Praise for Pesach for the Rest of Us "When poet and novelist Marge Piercy shows us how to prepare for, partake of and run a Seder, it feels like a good neighbor has taken us under her wing. Piercy's informed informality takes us from the search for hametz to Miriam's Cup, but along the way we are treated to poetry ("It is a miniature ocean on the table,/salt as the Sea of Reeds through which they were to pass"); an abundance of recipes (Ashkenazic and Sefardic—from Gedemte Flaisch mit Abricotten to Cinnamon Lamb); essays on bread in history and how to choose wine; and blessings both traditional and in the feminine vernacular. Like any good friend, Piercy is passing along her accumulated knowledge in this smart Seder companion. Take advantage." --Hadassah Magazine READ THE FIRST CHAPTER (FOR A SAMPLING OF POEMS & RECIPES)

Every year, Marge Piercy, beloved poet and novelist, has been making her own Passover seder with a group of family and friends. Over the years, babies have been born and grown up, friends move and divorce, but over time the principals gather in her rustic Cape Cod home to participate in a seder that Piercy takes joy in refreshing with the object above all to create meaning. Making her way through the ritual one item and one practice at a time, she coaxes us toward “a significant contemporary interpretation, rather than an emphasis on what is strictly 'correct' or traditional." She discusses her grandmother, who thought herself unworthy to lead a seder because of her limited Hebrew, but presided "morally" at the table; she explores the reasons that some Jews add an orange to their seder plate; she even describes her heroic efforts to make her own Gefilte fish (an experiment not to be repeated). Along the way, Piercy offers her distinct slant on each element of the feast and its symbols, and dozens of her own wonderful recipes. "Food sometimes feels like emotion made edible," she writes, and her recipes are delivered in the same warm and commanding voice as her poems and prose: "When I told Ira that I was going to explain how to cook matzah brei, he thought I was crazy. Everybody knows how to make matzah brie, he said. But I am of the opinion that there is no longer anything that everybody knows how to cook."

It is in that spirit -- no question taken for granted -- that Piercy welcomes readers to her kind of seder: a homemade and personal affair, the kind of seder we all wish we could be invited to. "Why should you do all the work?” she asks. “Get your people involved.” This charming and instructive book of Passover wisdom, brimming with favorite dishes and Marge Piercy’s own moving Passover poems and blessings, as well as fascinating histories of the Passover foods we all love, invites us to look at an important Jewish ritual in a whole new way.

More Praise:

Creating the Perfect Seder
"Passover wins the prize for the Jewish holiday most likely to be celebrated. I suspect this is true because, at the bare minimum, celebrating can be accomplished by merely showing up for dinner. For those of us who actually provide the dinner – the ritual Seder meal – the maximum is usually required: weeks of planning, preparation, shopping, cleaning, cooking. Despite theses efforts, however, just attending a Seder can be hard work, especially if no one understands what is going on, and the goal is simply to get at the food. Guidance is the answer and how-to-books on Passover abound, but they usually read like reference books, giving dry entries on the history of the Seder. Marge Piercy’s new book, however, is a pleasure to read. Pesach for the Rest of Us: Making the Passover Seder Your Own is an extraordinary examination of what should be an extraordinary ritual event.
Just who is “the rest of us?” Piercy answers this right away: folks who are not Orthodox, and who are searching for mindful ways to connect with Passover. The book is organized into chapters that focus on key steps or elements of the Seder, such as the four questions, the four children, matzoh, wine and maror (bitter herbs). These are peppered with personal memories and musings, choice recipes, historical reference points and blessings. Readers can dip into this feast for quick, practical information, or savor it cover to cover to enjoy the poetic flow of Piercy’s prose.
Either way, Seders everywhere will benefit. Piercy’s suggestions, insights and queries will motivate readers to create a Seder that is much more than a race to the meal. This unexpected treat from an acclaimed poet and novelist belongs on the table of everyone – or, at least, the rest of us – interested in making a Seder meaningful."
--BookPage

“Pesach for the Rest of Us is like an intimate conversation with a friend —reading her Passover guidebook is like having a surrogate bubbe, except one who, in addition to being a great cook with a treasure trove of folk wisdom and tips, is also feminist, acerbic and literarily brilliant. As such, Pesach for the Rest of Us is the perfect bridge between the old world and the new — that is, between an old, vanishing Jewish culture and a contemporary world that is both duly suspicious of its antiquity and desperately in need of it.”
--The Forward

" The traditional Passover seder is dissected, reinterpreted and given a contemporary and feminist bent in Piercy's guidebook to making the haggadah more readable and meaningful to today's unaffiliated Jews. Novelist Piercy confesses that her own Passover preparations are "heavy on the convenient"; for example, she will use the prohibited sunflower oil to make her dishes tasty. She wants to focus instead on what brings resonance to her observance of the holiday, like adding the Cup of Miriam to her seder table and including a Fifth Child in remembrance of those murdered during the Holocaust. Nearly every page reminds readers to change parts of the seder as they see fit. Throughout are Piercy's poems recognizing many aspects of the seder; her own rendition of traditional blessings into the feminine Hebrew; and ideas on how to create one's own English prayers. Memories of her Grandmother Hannah's Pesach segue into old-time recipes of the holiday's traditional foods, and an entire chapter is dedicated to mouthwatering recipes that can be used for the main meal. Some tangents in this conversational guide ...including histories of the origins of wine, horseradish and other seder foods are fascinating."
--Publishers Weekly

"Pesach (Passover in English) is the eight-day festival that commemorates the Exodus of the Israelite people from their enslavement to pharaoh in Egypt. The seder is the meal on the first two nights of Pesach in which the Haggadah­the telling­of the Passover story is read. Piercy writes that the book is not intended for Orthodox Jews, but rather for secular and religious Jews "with a modern slant into a more satisfying and meaningful way to celebrate the holiday.” She offers recipes, poems, and blessings, as she delves into all the rituals and practices, and she reminisces about the seders spent with her grandmother when the author was a child. Piercy, the author of 17 novels, 17 volumes of poetry, and a memoir, has written an engaging account of this important holiday."
--Booklist

" Pesach For the Rest of Us is truly excellent. Marge Piercy’s amazing voice shines through the book and accompanies the reader on a journey through the sedar that is illuminating, exciting, encouraging and healing all at once. The way she holds all the threads and elements of the sedar is truly breathtaking. Finally, a book I can recommend to people who are trying to wrestle with how to bring their sedarim to life and at the same time hold onto the wisdom that resides in the tradition. Piercy frees us up to be creative and alive. The book is a gift and a blessing."
–Rabbi Alan Ullman

"Marge Piercy teaches new ways and old ways and how to join them, and opens a door into the tradition for those who have been unable to open that door for themselves until now. Food is the most elemental of traditions, and the honesty of the food before us in her book – seeing her prepare and share it – is like being invited to her seder and sitting around the table with our mothers and grandmothers as they show us their generations, forgetting no one, and letting us in on the secret whispers that go on in the kitchen when no one else is paying attention."
–Rabbi Alana Suskin

“Accessible, transformative, thrilling. Marge Piercy teases out the spiritual lights hidden within the most ordinary events.” – Rabbi Lawrence Kushner

“Pesach for the Rest of Us: Making the Passover Seder Your Own” (Schocken Books, $22.95) is the unlikely new offering from acclaimed poet, novelist, social activist and great all-time feminist Marge Piercy, whose books, “Gone to Soldiers” and “Vida” blew me away when I first read them, years ago.
For more than 20 years, it seems, Piercy has been creating an annual seder with an evolving group of family and friends at her home on Cape Cod. With humor, attitude, insight, and (of course) recipes, she invites readers to create their own, highly personal Passover seders, based in tradition but open to “significant contemporary interpretation.”
Finding new meaning in traditional Passover rites such as the dipping of parsely into salt water, Piercy takes off on a path that seamlessly weaves together amniotic fluid, parsley’s healing attributes, and its prevalence in a host of native cuisines, from Italian to Greek to French. She delves into the urban legend behind adding an orange to the seder plate, revealing it as a symbolic act of inclusion to those frequently left out of traditional Judaism, such as women.
And then there are the recipes, from Beef and Cabbage Borscht to Leek and Mushroom Soup to Chicken Soup with Matzoh Balls to half a dozen variations on Charoset: they’re all in there.
I’ve got all kinds of ideas for my family’s seder this year, thanks to Piercy’s quirky, insightful, appealing new book. Can’t wait to give them a shot."
--The Montclair Times

“Marge Piercy’s superb spiritual powers are up to their elbows in the lived world, bringing a liberated and grounded wisdom to everything they touch. Behind this book one hears the great embracing toast of Jewish tradition: ‘L’Chaim’—‘to life!’”
–Jane Hirschfield

A poem from Marge's seder :

Miriam’s cup

This cup of fresh water represents Miriam’s well, which accompanied the children of Israel through the desert until her death. Miriam, elder sister of Moses, is associated with ongoing redemption. In Miriam’s cup of water, we have a parallel to Elijah’s cup of wine. Elijah stands for redemption to come; Miriam’s concerns the redemption occurring daily in our lives.

The cup of Elijah holds wine;
the cup of Miriam holds water.
Wine is more precious
until you have no water.

Water that flows in our veins,
water that is the stuff of life
for we are made of breath
and water, vision

and fact. Elijah is
the extraordinary; Miriam
brings the daily wonders:
the joy of a fresh morning

like a newly prepared table,
a white linen cloth on which
nothing has yet spilled.
The descent into the heavy

waters of sleep healing us.
The scent of baking bread,
roasted chicken, fresh herbs,
the faces of friends across

the table. What sustains us
every morning, every evening,
the common miracles
like the taste of cool water

To Order this book:

Available Now
Publisher: Schocken / Random House
ISBN: 0805242422 / 304 Pages