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Afterglow
Prolific and widely renowned, Eileen Myles is a trailblazer whose decades of literary and artistic work "set a bar for openness, frankness, and variability few lives could ever match" (New York Review of Books). This newest book paints a kaleidoscopic portrait of a beloved confidant: the pit bull called Rosie.In 1990, Myles chose Rosie from a litter on the street, and their connection instantly became central to the writer's life and work. During the course of their sixteen years together, Myles was madly devoted to the dog's well-being, especially in her final days. Starting from the emptiness following Rosie's death, Afterglow launches a heartfelt and fabulist investigation into the true nature of the bond between pet and pet owner. Through this lens, we witness Myles' experiences with intimacy and spirituality, celebrity and politics, alcoholism and recovery, fathers and family history, as well as the fantastical myths we spin to get to the heart of grief.Moving from an imaginary talk show where Rosie is interviewed by Myles' childhood puppet to a critical reenactment of the night Rosie mated with another pit bull, from lyrical transcriptions of their walks to Rosie's enlightened narration from the afterlife, Afterglow illuminates all that it can mean when we dedicate our existence to a dog.
224 pages, Hardcover
First published September 12, 2017
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About the author
Eileen Myles
118 books1,061 followersEileen Myles is a LAMBDA Literary Award-winning American poet and writer who has produced more than twenty volumes of poetry, fiction, non-fiction, libretti, plays, and performance pieces over the last three decades.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 149 reviews
October 24, 2017
Afterglow (a dog memoir) written by celebrity poet Eileen Myles is a heartfelt loving tribute to Rosie, her Pitbull Terrier that lived for nearly 17 years. Whether readers are familiar with Myles writing style or poetry, Myles captures a sensitive unique flair and a meaningful creative writing combination she is recognized for.
Caring for an elderly incontinent dog—the endless cycle of washing and laundering is nearly impossible to keep up with. Myles resisted the notion to put Rosie down, though towards the end of Rosie’s life Myles is naturally suffering tremendously along with Rosie. Myles lovingly cares for Rosie, filming her in an endless loop, she reads her poetry: (from the book)… “”I read for Rosie that night. Read every poem she was in. Not that she needed it. She did not need poetry. She was it, mainstay of my liturgy for 16.5 almost 17 years.”
Myles wrote about her extremely busy professional career and life—the time spent traveling away from home, unhappy lovers/girlfriends over her inability to remain at home for longer times, and teaching at the University of San Diego (2002). The war in Iraq was taking place, (2005) and the Bush administration was addressing the issues with Abu Ghraib; and readers learned more about Myles upbringing in Ireland.
Rosie had her own distinctive voice in the book, referring to Myles as “Jethro”. A letter from Rosie’s attorney arrived, Rosie appeared in a puppet troupe from the after-life and other occasions throughout the book-- bringing solace and comfort to her master Jethro. It was difficult to ascertain if Rosie was there or if she wasn’t; according to Myles. There was so much silence. We can’t know if Rosie was reincarnated as Myles father--who in Ireland, was a mailman. This could be considered as magical thinking, as we feel sympathetic and the depth of sadness Myles experienced in the loss of her beloved pet. **With thanks to the Seattle Public Library.
Caring for an elderly incontinent dog—the endless cycle of washing and laundering is nearly impossible to keep up with. Myles resisted the notion to put Rosie down, though towards the end of Rosie’s life Myles is naturally suffering tremendously along with Rosie. Myles lovingly cares for Rosie, filming her in an endless loop, she reads her poetry: (from the book)… “”I read for Rosie that night. Read every poem she was in. Not that she needed it. She did not need poetry. She was it, mainstay of my liturgy for 16.5 almost 17 years.”
Myles wrote about her extremely busy professional career and life—the time spent traveling away from home, unhappy lovers/girlfriends over her inability to remain at home for longer times, and teaching at the University of San Diego (2002). The war in Iraq was taking place, (2005) and the Bush administration was addressing the issues with Abu Ghraib; and readers learned more about Myles upbringing in Ireland.
Rosie had her own distinctive voice in the book, referring to Myles as “Jethro”. A letter from Rosie’s attorney arrived, Rosie appeared in a puppet troupe from the after-life and other occasions throughout the book-- bringing solace and comfort to her master Jethro. It was difficult to ascertain if Rosie was there or if she wasn’t; according to Myles. There was so much silence. We can’t know if Rosie was reincarnated as Myles father--who in Ireland, was a mailman. This could be considered as magical thinking, as we feel sympathetic and the depth of sadness Myles experienced in the loss of her beloved pet. **With thanks to the Seattle Public Library.
August 30, 2017
I wish this had been published without the subtitle, or with a more cagey one (like “Notes towards a Dog Memoir” or “A Sort of Dog Memoir”). If what you want is a straightforward dog memoir, read Dog Years by Mark Doty and Ordinary Dogs by Eileen Battersby, both excellent examples of the genre. The time that Myles, known primarily as a poet and queer theorist, had with her pit bull Rosie between 1990 and 2006 is less the substance of this book than a jumping-off point for a jumbled set of reminiscences and imagined scenarios.
Myles sometimes writes as Rosie, and sometimes to Rosie; one particularly unusual chapter has Rosie being interviewed by a puppet. The author milks the god/dog connection for all it’s worth, and suggests (seriously, I think) that Rosie was the reincarnation of her father. The style is playful, sometimes a stream of consciousness with lots of run-on sentences and paragraphs that read like prose poems. As long as the dog was the main subject I was with Myles, but there was so much that seemed extraneous: a trip to Ireland, a lecture on foam (?) given at the San Diego Women’s Center, and extended thoughts about mailmen.
Perhaps if I’d read something else by Myles previously I would have had a better idea of what I was getting into. Enjoyable enough, but weird, and not what I was expecting from the marketing.
[An odd connection from my recent reading: In The Argonauts, Maggie Nelson writes, “My feeling is, you should be so lucky to get a pizza in the face from Eileen Myles”.]
Some favorite lines:
Myles sometimes writes as Rosie, and sometimes to Rosie; one particularly unusual chapter has Rosie being interviewed by a puppet. The author milks the god/dog connection for all it’s worth, and suggests (seriously, I think) that Rosie was the reincarnation of her father. The style is playful, sometimes a stream of consciousness with lots of run-on sentences and paragraphs that read like prose poems. As long as the dog was the main subject I was with Myles, but there was so much that seemed extraneous: a trip to Ireland, a lecture on foam (?) given at the San Diego Women’s Center, and extended thoughts about mailmen.
Perhaps if I’d read something else by Myles previously I would have had a better idea of what I was getting into. Enjoyable enough, but weird, and not what I was expecting from the marketing.
[An odd connection from my recent reading: In The Argonauts, Maggie Nelson writes, “My feeling is, you should be so lucky to get a pizza in the face from Eileen Myles”.]
Some favorite lines:
She was it. Mainstay of my liturgy for sixteen point five almost seventeen years. She was observed. I was companioned, seen.
To write a book is to dig a hole in eternity.
Gender is an untrustworthy system and at the deepest point its waters are pure myth.
I mean the point is to dissolve categories. Ideas hold things up. Eileen—just write.
The dog has been serving the writer for years, opening up her life and getting her out into the air and onto the beaches and even bringing attractive people into the unattractive life of the writer who often never goes out. And now once she/he, the writer succumbs the dog gives pictures to the writer which the writer transcribes and we are seeing it here.
April 10, 2017
I'm conflicted about this book. Parts of it just seem heartless... I've lost beloved pets through the years and my heart still aches when I really think about them. The grief just doesn't seem to be in this book for me. I don't mean to say the author didn't grieve her pet, I am sure she did (I cried for weeks after the loss of each of my pet children). I will finish the book, but just not right now.
December 1, 2017
4.5! Loved much of this, a lot. The essay on Foam as a concept/metaphor for thinking about knowledge/writing is my favorite, I think, but many of the doggo pieces are glorious and sui generis. Many adopt a style that is a kind of frothy walk / flaneur avec dog; and then there's Rosie (the dog) speaking from the dead, "ghostwriting". Myles is sometimes Jethro here, sometimes she, sometimes he, and Rosie, always, is god. Sometimes the pov rolls back and forth between Eileen and Rosie, and the effect is startling, frustrating, funny -- the playfulness and premise both remind me of Yoko Tawada's Memoirs of a Polar Bear (a novel). These essays (it's really more collection than memoir) move with twitchy buoyancy, spark with a smartalecky glint, all held by, holding this kind of awe at the magnitude of love for this dog, Rosie: "I felt less ambivalently loving than I have ever felt in my life."
August 24, 2017
I went into this with a very open mind. Having finished it, I'm left with very mixed feelings. The author certainly has a wonderful way with words and her affinity for poetry is obvious throughout. I just had some trouble at times keeping up with where she was going and who she was speaking as. Perhaps it's because I'm not familiar with her writing style, but I kept finding myself lost and having to backtrack a bit to figure out what she was talking about. I received an ARC from NetGalley, Grove Press, and the author, for my review.
November 25, 2017
It went on, and on, and on some more, and it still hadn't ended, and then there was another few chapters - 200 pages that seemed like 2000. The only analog that comes to mind is the film Melancholia.
January 22, 2018
You see, it was this. The prose - was unreadable. I could have done with a poem like. Like, this. But not a full novela. It is. Exhausting.
June 20, 2025
Made me seriously consider getting a dog so I can finally reach spiritual awakening
No for real, was a bit sceptical going into this, but once again, Eileen never lets down. Had so much fun reading this, what a beauty, so tender and loving and ugly and uncomfortable at times! :’) can’t help but love it
4,5 :))
No for real, was a bit sceptical going into this, but once again, Eileen never lets down. Had so much fun reading this, what a beauty, so tender and loving and ugly and uncomfortable at times! :’) can’t help but love it
4,5 :))
July 9, 2017
I'm only half way through this memoir, but...wow! Imagine a poet writing about a dog, a beloved dog that has to be put down. Imagine the dog's perspective in all this. Innovative structure, beautiful writing; all in all a stunning work of genius. What. a. fantastic. book.
Update, now that I've finished. There are riffs of gorgeous prose, a poet's ear for what is real/true. There are also places where Myles lost me completely. Her discussion of writing as foam, for instance. I was hanging in there for a bit and then it went all molecular on me and I couldn't figure out where she was going with it. The foam metaphor repeats itself.
I found, like much poetry, I could not read this book straight through; I needed time to rest in between dense passages of both grief and Myles' stream of consciousness about her life. Worth reading but...hard.
Update, now that I've finished. There are riffs of gorgeous prose, a poet's ear for what is real/true. There are also places where Myles lost me completely. Her discussion of writing as foam, for instance. I was hanging in there for a bit and then it went all molecular on me and I couldn't figure out where she was going with it. The foam metaphor repeats itself.
I found, like much poetry, I could not read this book straight through; I needed time to rest in between dense passages of both grief and Myles' stream of consciousness about her life. Worth reading but...hard.
July 11, 2017
what a book. magic. never read anything like it. some sections I need to go back and spend more time with, were harder to understand. the structure and theme of story as tapestry really worked for me. well worth a second read.
November 26, 2019
As bizarre, crass, and hilarious as any other Eileen Myles book. I laughed a lot, I mostly had no idea what was going on, but I liked it. I will never get tired of the creative ways this woman talks about genitals.
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November 7, 2017This book is for an audience that doesn’t include me. My bad. I thought it was a dog memoir and it’s really prose/poem/rumination.
December 3, 2020
Fucking wild. Dog is god is dad.
May 3, 2023
like passing through a portal that’s really just actually opening your eyes.
January 27, 2018
Although it gets a bit long in the tooth, I loved this. As a life-long dog person, about to get his own dog for the first time, it also hit me right in the sweetest of spots. Rosie seems like she was a good dog, perhaps one of the best, to inspire a work so multifaceted and silly and loving and heartfelt and weighty as this. And that Eileen Myles, she's not half-bad either.
August 3, 2024
Ate up the first half of this book but the second half left something to be desired.
February 1, 2018
Eileen Myles deserves her reputation as a startling frank and forthright poet, but I found her effort here to be too haphazard to rate more than two stars. While some parts of the book offer honest and heartfelt insight into the human and animal bond, one has to wade through far too much pretentious stream of consciousness crap to fully relax into the author's voice with any regularity.
Myles is most effective when she is writing directly about her beloved pit bull, Rosie, or when she is channeling her pup's voice from the after life. In those moments her writing voice rings true and clear, her insights appear effortlessly, and her honesty is so rewarding. At other moments, for example when Myles has her childhood sock puppet interview Rosie about her abuse by the author, I could respect that Myles was experimenting with narrative in a creative way, even if I did not get much from it. I also flipped my way through a number of wasted pages of conversation that were too confusing to pay much attention to. Who is speaking? What are they talking about? As a reader I felt excluded from whatever experience Myles was trying to offer here & fI wound up feeling quite annoyed by the coyness of it all.
I really reached my limit though with the core of the book, which was consumed by a rambling, over intellectualized spasm of free association that spoke about foam but came across like being hit on the head with a verbal bat. I admit to a certain petty annoyance with writers that I feel stray too far into forms of mental masturbation that seems to wish to punish the reader for not understanding the greatness of the author when the author is obviously making every effort to be unattainable--think Borges, Pound, Nietzsche, et al--but I don't know that Myles was really trying to be obtuse here. I suppose I could see this sagging middle passage as another experiment but there was a rigidness and a righteousness to it that I just resisted and thoroughly disliked.
I can imagine recommending this book to people who already appreciate Ms. Myles style, or to those who are willing to ride along with a writer as they explore different voices & different approaches. If you are coming to this book for a more straight forward and well told story about a girl and her dog though you might very well find yourself disappointed.
Myles is most effective when she is writing directly about her beloved pit bull, Rosie, or when she is channeling her pup's voice from the after life. In those moments her writing voice rings true and clear, her insights appear effortlessly, and her honesty is so rewarding. At other moments, for example when Myles has her childhood sock puppet interview Rosie about her abuse by the author, I could respect that Myles was experimenting with narrative in a creative way, even if I did not get much from it. I also flipped my way through a number of wasted pages of conversation that were too confusing to pay much attention to. Who is speaking? What are they talking about? As a reader I felt excluded from whatever experience Myles was trying to offer here & fI wound up feeling quite annoyed by the coyness of it all.
I really reached my limit though with the core of the book, which was consumed by a rambling, over intellectualized spasm of free association that spoke about foam but came across like being hit on the head with a verbal bat. I admit to a certain petty annoyance with writers that I feel stray too far into forms of mental masturbation that seems to wish to punish the reader for not understanding the greatness of the author when the author is obviously making every effort to be unattainable--think Borges, Pound, Nietzsche, et al--but I don't know that Myles was really trying to be obtuse here. I suppose I could see this sagging middle passage as another experiment but there was a rigidness and a righteousness to it that I just resisted and thoroughly disliked.
I can imagine recommending this book to people who already appreciate Ms. Myles style, or to those who are willing to ride along with a writer as they explore different voices & different approaches. If you are coming to this book for a more straight forward and well told story about a girl and her dog though you might very well find yourself disappointed.
July 22, 2017
I think a lot of the time poets' prose efforts can be so packed that they're by nature uneven—I guess you can say the same for poetry as well. That's definitely the case with this book, and honestly I get the feeling that Myles would be just fine with the idea of taking what you want and leaving the rest. Some of it is just gorgeous, lyrical, madly associative and evocative. And some of it is just too dense or esoteric for the likes of me, and I was perfectly happy to read along and let some of it settle to the bottom in order for the stuff that resonated for me to rise.
Although she definitely stretches the definition of "a dog memoir," there is some marvelous writing on dogs, and about dog ownership in particular—both the intense scrutiny that's borne out of love and also the dilemma of all that tenderness and adoration weighed against the wrongness of leading another living being around by the neck. I love Myles's directness, often bordering on crudeness, and the love that shines through it all for her Rosie—"the physiognomy of dearness unsurpassed." This one takes a little suspension of the need to get every sentence, but the rewards are great.
Although she definitely stretches the definition of "a dog memoir," there is some marvelous writing on dogs, and about dog ownership in particular—both the intense scrutiny that's borne out of love and also the dilemma of all that tenderness and adoration weighed against the wrongness of leading another living being around by the neck. I love Myles's directness, often bordering on crudeness, and the love that shines through it all for her Rosie—"the physiognomy of dearness unsurpassed." This one takes a little suspension of the need to get every sentence, but the rewards are great.
May 3, 2024
I didn't get much into this book and that is totally my fault for making my first Eileen Myles's book be their dog's memoir.
I wasn't really into the magical realism of hearing the dog's perspective and I had no previous knowledge of Eileen Myles to anchor myself. I was really interested in their perspective on gender, alcoholism, religion etc. Those parts were so good but too short and again I was missing context.
I need to try another book because Eileen Myself is so engaging and just the fact that they are 74 years old and non binary is so special. It really strikes me as the kind of author to become really popular once they pass and it already gets me angry to think about it.
I wasn't really into the magical realism of hearing the dog's perspective and I had no previous knowledge of Eileen Myles to anchor myself. I was really interested in their perspective on gender, alcoholism, religion etc. Those parts were so good but too short and again I was missing context.
I need to try another book because Eileen Myself is so engaging and just the fact that they are 74 years old and non binary is so special. It really strikes me as the kind of author to become really popular once they pass and it already gets me angry to think about it.
August 26, 2023
Did anyone expect anything else. I loved this book (mostly) - phenomenal beginning, lost me a bit in the middle, but then found me again with a weird & beautiful end. I just love the way Eileen Myles writes so much, I love the voice, I love their honesty, I love the way they used writing about Rosie as a vehicle for writing about everything. Especially enjoyed those last sections that were like fluidly moving between Rosie/Eileen, very cool
& makes me want to write a cat memoir about Jerry
& makes me want to write a cat memoir about Jerry
June 14, 2018
Some of this I found quite touching, but parts of it were too scattered and out there for me. No criticism meant at all, just not my thing. I loved hearing about Rosie, though.
July 2, 2025
could’ve made a handful of very moving poems i think but as a book it really doesn’t work at all. sorry eileen i usually rly like your work
October 13, 2021
A gorgeous, inventive, poetic fever dream of a dog memoir. I truly needed it.
September 3, 2024
love u eileen but u kinda lost me with this one.....it has its moments for sure but the second half was a SLOG omg
August 15, 2025
totally batshit. the dog has sex with jeff buckley. five stars
September 12, 2017
another great one
October 13, 2017
Eileen Myles writes about her dog? Obviously I had to read this one right away. This is a book of dogs and grief. It is a book of loss, and kinship and what happens if dogs wrote us poetry and letters. There were stories that made me (as an admittedly neurotic dog person ) uncomfortable, and stories about the end, about aging, failing bodies, and passing, that made my heart clench (while I anxiously pet my ancient canine sidekick).
"Each writer is required to tell a dog's story and so dogs attach themselves to writers...." - Eileen Myles 'Afterglow (a dog memoir)'
"Each writer is required to tell a dog's story and so dogs attach themselves to writers...." - Eileen Myles 'Afterglow (a dog memoir)'
May 3, 2022
I initially thought this might be cheesy bc ~~dog book~~ but it’s sm more than that and I loved it.
“Okay you can open your eyes. The pitbull is watching the skyline. She’s whispering inside my head. She’s singing to me. ‘One tree, that’s all you need.’ Shaped like broccoli or cauliflower some rainy day. I’m glad I woke. Maybe I’ll make some coffee. She keeps whispering. ‘One tree.’ That’s all you need. Start a whole civilization that way. ‘One little piece grows it all.’ Feel the bump. And her paw holds my finger to the weave. I don’t want to wake up. That’s it, she says. Every part grows from every other part. Feel it. Every tiny leaf on the tree is singing. Can you hear it. Yes. Alright now.”
“The rain comes down and you go outside because you feel it.This is what it is to be a dog. Weather and feeling and knowing. That’s why you let us remain.”
“Okay you can open your eyes. The pitbull is watching the skyline. She’s whispering inside my head. She’s singing to me. ‘One tree, that’s all you need.’ Shaped like broccoli or cauliflower some rainy day. I’m glad I woke. Maybe I’ll make some coffee. She keeps whispering. ‘One tree.’ That’s all you need. Start a whole civilization that way. ‘One little piece grows it all.’ Feel the bump. And her paw holds my finger to the weave. I don’t want to wake up. That’s it, she says. Every part grows from every other part. Feel it. Every tiny leaf on the tree is singing. Can you hear it. Yes. Alright now.”
“The rain comes down and you go outside because you feel it.This is what it is to be a dog. Weather and feeling and knowing. That’s why you let us remain.”
September 4, 2017
I knew I shouldn't have attempted this book. I had to stop once he described Rosie being put to sleep. Nothing good could come from reading a sad story of a dog's death, even if in her life time she'd known happiness.
This is a difficult book. Not just because of the subject matter, but because it's written as one stream of consciousness that wildly jumps around & goes off topic.
A copy of this book was provided to me for free by NetGalley
This is a difficult book. Not just because of the subject matter, but because it's written as one stream of consciousness that wildly jumps around & goes off topic.
A copy of this book was provided to me for free by NetGalley
Displaying 1 - 30 of 149 reviews