The Dark-Robed Mother
A Memoir
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Estimated delivery time: In stock at the publisher, but not at Prospero's office. Delivery time approx. 3-5 weeks.
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Product details:
- Publisher Wesleyan University Press
- Date of Publication 10 February 2026
- ISBN 9780819502148
- Binding Paperback
- No. of pages192 pages
- Size 203x152 mm
- Weight 295 g
- Language English 695
Categories
Long description:
A lyric memoir about motherhood, depression, and writing
The Dark-Robed Mother is a striking blend of memoir and poetry, grappling with a cyclical "high-functioning" depression and its profound impact on self and family. It is also a modern descent into the underworld, reckoning with the myth of Demeter and Persephone as it unfolds through lived experience. Poet Rachel Tzvia Back draws on this ancient story of loss, return, and the aching bond between generations to illuminate her journey through decades of living, writing, and mothering with depression. She also explores family history and interviews each of her own children as she seeks to understand depression's mark from generation to generation. Threading myth through memoir, poetry through prose, Back confronts the question: how do we survive seasons of despair? And can we break the cycles that bind us to sorrow? Singular memories stand out as navigational "cairns," and the book calls on the poetry of other writers, summoning language to help retrieve oneself from the depths. The Dark-Robed Mother is a rare work of intellect and tenderness—a searching, intimate account of the importance of stories, language, and imagination.
"Perhaps, after writing The Dark-Robed Mother, Ms. Back has found solace in the assurance that by shedding light on her own depression, she has lifted a darkness for some of her readers, giving powerful articulation to an experience that is frightful and unfathomable—unless one is intimately familiar with it."—Ilana Kurshan, The Wall Street Journal
"Weaving poetry and mythology into her narrative, she writes powerfully of the darkness of depression, although she stipulates that she is high functioning and 'passes as normal.'"—Sandee Brawarsky, Hadassah Magazine
"In The Dark-Robed Mother, Back courageously gives voice to her own and others' cries. We hear them. While shedding light on a dark, isolating illness, Back has written a memoir of great beauty and hope."—Diane Gottlieb, Jewish Book Council
Table of Contents:
Preface
1: First Descent
2: Origin Stories
3: Living With
4: Grief
5: The Children Of
6: Necessary Poems
7: From Across the Decades
Coda
Author's Note
Notes
Acknowledgements
