How Tori Amos taught me the beautiful power of anger

Tori Amos is beautiful and deadly. And when I first met her, I was ravenous for her power.

Tori Amos around 1992.
(Image credit: Pictorial Press Ltd / Alamy Stock Photo)

Pele, fire goddess. Hawaiian mythology renders her as a mighty, volcano-dwelling deity marshaling the twin forces of creation and destruction. She summons volcanoes' tantrums and siphons rivulets of molten lava. She forges islands with her powerfully simmering energy. She is vital; she is lethal. As Tori Amos warns in the song "Muhammad My Friend," "You've never seen fire until you've seen Pele blow."

Mortal girls breathe fire, too — they erupt, and they ravage.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Rachel Vorona Cote is a writer in Washington, D.C. She is a contributor at Jezebel and has written for other venues including The New Republic, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Hazlitt, and Literary Hub. You can find her on Twitter here.