Book Review – ‘Medusa’s Daughter’ by Jane Rosenberg LaForge, reviewed by Kristen Coates

“It’s on the coast that all monsters/
have children”

In Jane Rosenberg LaForge’s Medusa’s Daughter the Greek myth of Medusa, the snake-haired Gorgon whose gaze turns onlookers to stone, is reinterpreted to reveal a Medusa who is a mother, a wife, and a sister living in modern times. The finely wrought narrative verse is from the perspective of one of Medusa’s daughters, and the mother-daughter dynamic underpinning the collection lends this retelling so much depth and emotional resonance as well as providing a feminist lens.

Medusa’s daughter describes the original Greek mythology as “the original horror, the first interpretation” and the narrative uses vivid imagery and rich metaphor to depict her mother as a mortal monster. Instead of snakes, her mother’s hair is made of voices, its texture more wolf than reptile. She suffers from cancer and diabetes and “blue manias, mean reds.” 

This Greek mythology is intertwined with Medusa’s Jewish heritage at times, as when Medusa says a dish of stuffed cabbage isn’t “Jewish enough” and the daughter understands this to mean “another one/ of [Medusa’s] civilizations dashed to the ash can of history, as my/ own peel like the leaves/ of a bulb dormant in the earth.” This is powerful, compelling poetry.

The narrator struggles with the push/pull dynamic of recoiling from her mother’s differences and recognizing that she is her mother’s daughter. Medusa wears “jungle red” lipstick, an old-fashioned color that is very loud and distinct from the lipstick shades other mothers wear, an emblem of “the artificial, / in place of a real mother,” signaling a lack of emotional intimacy. Yet, “but then again/ in your genes, passed on to your/ girl children”— she has inherited her mother’s traits.

Medusa’s daughter reinterprets the rape of Medusa by the Greek god Poseidon in Athena’s temple in several poems, including “Medusa’s Crime and Punishment,” where Medusa’s daughter sees her mother as “a believer in her convictions, in her own clear way/ of thinking” and Medusa was punished “not for what she failed/ to stop before the idols from seeing in the temple, / and not because she is a victim.”  This is an incredible poetry collection.

Medusa’s Daughter is available for pre-order now from Animal Heart Press.

Kristen Coates is a writer and editor based in Boulder, Colorado who loves and supports independent literature and publishing. She tweets @systemosystems.