At the age of fourteen, Sappho is seduced by the beautiful poet Alcaeus and plots with him to overthrow the dictator of their island. When they are caught, she is married off to a repellent older man in hopes that matrimony will keep her out of trouble. Instead, it starts her off on a series of amorous adventures with both men and women, taking her from Delphi to Egypt, and even to the Land of the Amazons and the shadowy realm of Hades. Complemented by Erica Jong's new translations of Sappho's fragments, as well as nine of the author's own poems about the epic poet who shaped all our understandings of poetic verse, Sappho's Leap is not to be missed. Jong's Sappho is one of her most unforgettable and exuberant heroines.