Susan Hahn

Telling the story of a family of Jewish Hungarian immigrants settled in Chicago in the first half of the 20th century, this novel follows their rise from poverty to prosperity as Cecil Slaughter's children--out of equal measures glorified memory and sibling rivalry--name their daughters after him, with subtle variations: Ceci, Cecilia, Cecily, Celine, Celie, and Celeste. Despite--or perhaps because of--this and other familial forces pushing on them, each has a personality and direction of life distinct from her cousins. Celie is the top saleswoman in an upscale dress shop; Cecily is a playwright; Cecilia is a poet; Celine finds her expression in the seduction of men; and Celeste died as an infant. Ceci, the eldest of the Slaughter grandchildren and daughter of the admired and envied family beauty, Rose, died as a young adult and she serves as narrator of the novel from the afterlife. Through reflection, and with the counsel of Lao Tzu, she gradually attains a greater understanding and acceptance of Earthly human weakness, even as the lives of her living cousins lead inexorably to a violent and tragic conclusion. Set in the Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago, this unusual page turner utilizes poetry and a sense of theatrical staging to original and haunting effect, rending a family saga with both distance and intimacy.

A Novel

The Six Granddaughters of Cecil Slaughter

Charged with sensuality, ferocity, and despair, this sequence of poems follows the progress of a central character's passionate romance. Hahn's fevered book of human emotions becomes a powerful rumination on love, aging, and mutability in general. "Stitching together tropes about writing and technique, as well as hunting and the loss of sexual innocence, [Hahn] marks and exploits the body with surgical precision in order to explore the peripheries of the personal lyric. She wants to take poetry to the most tangible and sensual extremes. It's often uncomfortable, and yet as often results in a poetry of generous, piercing honesty, as if (to rewrite Bradford) it's by the body we are 'plainly told.'"—David Baker, Poetry "Incontinence has an enormous, almost epic sweep."—Chicago Sun-Times

Incontinence

Collects a series of poems that are connected by the image of the ibis.

Poems

The Scarlet Ibis

Hahn’s new collection wrestles with the elemental and enduring challenges of the human condition: What can we use from our spiritual heritage? How should we find relief? How, after it all, do we live? The poems are presented as a letter to the world from a woman preparing to leave it. In four sections—“The Bells,” “The Crosses,” “Widdershins,” and “Afterwor(l)d”—she contrasts the hope against the dark that is embodied by an amulet or cross with the abased resignation of torture, failed prayers, and witchcraft. Though Hahn’s vision is a dark one, its dramatic emotional depth speaks to a human power that, though damaged, can still engage. from The Crosses (V) Cross my fingers, cross my heart, arms extended, legs together, not apart, I make of myself a cross. In my pockets bright blue beads, small clay gods, scarabs, four-leaf clovers, bejewelled mezuzahs. In my hat cockleshells to exorcize the demons, to keep hidden the seventh chakra, the tonsure, the bald compulsion. Cross my fingers, cross my heart, arms extended, legs together, not apart. In my ears little bells of confusion, to frighten away eyes of the evil. On my breast a foul sachet to repel the lick of the Devil. Cross my fingers, cross my heart. In my window a glass witch ball to guard against the shatter from intruders. Cross my fingers.

The Note She Left

Guy Sharrock

Valerie Stetson

Project Design and Proposal Guidance for CRS Project and Program Managers

ProPack I

Debbie Reynolds

David Leege

Project Management and Implementation Guidance for CRS Project and Program Managers

ProPack II

A Guide to Creating a SMILER M&E System

ProPack III

David Kirby Charles Baxter David H. Lynn Marie Myung-Ok Lee Barbara Hamby Mary Morris Debora Greger Reginald Shepherd Amit Majmudar Page Hill Starzinger Ricardo Pau-Llosa Julianna Baggott G.E. Murray Patrice de La Tour du Pin--translated from the French by Jennifer Grotz R.T. Smith Rebecca Rasmussen Steven A. Dabrowski Celeste Ng Nancy Eimers Chard deNiord Laura Kasischke Derek Mong Judith Valente Debra Nystrom John J. Clayton Erika Dreifus David Wagoner Charlie Smith Pimone Triplett Megan Harlan Jonathan Fink Corey Marks Anne Harding Woodwortth

Susan Hahn

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