All We Know of Pleasure

Here is the good stuff: poetry written by women that actually excites the thinking reader. This anthology, spanning work of the last 75 years, will broaden its readers' notions of what defines erotic poetry. For what is more intriguing, more satisfying than strong, self-assured writing?

This groundbreaking anthology includes the most popular women writers - among them Sharon Olds, Elizabeth Alexander, Anne Sexton, Dorianne Laux, Denise Levertov, Adrienne Rich, Lucille Clifton, and Louise Glck. These poets fully demonstrate that, far from being prurient, the erotic can permeate even the most mundane aspects of life, from reading a book to buying clothes.

At the same time, the collection affirms the enormous meaningfulness of poetry - its ability to express the inexpressible and to illuminate the most private and intimate of human experiences. The poets included here represent different ethnicities, geographies, social classes, and sexual preferences. The only characteristic they share is that they are women writing about sex.

“"All We Know of Pleasure: Poetic Erotica by Women is a breathtaking, eros driven, somatic poetic loveletter to women's bodies. So many of the poets who changed my life and writing live inside this book, and isn't that the truth of it, that poets give our desires and ecstasies back to us? I read it with my whole body, dripping with delight." --Lidia Yuknavitch, author of The Book of Joan”

All We Know of Pleasure: Poetic Erotica by Women was featured in the July 2019 issue of Cosmopolitan"All We Know of Pleasure: Poetic Erotica by Women is a breathtaking, eros driven, somatic poetic loveletter to women's bodies. So many of the poets who changed my life and writing live inside this book, and isn't that the truth of it, that poets give our desires and ecstasies back to us? I read it with my whole body, dripping with delight." —Lidia Yuknavitch, author of The Book of Joan“I absolutely loved these poems and devoured them in one night— like a lover who wants to take her time but can’t. They reminded me of what I first learned stealing Erica Jong off my mom’s shelf when I was a teenager: sex is the force that drives the world, and women writing about it, with all that energy, particularity, sensuality, and humor, is the powerful force that cracks the world open.” ―Jenna Blum, New York Times bestselling author of Those Who Save Us and The Lost Family"It's the verve of the lines in each of these poems that will electrify a reader. [. . .] Many of the poems play with the language of the erotic the same way lovers play, with a potent and beguiling imagination for both what's observed and experienced. [. . .] The anthology's poems tie love and passion together brilliantly, striking readers as much with their music and magic as their erotic energy." ―Apalachee Review

Enid Shomer, Anthology Editor

Poet and fiction writer Enid Shomer is the author of four books of poetry and three of fiction, most recently the novel The Twelve Rooms of the Nile (Simon & Schuster, 2012). Her work has been collected in more than fifty anthologies and textbooks, including POETRY: A Harper Collins Pocket Anthology, Best American Poetry, and New Stories from the South. Two of her books, Stars at Noon (poetry) and Imaginary Men (short fiction), were the subject of feature interviews on NPR's Morning Edition and All Things Considered. In 2013, she received the Lifetime Achievement Award in Writing from the Florida Humanities Council.

Here is the good stuff: poetry written by women that actually excites the thinking reader. This anthology, spanning work of the last 75 years, will broaden its readers' notions of what defines erotic poetry. For what is more intriguing, more satisfying than strong, self-assured writing? This groundbreaking anthology includes the most popular women writers -- among them Sharon Olds, Elizabeth Alexander, Anne Sexton, Dorianne Laux, Denise Levertov, Adrienne Rich, Lucille Clifton, and Louise Gl

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