Rachel Pollack

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Rachel Pollack
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New York City, U.S.
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Rhinebeck, New York, U.S.
Alma materNew York University
Claremont Graduate University
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Notable workUnquenchable Fire
Doom Patrol (issues 64–87)
StyleMagical realism
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Zoe Matoff
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(m. 2022)​
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Rachel Grace Pollack (August 17, 1945 – April 7, 2023) was an American science fiction author, comic book writer, and expert on divinatory tarot.

Early life and education

Pollack was born on August 17, 1945, in Brooklyn, New York to a Jewish family.[2] She earned an honours degree in English from New York University and a master's in English from Claremont Graduate University.[3]

Career

Tarot reading

Pollack wrote the 1985 book Salvador Dali's Tarot, an exposition of Salvador Dalí's Tarot deck, comprising a full-page color plate for each card, with her commentary on the facing page.[4] Her work 78 Degrees of Wisdom on Tarot reading is commonly referenced by Tarot readers.[5] She created her own Tarot deck, Shining Woman Tarot (later Shining Tribe Tarot).[6] She also aided in the creation of the Vertigo Tarot Deck with illustrator Dave McKean and author Neil Gaiman, and she wrote a book to accompany it.[7] Gaiman sometimes consulted Pollack on the tarot for his stories.[8]

Comics

Pollack wrote for the comic book Doom Patrol, on DC Comics' Vertigo imprint, from 1993 to 1995. Her run of issues (64–87)[9] was a continuation of a 1960s comic which had recently become a cult favorite under Grant Morrison. Pollack took over the series in 1993 after meeting editor Tom Peyer at a party, telling him it was the only monthly comic book she would want to write at the time, and sending him a sample script. Towards the end of Morrison's run, Pollack began writing monthly "letters to the editor" in what she describes as a "gee-whiz fangirl" voice asking to take over the book when Morrison was finished. In the final letter, she claims that she had already told her mother that she had been given the job. Peyer then used that response to that letter to officially announce that Pollack was, in fact, taking over the book.[10]

During her tenure, Pollack dealt with such rarely addressed comic book topics as menstruation, sexual identity, and transsexuality. Her run ended two years later, with the book's cancellation.[11]

In addition to Doom Patrol, Pollack wrote issues of the Vertigo Visions anthology featuring Brother Power the Geek (1993) and Tomahawk (1998), the first 11 issues of the fourth volume of New Gods (1995), and the five-issue limited series Time Breakers (1996) for the short lived Helix imprint.[12]

In 2019, it was announced that Pollack was reuniting with Doom Patrol artist Richard Case and letterer John Workman to create a short story—titled "Snake Song"—for the Kickstarter funded "music-themed horror anthology" Dead Beats.[13][14]

In 2024, DC Comics published "DC Pride: A Celebration of Rachel Pollack" reprinting issue 70 of "Doom Patrol" and issue 1 of "Vertigo Visions: The Geek #1 'Homelands of the Dolls'" as well as an introductory tribute by Stuart Moore and a new story, "Shining Through the Wreckage" revisiting Pollack's Doom Patrol character Coagula written by Joe Corallo.

Fiction

Three of Pollack's novels won or were nominated for major awards in the science fiction and fantasy field: Unquenchable Fire won the 1989 Arthur C. Clarke Award; Godmother Night won the 1997 World Fantasy Award, was shortlisted for the James Tiptree Jr. Award, and was nominated for a Lambda Literary Award for Transgender Literature; while Temporary Agency was nominated for the 1995 Nebula Award and the Mythopoeic Award, and shortlisted for the Tiptree.[15]

Her magical realism[16] novels explore worlds imbued with elements pulled from a number of traditions, faiths, and religions. Several of her novels are set in an alternative reality that resembles modern America, but an America of Bright Beings, where magic and ritual, religion and thaumaturgy are the norms.[17]

Her short work "Burning Beard: The Dreams and Visions of Joseph ben Jacob, Lord Viceroy of Egypt" was published in 2007 in the anthology Interfictions: An Anthology of Interstitial Writing, edited by Theodora Goss and Delia Sherman.[18] It was reprinted online in Lightspeed in May 2014.[19]

Nonfiction

Pollack's book The Body of the Goddess is an exploration of the history of the Goddess and her relation to locality and landscape.[20] Pollack uses the image of the Goddess in many of her works.[21]

Teaching

For 32 years, Pollack taught seminars with tarot author Mary K. Greer at the Omega Institute, in Rhinebeck, New York. She also did seminars for several years in California in conjunction with Greer, and she co-presented a breakthrough seminar with author Johanna Gargiulo-Sherman on tarot and psychic ability, using her own Shining Tribe Tarot and Gargiulo-Sherman's Sacred Rose Tarot. Pollack was also a popular lecturer at tarot seminars and symposiums such as Los Angeles Tarot Symposium, Bay Area Tarot Symposium, and the Readers Studio.[22]

She was a professor of creative writing in the Masters of Fine Arts program of Goddard College.[23] She taught English at State University of New York.[24]

Influences

Pollack was Jewish,[25] and frequently wrote about the Kabbalah, most notably in The Kabbalah Tree.[26]

She was a trans woman and wrote frequently on transgender issues.[27][28] In Doom Patrol she introduced Coagula, a transsexual character. She also wrote several essays on transsexualism, attacking the notion that it is a "sickness", instead saying that it is a passion.[29] She emphasized the revelatory aspects of transsexualism, saying that "the trance-sexual [sic] woman sacrifices her social identity as a male, her personal history, and finally the very shape of her body to a knowledge, a desire, which overpowers all rational understanding and proof."[30]

A Secret Woman features a police detective who is transgender and Jewish. The detective utters the prayer, "Blessed art thou oh G-d who made me not a woman. Double blessed is Doctor Green who has."[31] Pollack created the characters known as 'the bandage people' for her Doom Patrol run.[12] The bandage people are 'sexually remaindered spirits' who died in sexual accidents. The initials SRS came from the medical term 'sex reassignment surgery'. Pollack's essay "The Transsexual Book of The Dead: Osiris and the Trance Man", written for the anthology Phallus Palace, addresses the Osiris myth and "reconfigures Egyptian mythology into a multi-layered map for transsexual experience."[32][33]

Fairy tales such as the Brothers Grimm influenced many of Pollack's writings. Her book Tarot of Perfection is a book of fairy tales based on the tarot.[34]

Personal life

In July 2022, Pollack revealed via Facebook that, after seemingly overcoming Hodgkin lymphoma several years earlier, she had been diagnosed with a different variant of lymphoma and would be undergoing chemotherapy.[35] In August, Pollack's wife Zoe Matoff and Patricia Nolan announced that Pollack was in an intensive care unit and started a GoFundMe fundraiser for her medical expenses.[36][37] Those who shared the fundraiser on Twitter included Neil Gaiman, Shelly Bond, Gail Simone, and DC Comics editors Chris Conroy and Andrea Shay, while prominent donors included Rachel Gold, Al Ewing, Kieron Gillen, Kim Newman, Brett Booth, and Cliff Chiang, ultimately raising over $28,000 against a $15,000 goal by September.[35]

On March 12, 2023, Gaiman announced on Instagram and Mastodon, at the behest of Pollack's wife, that Pollack was in hospice care and nearing the end of her life. This led some outlets to mistakenly report that Pollack had already died.[38][39]

Pollack died from Hodgkin lymphoma on April 7, 2023, at the age of 77.[1][40]

Awards and memberships

Published works

Non-fiction books

Novels

Collections

Anthologies

Short fiction

Poetry

  • The Wild Cows (1993)[44]
  • Fortune's Lover (May 2009). A Midsummer Night's Press
  • Tyrant Oedipus (2012), with David Vine. EyeCorner Press

Essays

  • "Introduction: A Machine for Constructing Stories" (1989)[44]
  • Read This (The New York Review of Science Fiction, October 1991) (1991)[44]
  • Read This (The New York Review of Science Fiction, July 1995) (1995)[44]
  • Read This (The New York Review of Science Fiction, August 1996) (1996)[44]
  • Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Pollack, Rachel. "Death and Its Afterlives In the Tarot". Parabola.[44]

Reviews

Comics

References

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  1. ^ a b Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Gustines, George Gene (April 13, 2023). "Rachel Pollack, Transgender Activist and Authority on Tarot, Dies at 77". The New York Times. Retrieved April 13, 2023.
  2. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Barnett, David (April 8, 2023). "Rachel Pollack, trans activist and comic book writer, dies aged 77". The Observer.
  3. ^ a b c Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."The Shining Tribe". Retrieved November 19, 2008.
  4. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Pollack, Rachel (1985). Salvador Dali's Tarot. Salem, New Hampshire: Salem House. ISBN 0-88162-076-9.
  5. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Llewellyn.com". Archived from the original on September 23, 2007. Retrieved April 8, 2008.
  6. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Shining Tribe Tarot". Retrieved April 15, 2008.
  7. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Vertigo Tarot". Retrieved April 15, 2008.
  8. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Davis, Erik (1994). "The Gods of the Funny Books: An Interview with Neil Gaiman and Rachel Pollack". Gnosis. Archived from the original on May 29, 2012. Retrieved November 22, 2012.
  9. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Doom Patrol". Retrieved April 15, 2008.
  10. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Pollack, Rachel (2019). ""Radical, Sacred, Hopefully Magical" Outspoken Interview with Rachel Pollack". The Beatrix Gates Plus... PM Press. pp. 99–100. ISBN 978-1-62963-578-1.
  11. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Williamson, Harriet (April 8, 2023). "Trailblazing trans DC Comics writer Rachel Pollack dies aged 77". PinkNews.
  12. ^ a b Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Cronin, Brian (April 7, 2023). "Rachel Pollack, Trailblazing Doom Patrol Writer, Dies at 77". CBR.
  13. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Dead Beats By Tyler & Wendy Chin-Tanner". Kickstarter. April 9, 2019. Retrieved April 23, 2019. Notably, the book includes a reunion of Doom Patrol alums Rachel Pollack and Richard Case, working together for the first time in more than 25 years!
  14. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Corallo, Joe (April 19, 2019). "Rachel Pollack Signed Bookplates, Bigger Doom Patrol Reunion, and New Artwork!". Kickstarter. Retrieved April 23, 2019. We are also absolutely thrilled to announce that our Doom Patrol reunion just got even bigger! Legendary and award winning comics letterer John Workman, whose work includes having lettered Doom Patrol for all of Grant Morrison and Rachel Pollack's runs, will be lettering Rachel Pollack and Richard Case's story in Dead Beats, Snake Song! He's excited to be part of this reunion and we hope you're excited he's on board too!
  15. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Rachel Pollack Awards". Science Fiction Awards Database. Retrieved April 9, 2023.
  16. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."GLBT Fantasy review of Godmother Night". Retrieved September 19, 2008.
  17. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Temporary Agency". Archived from the original on May 9, 2008. Retrieved September 6, 2008.
  18. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Sherman, Delia; Goss, Theodora (2007). Interfictions: An Anthology of Interstitial Writing. Small Beer Press. ISBN 9781931520249. Retrieved April 14, 2023.
  19. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Burning Beard: The Dreams and Visions of Joseph ben Jacob, Lord Viceroy of Egypt". Lightspeed Magazine. May 6, 2014. Retrieved April 14, 2023.
  20. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Reid-Bowen, Paul (2016). Goddess as Nature: Towards a Philosophical Thealogy. Routledge. p. 109. ISBN 978-1-317-12634-8.
  21. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Chase, Christopher W. (2009). "Paul Reid-Bowen, Goddess As Nature: Towards a Philosophical Theaiogy (Burlington, Vt. : Ashgate, 2007)". The Pomegranate. 11 (2).
  22. ^ a b c d e f g Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Women In Tarot". Archived from the original on April 23, 2008. Retrieved April 16, 2008.
  23. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Hoffman, Cara (2009). "Rachel Pollack is Willing to Change Everything - Issue 380 - Fifth Estate Magazine". Fifth Estate (380).
  24. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Chiu-Tabet, Christopher (April 7, 2023). "Rachel Pollack, "Doom Patrol" Writer, Dead at 77". Multiversity Comics.
  25. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."New Worlds Article". Archived from the original on July 4, 2007. Retrieved September 6, 2008.
  26. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."biblio.com". Retrieved April 15, 2008.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: deprecated archival service (link)
  27. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Valerio, Max Wolf (2006). The Testosterone Files: My Hormonal and Social Transformation from Female to Male. Berkeley: Seal Press. p. 147. ISBN 1-58005-173-1.
  28. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Israel, Gianna E.; Tarver II; Donald E. (2001). Transgender Care: Recommended Guidelines, Practical Information & Personal Accounts. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. p. 269. ISBN 1-56639-852-5.
  29. ^ Pollack, Rachel. "Archetypal Transsexuality." Retrieved October 20, 2008.
  30. ^ Pollack, Rachel. "Abandonment to the Body's Desire." In: 'Balancing on the Mechitza: Transgender in Jewish Community.' Retrieved April 6, 2020.
  31. ^ Pollack, Rachel. A Secret Woman: A Mystery. New York: St. Martin's Minotaur, 2002.
  32. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Valerio, Max Wolf (2002). "Peering Inside the Phallus Palace". FTMi Newsletter (52): 15.
  33. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Kotula, Dean (2002). The phallus palace : female to male transsexuals. Internet Archive. Los Angeles, Calif.: Alyson Books. pp. 131–146. ISBN 978-1-55583-654-2.
  34. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Jensen, Marjorie (November 29, 2017). "Five essential books of tarot fiction". Spiral Nature Magazine.
  35. ^ a b Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Johnston, Rich (September 1, 2022). "Rachel Pollack Appeal By Neil Gaiman, Gail Simone, Shelly Bond & More". Bleeding Cool. Retrieved March 17, 2023.
  36. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Schreur, Brandon (August 26, 2022). "Doom Patrol Writer Rachel Pollack in ICU, GoFundMe Launched for Medical Bill Help". CBR. Retrieved March 17, 2023.
  37. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Anderson, Jenna (August 26, 2022). "Doom Patrol and New Gods Writer Rachel Pollack Hospitalized". ComicBook.com. Retrieved March 17, 2023.
  38. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Stratis, Niko (March 16, 2023). "Gutter Talk: Portents of Doom Patrol". Autostraddle. Retrieved March 17, 2023.
  39. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Coke, Travis Hedge (March 16, 2023). "The Transcendental Love of Rachel Pollack". Comic Watch. Retrieved March 17, 2023.
  40. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Marston, George (April 7, 2023). "Comic and Tarot icon Rachel Pollack dies". GamesRadar.
  41. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.World Fantasy Convention (2010). "Award Winners and Nominees". Archived from the original on December 1, 2010. Retrieved February 4, 2011.
  42. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Rachel Pollack: Past Nominations and Wins". The Nebula Awards. Science Fictions & Fantasy Writers of America. Retrieved April 9, 2023.
  43. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Winners and Shortlists". The Arthur C. Clarke Award. Retrieved April 9, 2023.
  44. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae af Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Internet Science Fiction Data Base". isfdb.org. Retrieved April 15, 2008.

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