Dream of Europe: selected seminars and interviews: 1984-1992

by Audre Lorde, Mayra Rodriguez Castro (Editor)

Poetry. Literary Nonfiction. African & African American Studies. Women's Studies. LGBTQIA Studies. Edited by Mayra RodrÍguez Castro. Preface by Dagmar Schultz. AUDRE DREAM OF EUROPE elucidates Lorde's methodology as a poet, mentor, and activist during the last decade of her life. This volume compiles a series of seminars, interviews, and conversations held by the author and collaborators across Berlin, Western Europe, and The Caribbean between 1984-1992. While Lorde stood at the intersection of various historical and literary movements in The United States--the uprising of black social life after the Harlem Renaissance, poetry of the AIDS epidemic, and the unfolding of the Civil Rights Movement--this selection of texts reveals Lorde as a catalyst for the first movement of Black Germans in West Berlin. The legacy of this "Black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet" has been well preserved by her colleagues in Germany. These selected writings lay bare struggles, bonds, and hopes shared among Black women in a transnational political context, as well as offering sometimes surprising reflections on the US American counter culture with which Lorde is associated. Many of the poems that were important to Lorde's development are excerpted in full within these pages, serving as a sort of critical anthology.

Genres: Nonfiction

304 pages, Paperback

Published April 20, 2020

About the author

Audre Lorde was a revolutionary Black feminist. Lorde's poetry was published very regularly during the 1960s — in Langston Hughes' 1962 New Negro Poets, USA; in several foreign anthologies; and in black literary magazines. During this time, she was politically active in civil rights, anti-war, and feminist movements. Her first volume of poetry, The First Cities (1968), was published by the Poet's Press and edited by Diane di Prima, a former classmate and friend from Hunter College High School. Dudley Randall, a poet and critic, asserted in his review of the book that Lorde "does not wave a black flag, but her blackness is there, implicit, in the bone."

Her second volume, Cables to Rage (1970), which was mainly written during her tenure at Tougaloo College in Mississippi, addressed themes of love, betrayal, childbirth and the complexities of raising children. It is particularly noteworthy for the poem "Martha", in which Lorde poetically confirms her homosexuality: "[W]e shall love each other here if ever at all." Later books continued her political aims in lesbian and gay rights, and feminism. In 1980, together with Barbara Smith and Cherríe Moraga, she co-founded Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, the first U.S. publisher for women of colour. Lorde was State Poet of New York from 1991 to 1992.

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Reviews

[Annie Cheng · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can’t imagine how it would feel to be in a room with her—even so many degrees removed, she is an electrifying lecturer… engrossing, implicating, unusual. I feel like this was the ideal way to be exposed to tons of new poems too, with Lorde’s guidance and her constant insistence toward discomfort. I want to return to these very badly

[Caleb · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is amazing in many many ways, an essential source of Lorde's insights from her work in the mid-1980s. Great thanks go to the editor for all the labor and love that went into making it exist. BUT! Readers need to know that it is not a reliable scholarly source, because Lorde's words have been significantly edited from the recordings at the archive in Germany. In some places, her meaning has been changed significantly. For example, her statement "I hate being bored" in one of her seminars is rendered here, "I hate being at war"... a puzzling comment from a woman who embraced conflict and embattlement across her life.

Kenning Editions has gone out of business, so the book is out of print indefinitely. Hopefully it will be revised for accuracy and brought back into print soon!

[Sophia Le Fraga · Rating 5 out of 5]

outstanding collection from Kenning Editions, and kind of interesting to experience in conjunction with my latest self-help pop psych book The Dance of Anger. i loved reading Audre Lorde’s talks, poems, documents, and lectures spanning so many years in germany and took away a lot on self-conscious living, a woman’s survival, embracing difference, and a Black Lesbian genius’s response to the western european landscape of the 80s and 90s

[Van · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of interviews and seminars is a must-read for anyone who reads and writes. It's an invaluable lesson on poetry and ways to engage with art, and there are so many valuable lessons to take away. I come back to this book often, especially in moments stagnation, disconnect and despair. Audre Lorde's teachings help me return to the mind and heart space necessary to continue writing with grace, purpose and discipline.

Forever thankful to have come across these words:

"Poetry, like all art, has function: to bring us closer to who we wish to be, to help us envision a future which has not yet been, and to help us survive the lack of that future." (268)

[Ben Romero]

OK!!! ♡(ﾐ ᵕ̣̣̣̣̣̣ ﻌ ᵕ̣̣̣̣̣̣ ﾐ)ﾉ puuurrrrrrr mama...