Book Review: The Thorn Key

 For as long as I can remember I have loved poetry. From Mother Goose and schoolyard rhymes to Emily Dickenson and Dylan Thomas, there is just something about the flow and rhythm of poetry that speaks to me. It allows more expression that prose. It speaks in imagery and emotion. And given my similar love of folklore and fairy tales when I saw that Jeana Jorgensen had written a book of poetry inspired by fairy tales, how could I resist?

The Thorn Key by Jeana Jorgensen is a captivating collection of poems that speak as much to our thoroughly modern world as to the distant imagined world of fairy tales. The words weave together monsters and maidens with cars and college loans - and it works, brilliantly, somehow making the fairy tale more relatable and the modern world more magical. It is a book that speaks in metaphor and allegory and blunt directness, keeping the reader captivated and just slightly off balance.

The book's 40 poems are divided into 4 sections by broad themes: Door of Red and White Roses, Door of Swan and Raven Feathers, Door of Gold and Silver Crowns, and Door of Bone and Ice Needles. I also appreciated that the author included an appendix of tale types; a tale type is something used in fairy tale studies to group together stories with similar themes and plots under different names. In this case Jorgensen listed the tale types she used by number and name and with each one listed the poems that fit into it. I liked this because it allowed for some cross referencing to tales I wasn't as familiar with and also helped show the pattern of poems that were connected by theme. I also really liked the afterword, where the author provided context for the poems, some great detail on the way that fairy tale studies intersect modern interpretations of stories, and her own motivation for writing these poems. 

My favourite poem was The Ogre's Heart, which resonated strongly to me of some of my own experiences, putting into beautiful words the cost of strength. I also particularly liked You Can't Just Leave Your Car Keys These Days which made me laugh aloud. But I can't think of any poem I skipped or shrugged away - they are all evocative, they each speak to a little piece of modern experience dressed in silk and sealskin or blood and iron. And perhaps they convey more truth written the way they are than they would in prose, bridging the fantastic and the mundane. 

If you like fairy tales or poetry, or both, or if you are just in the mood for some catharsis then I definitely recommend this book.