Diana Arterian: Agrippina the Younger

Poet Diana Arterian shares her latest collection, a poetic journey through the past of the Roman Empress Agrippina looks toward the future.

ABOUT THE BOOK

A poetic journey through the past of the Roman Empress Agrippina looks toward the future

Agrippina the Younger follows one woman's study of another, separated by thousands of miles and two millennia but bound by a shared sense of powerlessness. Agrippina was a daughter in a golden political family, destined for greatness--but she hungered for more power than women were allowed. Exhausted by the misogyny of the present, Diana Arterian reaches into the past to try to understand the patriarchal systems of today. In lyric verse and prose poems, she traces Agrippina's rise, interrogating a life studded with intrigue, sex, M**der, and manipulation. Arterian eagerly pursues Agrippina through texts, ruins, and films, exhuming the hidden details of the ancient noblewoman's life. These poems consider the valences of patriarchy, power, and the archive to try to answer the question: How do we recover a woman erased by history?

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Diana Arterian is the author of the forthcoming poetry collection (Northwestern University Press/Curbstone, 2025). Her first book, Playing Monster :: Seiche, received a starred review in Publishers Weekly and was a Poetry Foundation Staff Pick. Also forthcoming is , her co-translation of Nadia Anjuman's poetry done with Marina Omar (World Poetry Books, 2025). A Poetry Editor at Noemi Press and twice-finalist for the National Poetry Series, Diana's creative work has been recognized with fellowships from the Banff Centre, Caldera, Millay Arts, Vermont Studio Center, and Yaddo. Her poetry, nonfiction, criticism, co-translations, and conversations have been featured in BOMB, Brooklyn Rail, Harvard Review, Los Angeles Review of Books, NPR, The New York Times Book Review, and The Poetry Foundation website, among others. She writes "The Annotated Nightstand" column at Lit Hub and lives in Los Angeles.
Raquel Gutiérrez is a bilingual writer, poet, critic, performer, and the author of Brown Neon (Coffee House Press), a 2023 recipient of the Publishing Triangle Judy Grahn Award for Lesbian Nonfiction. Gutiérrez has been a part of several creative ecosystems and artistic communities for the last three decades. Their work has been recently supported by the United States Artist Fellowship and the Foundation for Contemporary Arts. Their first poetry collection, “Southwest Reconstruction,” is out late Fall 2025 on Noemi Press. Gutiérrez has lived on unceded lands of the Tohono O’odham and Pascua Yaqui people since 2016.
Susan Briante is the author of (Noemi Press 2020), essays on immigration, archives, aesthetics and the state, winner of the Poetry Foundation’s Pegasus Award for Poetry Criticism in 2021. In addition, she has written three books of poetry, most recently. Her work can be found in The Virginia Quarterly Review, The Best American Poetry (2020) and The Brooklyn Rail (among many other venues). She is a professor of creative writing at the University of Arizona, where she directs the Southwest Field Studies in Writing Program, which brings students to the US-Mexico border to collaborate with community-based environmental and social justice groups. Her book 13 Questions for the Next Economy: New and Selected Poems is forthcoming from Noemi Press in 2025.
Sarah Vap grew up in Missoula, Montana and attended Brown University, where she studied English and American Literature, before receiving her MFA from Arizona State University and PhD from the University of Southern California. Vap is the author of six collections of poetry, the most recent of which is (Noemi Press). , published by Penguin in 2016, was selected by Mary Jo Bang for the National Poetry Series. Vap is also the author of (Saturalia, 2006), (University of Iowa, 2007), (Saturnalia, 2010), and (Saturnalia, 2012), which was named a Library Journal Best Book of 2012. Vap's 2013 title initiated Noemi Press' Infidel Poetics Series of prose by poets. She is a recipient of an NEA Literature Fellowship for Poetry, and lives and teaches in the Phoenix metro area.

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