Anne Carson

A novel in verse bridges the gap between modernity and classicism with a story about a winged red monster named Geryon, who retreats into the world of photography after losing a male lover.

A Novel in Verse

Autobiography of Red

WOOOOOOOOF. on list of things i would have love to have written but am elated exist regardless

mira lee

“Something black and heavy dropped between them like a smell of velvet. Herakles switched on the ignition and they jumped forward onto the back of the night. Not touching but joined in astonishment as two cuts lie parallel in the same flesh”

Kendall McClain

luna luna

lili🎐

becomes more and more of a book of all time every time i reread it. ancash my darling ancash. geryon you’re me and i’m you

lauren amitirigala

there’s so much here and a reread is one hundred percent needed to get everything out of this that i ultimately want. but for now I will say that i enjoyed it immensely both as a narrative and what it is trying to do in a boarder scope! 

ashley

Hellboy TCR

Sara

Carson's ability to communicate so much with so few words is incredible

alina s

The beginning of this book made no sense and I felt stupid but then the rest made me feel like I was dreaming. Very beautiful and clever in its language and phrasing. Smart without making you feel like you’re reading something quirky. Good shit

the first time i read this book, i was a college sophomore who was about to decide i didn't want to declare a psych major anymore. the class i read this for was the reason i made that decision and this book holds such a special place in my heart for that alone. anne carson's writing is poetic and emotional and raw and all the things i love to read. i just love this book, if i recced this is how you lose the time war to you, read this one next.

Emily Morgan

Francesca

Sicuramente farò qualche ricerca per comprendere meglio quest'opera, che comunque rientra tra le letture più interessanti che abbia mai intrapreso.

Alice

This verse-novel made me fall in love with Anne Carson's words. Metaphorical yet poignant.

Really inventive. I went into this slightly confused by the proposed relationship between Geryon and Herakles, because something like that happening in canon mythology would be...weird because Geryon and Herakles only knew each other for like. A few days. And then Herakles stole his cattle and killed Geryon. 

But then I saw that this was modernized and I felt a lot better.

Anne Carson's writing style made me fall in love. If only I could do descriptions justice like this.

In this extraordinary epic poem, Anne Carson bridges the gap between classicism and the modern, poetry and prose, with a volcanic journey into the soul of a winged red monster named Geryon. There is a strong mixture of whimsy and sadness in Geryon's story. He is tormented as a boy by his brother, escapes to a parallel world of photography, and falls in love with Herakles - a golden young man who leaves Geryon at the peak of infatuation. Geryon retreats ever further into the world created by his camera, until that glass house is suddenly and irrevocably shattered by Herakles' return. Running throughout is Geryon's fascination with his wings, the colour red, and the fantastic accident of who he is. Autobiography of Red is a deceptively simple narrative layered with currents of meaning, emotion, and the truth about what it's like to be red. It is a powerful and unsettling story that moves, disturbs, and delights.

Kwan Ann Tan

This book is actually the best thing I have read this year.

madina

i know!! me, not rating anything of anne carson's 5 stars? [shocked gasps from the audience]

i think, along with bone map, this is one of those books where i understand the literary viewpoint that it is absolutely gorgeous & groundbreaking but it just isn't for me in its entirety. there are some lines that i loved, phrases that shook me, but as an entirety it didn't pierce me the way, say, night sky did. honestly i think the [cough] "aesthetic" didn't fit mine in here. & tbh i was so much more interested in geryon's relationship with ancash rather than herakles so halfway through reading this i was dreadingg giving it a 3 but thank god he saved the day. also those translations > the actual retelling..... sorry ms carson.

brie 🦪

Arden Kowalski

a novel in verse

Autobiography of red

Melody Izard

A marriage of mythology and modern novel in verse Autobiography of Red has captured the heart of many of my Goodreads' literary friends. Geryon, the red-winged monster, who is the killed by Herakles’ during his 10th labor to atone for his crime of killing his family in a fit of rage, is recast as a misunderstood red-winged youth, who is sexually molested by his brother after having to share a room with him when his grandmother comes to visit and then falls off a bus. I’m not sure if the author, Anne Carson, is trying to suggest that this was the “cause” of Geryon’s sexual orientation, but whatever the case Geryon goes on to meet Herakles when he is 14 and Herakles is 16:


They were two superior eels

at the bottom of the tank and they recognized each other like italics

Soon they are having a love affair and are mistaken for newlyweds by the waitress at the Bus Depot. 
Herakles eventually leaves Geryon, breaks his heart and takes up with a Peruvian lover. Geryon has become a photographer and is traveling to Argentina with guidance from Fodor’s Guide to Argentina when he meets back up with Herakles and Ancash (his new object of romance). 

I struggle to find the enchanting factor of this novel. I seem to be expected to find it in the language of the “novel in verse”. 

During the story we learn that Geryon is working on his autobiography. His mother is chain smoking and talking to Maria on the phone:

No it’s a sculpture he doesn’t know how to write yet

Oh this and that stuff he finds outside Geryon’s always finding things aren’t you Geryon?

She winked at him over the telephone. He winked back using both eyes and returned to work.
He had ripped up some pieces of crispy paper he found in her purse to use for hair and was gluing these to the top of the tomato.


Yes, there are parts of the novel that enchant me. But I think in order to be awash with giddiness over this story; I need to see the visual parts of his autobiography. I mean the tomato and the photographs seem to play a vital part in his composition, I obviously NEED them to add this book to my list of favorites. I can’t deny I’m disappointed.

Ryan Nylander

This novel-in-verse begins with a peculiar frame story that is somehow both academic in tone and immediately engrossing. I found myself confused and immensely curious about this Stesichorus; was he even a real person? How much of the stuff about his blinding by Helen is an elaborate joke, and how much are we meant to take at face value? (These questions are best left to Wikipedia, as Carson isn't interested in spelling things out).

The quizzical frame story is actually a compass rose, meant to prepare us for the way the novel blurs reality and myth. Throughout Autobiography of Red we encounter metaphorical or imaginary events alongside literal ones, which can produce a dreamlike effect. It takes some getting used to. 

We learn early-on that Geryon has red wings, despite the story occurring in the real world, its events happening on a mundane, naturalistic scale (as opposed to the epic scale of the classical original). Such is the logic of this singular and idiosyncratic coming-of-age tale: it is up to us to determine how to interpret what is really happening, and what is purely poetry. We have to learn that the division isn't important. The novel's magic lies in accepting the subjectivity of Geryon's worldview.

I'm so enamored by this device, by the way that Geryon's worldview shifts as he grows up, that I haven't even talked about what this book is about. It's a gay love story, a simple and relatable story of unrequited love. Your mileage may vary here depending on if you've ever been a gay adolescent. As a young man I have been Geryon pining after Herakles, and I have been the Herakles to another young man's Geryon, and I can testify that Carson gets it right -- the angst and the rush of confused emotions, the teenage solipsism, the photographs. 

Some may be disappointed that the book's dramatic moments are so quiet, so internal. To the contrary, I found myself swept away by Carson's visions of Buenos Aires, Lima, the Andes, sex on an airplane. Geryon spends much of the book traveling, and in the throes of quarantine, his nomadic life, shot through with moments of mysticism and fantasy, feels impossibly free.

Autobiography of Red A Novel in Verse

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