T'shuvah (תשובה) means repentance in Hebrew. Etymologically, it comes from the root meaning "to return." One way to understand the logic of that etymology is this: if sin alienates you from both God and yourself, then atoning for sin means returning to yourself as a starting point for deepening your commitment to the life God wants you to lead. The poems in T'shuvah apply this framing to the question of what it means to "return" from the alienation that is inherent in surviving sexual violence, with the caveat, of course, that a survivor of sexual violence has committed no sin and that neither the moralizing nature nor the implicit politics of the phrase "the life God wants you to lead" need by definition to be part of anyone's healing. T’shuvah completes the exploration that runs through The Silence Of Men and Words For What Those Men Have Done, turning the three books into a trilogy.
I encourage you to buy T'shuvah directly from the publisher, Fernwood Press, because it's important to support small presses. If you would like a signed copy, contact me directly.
Praise for T’shuvah
"With survival comes shame but also the possibility of connection and beauty. While Newman explores in this book the underpinnings of t’shuvah, the Jewish tradition of acceptance, reconciliation, and forgiveness, the impulse transcends a specific spiritual experience and speaks to us all. Follow him on his path, and it will become yours."
Andrea Carter Brown, author of September 12
"What does the interior journey of a man who survives sexual violence feel like? Open Richard Jeffrey Newman's book, let him gently take your hand, enter a world of image, of sound, of pain and redemption, of wonder. When he lets go of your hand, he will leave you with salve for your wounded heart, like this: 'What draws you forward/through the faith you’ve lost will not desert you.'"
David Lisak, Ph.D., Vice Chair, 1in6 Board of Directors, Leader of The Bristlecone Project
"T’shuvah searches, with relentless beauty, for the truth of what we feel most deeply, pulsing with an awareness of loss as tangible as its celebration of faith, and of love — reminding us that “deceit begins when touch fails.” Sensual, visceral, yet warmly conversational, these poems reunite us with our own yearnings, paying tender tribute to all that can be touched, and lived, and remembered."
Nandana Dev Sen, translator of Acrobat: Poems by Nabaneeta Dev Sen
Richard Jeffrey Newman’s T’shuvah, once again, provides us with haunting images of our multi-faceted, complex world. Vacillating between a close first-person point of view, an expansive omniscient perspective, and every take of the world in between, Newman steers the reader on the interior journeys of speakers with incessant questions for our consideration. This is extraordinary work that propels us to think of the world in alternate takes, in meaningful possibility, and ultimately, in the context of redemption. A brilliant addition to the canon.
Jacqueline Jones LaMon, author of What Water Knows
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