At age forty, with two growing children and a new consulting company she’d recently founded, Gretchen Cherington, daughter of Pulitzer Prize–winning poet Richard Eberhart, faced a dilemma: Should she protect her parents’ well-crafted family myths while continuing to silence her own voice? Or was it time to challenge those myths and speak her truth—even the unbearable truth that her generous and … and kind father had sexually violated her?
In this powerful memoir, aided by her father’s extensive archives at Dartmouth College and interviews with some of her father’s best friends, Cherington candidly and courageously retraces her past to make sense of her father and herself. From the women’s movement of the ’60s and the back-to-the-land movement of the ’70s to Cherington’s consulting work through three decades with powerful executives to her eventual decision to speak publicly in the formative months of #MeToo, Poetic License is one woman’s story of speaking truth in a world where, too often, men still call the shots.
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Gretchen Cherington’s memoir held me spellbound from start to finish. What endeared me most to her book, Poetic License, was her honest and frank discussion of what could have remained a deeply buried secret—sexual molestation by her Pulitzer prize winning father, Richard Eberhart. Rather than hiding in the shadows, Ms. Cherington chose the courageous path of writing her story, and she did so beautifully. “Silence is isolation,” she wrote, “as bad as the abuse itself.”
A road map for survivors of the “Me Too” movement, Ms. Cherinton describes her journey to find her own voice and speak truth to power. Her courage and determination are a testament to her strength and signal hope to survivors that healing and forgiveness are possible in overcoming wounds from sexual abuse.
Ms. Cherington’s writing is exquisite, rich in sumptuous details, and deeply engaging. A master of scene development, she intimately portrays her world of innermost thoughts and feelings. Her descriptions of childhood are riveting. I really enjoyed this book and didn’t want it to end. I highly recommend and congratulate Ms. Cherington on the success of her debut memoir.
Poetic License–Gretchen Cherington
This memoir required courage and determination to face both father-worship and father-fear. Cherington’s unflinching account of a beloved father’s betrayal in the most personal and traumatic way reveals a trusting seventeen-year-old on the cusp of womanhood whose world is brought to a devastating crash one night. The writing is exquisite and deeply moving in understanding a father she adored but didn’t really know, whose narcissism was twisted together with his brilliance as an eminent academic. Retelling moments of upheaval and how her harrowing youth changed the author, Cherington reveals her vulnerability and vows to shift the trajectory of her life. “Poetic License” is also an account of how the author molds her future and that of her children, transcending an earlier life of pain and dark family secrets.
A powerful memoir to read.
Memoir writers dig deep to uncover their truths. Gretchen Cherington had the added burden of unveiling ugly truths about a beloved literary figure whose behavior was tolerated by many who hadn’t a depth of understanding about the extent of his abuse toward his daughter. Brilliant lights are often forgiven their flaws….
The author structures the book as a coming-of-age story which leads the reader through the various stages of understanding she naturally walks through in unveiling the unique characteristics of her family, her father’s idiosyncratic ways, and finally, her father’s abuse.
Courageous and heartfelt.
What an exquisitely written tour de force. Talk about I-couldn’t-put-it-down! Easy for me to say, having not had to live with what you’ve had to. But those gut-punch pages of betrayal were terribly hard to read even so. If you’ve felt the shadow of a worshipful fan trotting beside you, tis I, tis I. And I’ll bet the readers of your exceptional book feel the same. We want you to know we are buoyed by the power of your voice, your truth, your artistry.
I may be a rare reader for not knowing the work of Richard Eberhart. I read this because I was interested in the experience of the author, and not because of a curiosity about her father. It was a powerful experience to learn about him through her eyes, and it was intriguing to learn about the personal lives of some of the poets I did know (Ginsburg, Lowell) and to get a glimpse into a life of privilege that is far from my own experience, but the real power in this story is in witnessing the transformation of the author as she heals from neglect, role-reversals, and abuse. Despite her unique circumstances, her journey is one that too many of us must take, and I think this book will serve as good company to anyone who is feeling alone in their own struggle to heal and thrive.
Such a beautifully written and courageous book.
A Gripping Tale of a Strong Woman
I read Poetic License in just two sittings. Gretchen Cherington’s descriptive writing reels you in and keeps you involved in her story from start to finish. The author weaves her personal journey into the life history of a famous poet, her father Richard Eberhart. As such a strong force, Eberhart dominates the narrative but it’s Cherington who you root for the whole way. Many women can relate to her battle to come into her own skin in the presence of a domineering, egotistical man immersed in a male-centered world. I cheered her ability to make sense of it all and find her voice
-Poetic Justice-
I adored reading Poetic License for the author’s roll up her sleeves and go after it approach to the fraught subject of parental abuse. Whenever I finish reading a memoir, I like to feel that I’ve gotten to know the author. I want to be able to answer the questions: Who are they? and How did they get that way?
Gretchen Cherington delivers her personal history and memories with the modesty of a country farmer, a persona she enjoyed as a young woman. As she describes her enviable childhood, filled with play, privilege, and her famous father’s prestige, it’s as though she’s tilling the soil from which readers can watch her grow. All seems well, a life filled with love and laughter, but as she’s maturing, there are concerns. Like pestilence and disease threatening to ruin a crop, there are harmful pressures looming: a menacing neighbor that’s allowed to carry on unchecked, her mother’s worsening epilepsy, and a number of leering overtures and unwanted, slobbery kisses from her father. Furthermore, her childhood home seems to have been animated by a nearly constant parade of overshadowing literati. The inclination to eat, drink, and be merry was pervasive. When it came to unpleasantness however, the family practice was to endure with stolid silence. Added to the planting mix of Cherington’s adolescence were her mother’s banal words of instruction—to be happy, helpful, and brave.
Poetic license as a concept involves taking liberties, departing from norms and conventions, and subverting expectations for an intended lyrical effect. As a literary device, it would have been Cherington’s U.S. Poet Laureate/Pulitzer-Prize winning father’s stock and trade, but when that boundary busting habit of mind is used to violate the sovereignty of his daughter’s 17-year-old body, all poetry is wrecked. From that moment forward, for his daughter at least, the much-lauded linguistic communicator is reduced to little more than a narcissistic male leading with his libido. His indefensible actions, like a flood, locust infestation, or barn fire, are understandably devastating to young Gretchen.
Following her father’s odious sexual transgressions, the memoir continues with 150 pages of her regrowth, and self-determination is her tap root. Not to belabor this farming metaphor any further, what I appreciated most about Poetic License was that the assault took place in the middle of the story; not at the beginning, and not at the end. The author gives ample time to describing her path to recovery, a journey that necessarily includes breaking silence. I found her account to be sincere, heroic, and engaging. That the author finds healing through the written word is pure poetic justice.
I put down this memoir satisfied that I had been told what happened and how it affected the author.
It sounds so glamorous to have a famous Pulitzer prize winning poet for a father, a vivacious mother who hosts incredible parties, literary legends for guests (Anne Sexton, Allen Ginsburg) Summer spent in a cottage by the sea in Main. Cartwheels across the green lawn. This glamour comes with a heavy price. The poet father is self-absorbed and ultimately abusive. Gretchen Cherington struggles to make her own life and raise her own voice. This is a story of betrayal and hard won forgiveness.
If you’ve ever wondered what it might be like to grow up in the shadow of a famous American poet, read Gretchen Cherington’s memoir, Poetic License. Her father, Pulitzer Prize-winning, Poet Laureate Richard Eberhart was charming and charismatic, and their home frequently the center of gatherings with such greats as Allen Ginsburg, Anne Sexton, and even Robert Frost. But despite her privileged life, the author weaves a powerful story of what truly happened in his shadow, revealing the heartbreak of betrayal and assault that silenced her for far too long. Her memoir is her declaration that she is no longer willing to be silent. Beautifully written, with lines such as, “I’ve long loved the smell of pitch hardening on the trunk of an evergreen, pausing its growth as it gathers itself for winter,” Poetic License is a fascinating read. Her father, who believed in conveying truth, would be proud.
Gretchen, as a little child, watches her father struggle with his career. As his career developed and he began winning awards and selling more books, he became more absent. More trips, lectures and less time at home as she was growing up, made a profound impact on her life. Then…several events compounded her relationship with her father.
I enjoy memoirs and this one is a favorite. I will be honest. I had never heard of Richard Eberhart (GASP!). Well, I might have studied him in college…but I swear I don’t remember. So, this story had me researching and studying his poems. I love learning new things and this one had me on the hunt, even if Eberhart is an unlikable human being. You must read this story to find out why!
Need a unique memoir…this one is it! It is powerful and very well written. It will have you struggling to
Grab it today!
I received a copy from the publisher for a honest review.
I loved this memoir! Cherington’s evocative writing pulled me in, so that I felt I was walking through her life with her as she reconciles the public image of her powerful father with her private reality. Her wry humor and insightful perspectives make the worlds she inhabited over her life—social, psychological, and contextual worlds– both real and relatable.
As she unpacks powerful family myths, discovering secret after secret to integrate into her evolving understanding of her life experience, her beautifully-written book reads like a mystery as well as compelling memoir. At times vulnerable and raw, at times reflective, Cherington shares her uplifting journey of reclaiming her life and her voice.
Cherington’s story is at once unique and universal: unique because it is her own, universal in its themes of complicated family dynamics, power and gender, loss of innocence, coming of age and crafting a fledgling identity, confronting and eventually triumphing over traumas and their toll, finding one’s own voice, and growing into one’s full and true self
Poetic License is a beautifully written, clear-eyed memoir describing the author’s journey from growing up as the daughter of a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet to becoming a successful consultant to business executives all over the world. Through archival research and interviews, Cherington carefully puts together a portrait of her family and especially her father—a talented but complex man. More importantly, she faced his abusive behavior with courage, moving toward understanding and forgiveness. In the process, she finds own voice and strength. The reader will be inspired by her story—and unable to put this book down.
Poetic License is lush and evocative, both in setting the scene and in reporting personal but also cultural experiences of family, relationship, and womanhood. A vulnerable, powerful read.