on recognizable figures (Kali, Shiva, Hermes and the Buddha). Here, di Prima's invocations are spiked with etymological probings of received wisdom, as when examining the roots of ethics: "& ethos/ is not/ cannot be/ prima materia/ all "honor"/ is derivative." Such sentiments, "soft/ as russian vowels," show di Prima to be a pivotal figure for those who would rewrite the archetypes of the unconscious.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
A prolific writer generally associated with the Beat Generation, Di Prima deserves wider recognition. This epic poem, originally published in 1978 as a work in progress (eight parts) in a nicely illustrated edition, appears here in its completed form (16 parts) for the first time. For Di Prima the Loba, or she-wolf, represents a fundamental feminine principle, a powerful force underlying female sexuality. With reference to legendary figures including Eve, Helen of Troy, the Virgin Mary, and Kali, she explores this mysterious energy as the source of a unique female consciousness. The strength of these poems lies in Di Prima's ability to "make it new"-to synthesize mythological elements from a wide range of cultures into a unique vision based on Navajo wolf mythology. This major poem is strongly recommended for all larger poetry collections and for academic libraries serving women's studies programs.?William Gargan, Brooklyn Coll., CUNY
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review
& From Wherever Thou Willst Thou Gatherest Me
& In All Things Am I Dispersed
(dream Of Emily Dickinson As Immaterial Surf Breaking)
All Night Long We
And Loba Is Lovha, Or Louva
And She To Tristan
And This Is A Clearing In Which Glide - Spirit Wolves
And When We Have Won Clear
And Where Thou Art, I Am
And Will You Hunt The Loba?
Annunciation
Antlered %i Flee Him
'apparuit'
Ariadne As Starmaker
The Arms - (branches %of The Tree
Aula Lucis
Autour De
Ave, Fr. Loba
Bears See Only
Because You Love The Burning Grounds
Being In Love With Darkness
Beli - Ishtar - The White Lady - Mother Of All Living - Cerridwen
Beltain Note
The Body Itself Is The Vector
The Bull %belongs To The Moon
But In Gathering Me Thou Gatherest Thyself
But In The Longhouse
But We Cant
Can You, Friend, Say You Never Leaned
Chance Arrangement Of Constellation
Childhood Of The Loba
Cougar Night Report
Crevasse
The Critic Reviews Loba
Crystal Pyramid W/ Diamond Heart
The Day Lay Like A Pearl On Her Lap
Death & The Loba
Deer Leap
Delicious The Flesh She Offers, Like Succulent
Diamond, Quartz, Agate, It Is Labyrinth
Dream: The Loba Reveals Herself
Endurance. What Remains
Eros/animus
Even W/ Jewels On Her Eyes She Cd Not Dream
Flight Into Egypt
For Cameron
Four Poets Speak Of Her
From The Wished Universe
The Girl Had Brought The Weather With Her
Guardaviaz!
Guinevere
Gwalchmai
A Handful Of Starchips Thrown
Helen On The Wall
Her Dream
Her Power Is To Open What Is Shut, Shut What Is Open
Hermetic Astronomy
The Horned Lady
How Do The Gods Manifest, Where Do They
How He Drew Her Down To Pleasure! She Left
Huntress. She In Red Sari
Hymn: The Other Face
I Am A Shadow Crossing Ice
I Am Thou & Thou Art I
I Draw A Circle About Me
I Try To Make An Image Of Illusion
I Was Drawn To This World
I'm Biting At Yr Leash, I'm Plotting
Imago Mundi
In Whose Dream
Inanna: The Epiphany
The Interloper
Is He In Bondage? Does He Bow
Is It %frozen Flesh Or Polished Bone?
Is It She In Flame At Heart
Iseult On The Ship
Ishtar
It Is Still News To Her That Passion
Juliana
Kali's Greatness Is Increased By The One With Matted Hair
Know The Difference Between Epiphany & Theophany
The Lady Is Fresh As Jasmine
Light Made My Body To Live
Lilith Of The Stars
Litany
The Loba Addresses The Goddess / Or The Poet As Priestess...
Loba As Kore In The Labyrinth Of Her Beauty
The Loba Compares The Earthly & Heavenly Mothers
The Loba Continues To Sing
The Loba Dances
The Loba In Brooklyn
Loba In Childbed
The Loba In Flanders
The Loba Longs For Remembrance In The Bardo
The Loba Old
The Loba Prepares An Amulet For Her Daughter
The Loba Priestess As Bag Lady Utters Ragged Warnings
The Loba Recovers The Memory Of A Mare
The Loba Sings To Her Cub
The Loba, In May
Loba, To Apollo, At The Fountain Of Healing
Loba: 1
Loba: The Winds Of Change
Love Song Of The Loba
Madness Of The Loba
Make Me Mad, O Mother!
The Marriage At Cana
The Mask Is The Path Of The Star
Medusa Gazebo
The Memory Of Far Things
My Lady, We Are Being Hunted
My Mother Is Mad, My Father Is Mad, Their Two Disciples - Mad
Nativity
A Note On The Above
Now Born In Uniqueness, Join The Common Quest
O Make Latona White. Smooth Out Her Hair
O Mind, You Have Lost The Root
O Mother, Put On A Robe & Cover Yourself
O Taste The %rose-petal Wine
O The Unmatched Beauty Of This Dishevelled Woman
Oh Lil! You Promised Me Secrets Of Mushroom & Fern
Or Is She Soft
Or She Takes Yr Shape, She Bites
A Painting Of The Loba
A Part Of The Thousand Ways To Say Goodbye (psyche To Amor)
Parthenos
Persephone
Persephone: Reprise
The Poet Prays To The Loba
The Poet, Seeking Her
Point Of Ripening: Lughnasa
Reedgatherers: The Loba North
Report To Aphrodite (evening)
Reprise
Resurrection
The Ruses: A Coyote Tale
Sacred Geometry
The Second Daughter: Li (brightness)
She Flies Over Partitions On The
She Has Not Left Me - Tho I Have Published Our Secrets
She Is Not Helen. On Every Branch Of The Tree
She Is Opposed To Custom
She Is The Scrub Oak, Juniper
She Is The Wind You Never Leave Behind
She Lay %on The Straw Mat
She Sleeps On Sheepskins In Yr Dining Room
She Strides In Blue Jeans To The Corner
She Strides On The Battlefield W/ Loosened Hair
She Who
Sketches Of The Loba
Slealth Of Thieves
Some Lies About The Loba
Some Shapes Of The Loba
Sometimes She Slips Sinuous Thru Green
Song Of Heloise
Song Of The Dream-wolves
The Stars Shine For Us
The Sticky Nature Of
Sunwolf: Beltain
Tahuti Poems
Tara's Name Makes All Prosperity Vanish.
Theology Becomes The Body Politic
They Call Me Drunkard, Though I Drink No Liquor
This Wolf Is Black. She Does Not
Three More Sketches Of The Loba
Thus Love %in Wolf's Clothing - Stalks
Thus There Is
To Bring The Whole Form Into Silence
Tsogyal
Ursa
Vision Of The Hag, Devoured
Visitation: Elizabeth & Mary
Walpurgis
What Does It Mean To Rot?
What Woman Dances On This Battleground?'
When She Hoots It Makes
When Will Heart Lotus Bloom
Where Did It
You Are The Dancing Youth In A Circle Of Milkmaids
You Roll, Listing Thru Gummy Sheets Like Ship
The Confirmation
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder®

Customer Reviews

Depth and richness, weaving present and past
I had the privilige of hearing Diane Di Prima read recently, and discovered a new found appreciation for this collection. Many of her volumes have been published as a smaller collection previously, and then expanded to include the later works. 'Loba' is an amazingly, deceptively layered collection weaving together many themes and images over a length of her life. I highly recommend this, among others!

"It is the Word that is the Ground of Love..."
"It is the Word that is the Ground of Love..."

Diane di Prima is one of the most talented twentieth century American women poets, and the most important female figure of the Beat literary movement. She has authored thirty four books, including the two that have appeared in 1998, Loba, and the re-issued edition of Memoirs of a Beatnik, a classic of Beat narrative-a witty chronicle of the cultural conditions from which it grew. When the first part of Loba first appeared in 1978, it was hailed as the female counterpart to Allen Ginsberg's Howl. Loba is a series of poems forming a compact whole, presenting in a visionary manner all forms of the female experience. Anyone who knows Diane di Prima and her work knows that she is Loba, the protagonist of the work and the focal point of the poems. Loba, meaning she-wolf in Spanish, is an archetypal figure, fusing qualities that are both human and animal, terrestrial and divine. Diane di Prima's poetry has been essentially lyrical, even in its most radical aspects, but she has chosen to define this work of her maturity as an epic, inasmuch as an epic is a narrative poetic work about a quest. As in all epics, di Prima starts in a present time that echoes the past and that clearly foreshadows the portion of the journey to come: the conclusion. The poem opens with an invocation to the "lost moon sisters", to whom di Prima's poetry is addressed, who all partake of the divine multiplicity of the wolf-goddess. As poet Marge Piercey commented, di Prima, in this book, has taken from many mythologies to create her own. Loba is not just one figure, rather, it is a conglomeration of the re-incarnations of many personae within one character. We see the Loba under many other masks: in Flanders, we see her in the soft light of a Vermeer painting; in the exquisite Kali-ma versions, she is "as fresh as jasmine", but also bloody and ferocious; we see her also as the Maternal Principle, singing to her children or making an amulet for her daughter; we see her as the principle of Female Creation, Lilith; geographically, we see her in the most diverse places, from Brooklyn to the Bardo; we see her young, ageless and as an old hag. Born in Brooklyn in 1934, having lived in Manhattan for a period of time, Diane di Prima moved to Northern California where she has lived for the past thirty years. She has studied Zen and Tibetan Buddhism, and has delved in the science of alchemy and in the western magical traditions. This work summarizes her life and work, presenting to us her poetic itinerary. In Loba di Prima deals with mythical figures from the native American mythology to the heroes of Western medieval romances (from Tristan and Iseult to Guinevere), to the figures of the Judeo-Christian religion in The Seven Joys of the Virgin, to the acclamations to Lilith, to the personal re-creation of the myths of classical antiquity (such as Persephone, Ariadne, Helen, et al.), to the saga of the Sumerian Goddess Inanna, and finally to the hymns in honor of the Goddess Kali. Loba lives her own eclectic myth and encourages all of us to create our own magical reality. The superiority of the Female Principle permeates the whole volume, as openly declared in one of the Inanna poems: "The king is expendable, but not the Queen." Di Prima has evolved from a poetry that was essentially a poetry of protest and denunciation to a poetry that is meditation in motion, and that includes, comforts, teaches and soothes, rather than confronts. The style is fresh, crisp, and abounds with startling and powerful images. But there is a new, hieratic, classical tone in many of the poems in this volume. The volume is replete with teachings, reflections and musings on life that di Prima wants to share with her readers, and that come forth as brief and powerful aphorisms, as in the first verse of poem "He Who Was Not Born from a Lotus": "It is the Word that is the Ground of Love. . ." In many poems, di Prima speaks like a Hermes-like messenger come down to speak to men: "I come to speak of the long & slender vase / of the goblet like a sphere laid open / of the vessel with two handles, the one with none. . ." The epic properly ends with a poem entitled "Persephone: Reprise", a poem about severance and rebirth. Every great poem is a descent to what di Prima calls "the fluid boundaries of Hades," from which "we spring continuously into life & death." It is apparent that under the persona of Loba, the poet is talking about herself, the woman "with broom and pen," describing herself in a remarkably objective way, as if she were on the outside, looking at herself: "There is a woman who is full of grace / her lap is ample & empty / she is not abstract or sheepish / ... I warmly recommend this volume as one of the most important books of poetry of the twentieth century.

A Reader from Berkeley, CA