Anne Carson’s Point of View
The new Nobel laureate invokes ancient history while understanding its inaccessibility.
This is an edition of the Books Briefing, our weekly guide to the best in books. Sign up for it here. In recent months, Homer's epic poems have become best-sellers, and a few weeks ago, the Nobel Prize for Literature was awarded to Anne Carson, a contemporary poet known for her reinterpretations of ancient Greek works. This renewed interest in the classics may have roots in modern anxieties about the future; during uncertain times, people often turn to the past for guidance.
While I appreciate seeing the classics prominently displayed in bookstores, I don't believe they possess a unique wisdom that contemporary writing cannot access. To prove my point, I'll examine the work of Anne Carson herself, whose writing updates and remixes ancient verses and mythology, yet she doesn't see the past as a blueprint for the present.
Instead, Carson seduces us with the strangeness of history, rather than lulling us with its familiarity. In this piece, I'll present five new stories from The Atlantic's Books section.
Written by urgent.news from The Atlantic's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
