Eve--From the Autobiography and Other Poems

By Betsy Feagan Colquitt

Betsy Colquitt has long been recognized as one of Texas' finest poets. With the publication of this collection, readers can see for the first time the full range of her work. The "Eve" poems, which give the volume its title, are new in substance and tone. This exciting sequence traces the life of the first woman from her creation by the "Great Mother," through the years in the Garden of Eden, where Eve helps bring Adam out of the mud of Mother Earth, down to the present, as Eve looks at life and comments from the perspective of wise and eternal Woman. At the end of the sequence, Eve is seen in the Big Bend of Texas, a land different, yet strangely like, the first Garden. The second section of the book includes poems published in Colquitt's 1980 collection, Honor Card , and the third section, "New and Uncollected Poems," explores subjects ranging from art and architecture to home and family.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0875651747
• ISBN13: 9780875651743
• Release Date: July 1997
• Publisher: Texas Christian University Press
• Length: 260 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 5.8" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Beautiful words

I have to admit out loud that I am extremely prejudiced in my review of this book. Mrs. Colquitt taught me creative writing at TCU -- she actually had the nerve to give me a B simply because she said I was not writing up to my potential.But this is not about me, it is all about her marvelous book. As a teacher, Mrs. Colquitt was self-effacing and understated in speaking of her experience and accomplishments. Others had to tell us that Isaac Bashevis Singer asked her to be his editor. She never would have brought the subject up.Knowing that about her makes this book all the more moving.Yet, even if you've never been to Fort Worth, or never had opportunity to hear her lecture, you will appreciate this book. The first half could be a modern midrash on Eve (and Lilith). Colquitt writes feminism the way she practices it -- gentle, assertive, intelligent, and kind.The second half of the book tends to the more autobiographical. The final poem was for me gut-wrenching, as I honored and respected her husband, my math professor, for his unrelenting fairness and sense of humor. Dr. Colquitt died shortly after my own father died, and Mrs. Colquitt's vulnerability here is seldom duplicated.EVE is serious, playful, and worth curling up next to the fireplace and reading aloud.