Tamás, Rebecca (2019) The Songs of Hecate: Poetry and the Language of the Occult. The White Review (24). pp. 11-25.

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Abstract

In recent years, in the UK, and across Europe and the US, there has been a growing fascination with the occult, and especially with the figure of the witch, in all her variety, difference and infinite capacity. Much has already been written about contemporary Western culture’s renewed interest in witchcraft and the occult, from the appearance of ‘insta-witches’ to the rise of neo-pagan practice. But what I do in this essay is think about this ‘occult moment’ in relation to poetry. I explore this because these occult elements, to me, seem to offer something that speaks particularly to the nature of and difficulties of poetry itself – to what it might be possible to make language do, to what might be made possible through language. My particular occult interest is the witch – the witch as an explosively radical female figure, a site of resistance, a way out of silence and silencing. What she has made possible for me is a new relationship with poetic speaking, with the power of the word, and with what that power might make possible for liberatory, feminist thinking.

Item Type:	Article
Status:	Published
Subjects:	P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) > PN1010 Poetry
School/Department:	School of Humanities
URI:	https://ray.yorksj.ac.uk/id/eprint/4198

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