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Ann Wroe

Orpheus: The Song of Life Hardcover – 14 July 2011

by Ann Wroe (Author)

4.3 21 ratings

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For at least two and a half millennia, the figure of Orpheus has haunted humanity. Half-man, half-god, musician, magician, theologian, poet and lover, his story never leaves us. He may be myth, but his lyre still sounds, entrancing everything that hears it: animals, trees, water, stones, and men.

In this extraordinary work Ann Wroe goes in search of Orpheus, from the forests where he walked and the mountains where he worshipped to the artefacts, texts and philosophies built up round him. She traces the man, and the power he represents, through the myriad versions of a fantastical life: his birth in Thrace, his studies in Egypt, his voyage with the Argonauts to fetch the Golden Fleece, his love for Eurydice and journey to Hades, and his terrible death. We see him tantalising Cicero and Plato, and breathing new music into Gluck and Monteverdi; occupying the mind of Jung and the surreal dreams of Cocteau; scandalising the Fathers of the early Church, and filling Rilke with poems like a whirlwind. He emerges as not simply another mythical figure but the force of creation itself, singing the song of light out of darkness and life out of death.

Print length

272 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Jonathan Cape
Publication date

14 July 2011
Dimensions

14.22 x 2.44 x 22.1 cm
ISBN-10

0224091360
ISBN-13

978-0224091367
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From the Publisher

Product description

Review

This insightful and visionary study, treading a perfect line between imagination and scholarship, is as readable and necessary as a fine novel. Ted Hughes, another mythographer, would have loved it. ― Independent

Ann Wroe has an acute eye for pastoral detail...and takes a novelist's care in exploring character and evoking atmosphere... [Orpheus] will leave you dancing. ― New Statesman

This is a most remarkable book... most rewarding... [a book] that will surely enhance Ann Wroe's already considerable reputation. ― The Irish Times

Orpheus: The Song of Life is a book of wonders, learned, playful and passionate...For all her studies, her wide reading, her historical dilligence, Wroe's method is instinctive, as she searches for inspirations and connections across the millennia. ― Guardian

Marvellous subjects can still, sometimes deliver leaden books. This one, though, really is a song ... It evokes, but it also embodies, its subject. ― The Times

About the Author

Ann Wroe is the Briefings and Obituaries editor of The Economist. She is the author of seven previous works of non-fiction, including Pilate: The Biography of an Invented Man, which was shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Award and the W.H. Smith Award. She lives in north London.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Jonathan Cape (14 July 2011)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 272 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0224091360
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0224091367
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 14.22 x 2.44 x 22.1 cm

Best Sellers Rank: 855,473 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- 1,379 in History of Greece
- 2,134 in Ancient Greek History
- 9,346 in Literary Theory & Movements

Customer reviews:
4.3 21 ratings

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4.3 out of 5

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Douglas Macari

Engaging read.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 17 September 2019

Research.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 25 July 2017

Verified Purchase

A rich and stimulating survey of the Orphean tradition rendered in an Orphean and poetic mode. Highly recommended.

2 people found this helpful

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julietsmith

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 12 October 2014

Verified Purchase

breath taking and fun to read

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Zikmu

Pleasant reading but fanciful

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 26 September 2019

This book is full of "quotations" given without any reference, clearly written by the author expressing Orpheus as she imagines him. About Pythagoras, the Italian scholar Maria Timpanaro Cardini has produced a complete edition of all the texts about him, with index and Italian translations. To my knowledge, nothing of the sort has been done about Orpheus or about Eleusis, that would be useful compilation work for those seeking available information about Greek esotericism. I bought that book after reading an article in the Irish Times, by someone who seemed to be a friend of the author ; curiously that article gave more information on what we really know about the myth of Orpheus than this entire book !

One person found this helpful

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K. M. Brown

Not for the faint-hearted....

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 15 August 2011

...but if you can tune into Ann Wroe's fine poetic prose, this is a real gem. Her style is particular, but absolutely consistent and very beautiful. This is not a history book, nor a sociological analysis of a meme. It is founded on a great deal of erudition, the old-fashioned kind, eclectic, deep, emotionally and intellectually responsive, not the modern academic kind, which scientifically eviscerates its subjects in order mostly to score points off other academics. It's not a book about Orpheus, it is a meditation on, in, around Orpheus. I've been reading it at bedtime all this week, while riots rage outside and ongoing family tragedies play out inside, and its gentle flow and precisely woven structure have been nothing short of a life saver. It's not for everyone, I don't suppose it will sell like Stieg Larssen, or even the amber-eyed Hare, but if it floats your boat, then bon voyage, a ravishing cruise is yours.

18 people found this helpful

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pam

Unveiling Orpheus

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 25 March 2012

I've come across references to Orpheus hundreds of times, but never seemed to really internalize Orpheus until reading this book. Ann Wroe appropriately presents Orpheus through time and space, through the eyes of poets, artists, and chroniclers through the years by weaving a tapestry of perceptions and experiences. She also inserts modern imagery to make Orpheus relevant today.

This is probably not a book for someone new to Orpheus or Greek Mythology. But for those who study mythology from a spiritual, artistic or psychological perspective, it's a wonderful journey into knowing Orpheus.

One person found this helpful

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Mr. David Maclagan

orpheus revisited

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 29 September 2011

this is a beautifully written book, that combines serious research into the Orpheus myth way beyond its classical form: a very daring enterprise, but it's a wonderful, poetic read

3 people found this helpful

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travelswithadiplomat

Wroe captures the cadences of Orpheus perfectly

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 13 October 2011

It's pretty rare I find myself reading aloud excerpts from a non-fiction book to anyone within earshot but this study by Ann Wroe has impinged on me in a manner that caught me entirely by surprise. The author's aim is to bring us all to understand the power of Orpheus that permeates Western Literature and Art. She achieves this by letting us not just empathize with her subject matter, but sympathize to the point we are caught up in a glorious swirl of colour, pattern, song and poesy that is breathtaking.
I have found myself re-reading passages just to savour the poetic prose, the eclectic daub of a wordsmith who commences by telling us how the German poet Rilke finally experienced his Orphic epiphany. Yet, by the end, we realise that Wroe herself has experienced the same literary empyreal ascent and that Orpheus speaks once more through a select group of artists. I would give some examples of the subtle brilliance of word play, of the history we learn about Orpheus, about the mythical man, the ascribed Hymns and tantalising touches of verse in those who tried to quote him and, at the last, examples within this book of the real impact he has had on our artistic consciousness...but they are too bountiful to choose.
I found this book by chance in an independent bookshop and I am reluctant to take it from my side table and place it on a bookshelf. It and the author just keep on giving with every glance at its pages. As a previous reviewer suggests, if you like your analysis and history delivered in a dry manner then this will not suit you. However, if you wish to taste the power of Orpheus, then this book is very much for you.
A stunning effort by Ann Wroe.

8 people found this helpful

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Orpheus: The Song of Life Hardcover – 14 July 2011

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