The Niobe Poems

1989, Pitt Poetry Series

The second book from the author of The White Wave, winner of the 1983 Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize. Daniels taps the lasting power of the Niobe myth in poems about personal loss and political insanity. 

LSU Press

“Kate Daniels, in her second collection, The Niobe Poems, finds directive in what Adrienne Rich asked for in her poem, “Diving into the Wreck” – “the thing itself and not the myth.” The myth Daniels scrutinizes is that of motherhood, as represented by Niobe, the mortal mother of seven daughters and seven sons. Discovering that Apollo and Artemis had slain all fourteen children, Niobe turns to stone with sorrow. Daniels presents various versions of the myth, then retells it in contemporary contexts and idiom.” 

Julie Fay, Kenyon Review