Adrienne Rich Twenty One Love Poem - 1053 Words

Adrienne Cecile Rich was an American Poet and feminist born May 16, 1929 died March 27th 2012, was born in Baltimore, Maryland and the oldest of two sisters from a middle class family, Rich was educated by her parents until she entered public school in the fourth grade. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Radcliffe College in 1951, the same year her first book of poems, A Change of World, appeared. That volume, chosen by W. H. Auden for the Yale Series of Younger Poets Award, and her next, The Diamond Cutters and Other Poems (1955), earned her a reputation as an elegant, controlled stylist. Adrienne was known to be one of the most widely read and influential poets of the second half of the 20th century,and was credited with bringing the†¦show more content†¦Looking at the section beginning â€Å"No one has imagined us,† I didn’t identify the â€Å"us† necessarily as female but more generally just as humanity struggling and that their the only one who noti ce how rough things are, which, incidentally, I think is more powerful left unnamed because it allows the reader to take on the poem for him or herself. Then I read â€Å"live like trees,† which i get the sense it means they want to live naturally, free from the patriarchal oppression, and be able to branch out, take up space in this city. The poet makes reference to the opera Tristand und Isolde (a story about lovers that do confuse death and love, due to a love potion) and makes a point to say that the opera is NOT the story -- that fate, magic, love potions, etc., have nothing to do with it. The existential theme is continued when the poet mentions a tape recorder -- a device that can only record sound, what is actually said and done. In a sense, she is saying that actions are what are important -- thoughts and intentions are meaningless in death, what remains after we are gone is how we were are seen by others. If our actions define who we are or how we tried to love, the recorded may have caught some ghost of us -- that recordable actions are what will be remembered after death. She is saying that love is what we say and do, what we choose to act upon by ourselves despite the forces that rage within us and against. I think it s alsoShow MoreRelatedAnalysis Of The Poem Twenty One Love Poems By Adrienne Rich1782 Words   |  8 Pages Adrienne Rich was a highly acclaimed twentieth-century poet who railed against war and the injustices in the world, and also used imagery that spoke tenderly of love—feelings that she sensed were both highly individual for her, but also universal. â€Å"Twenty-One Love Poems† were written between 1974-1976 to her lover of the time, and they track the course of the relationship through the sweet beginning stages, the development of mature love, and all the way through to its dissolution due toRead MoreAnalysis Of Adrienne Rich s Twenty One Love Poems 1081 Words   |  5 Pages Love poems Adrienne Rich’s â€Å"Twenty-One Love Poems,† mainly focus on lesbian lovers which is a different style of writing from typical love poetry that is usually written by a man to a woman. The two poems that will be focused on are â€Å"To His Coy Mistress† written by Andrew Marvell as well as â€Å"There Is a Garden in Her Face† by Thomas Campion. Rich’s love poems mainly focus on two women who work together against all odds using the strength of their love. They also have a powerful love for oneRead More Adrienne Rich Essay1758 Words   |  8 Pages The Poetry of Adrienne Rich nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;Adrienne Rich was born in Baltimore, Maryland in the year of 1929. Rich grew up in a household as she describes it as † †¦white, middle-class, full of books, and with a father who encouraged her to write† (Daniel). Her father Arnold Rich was a doctor and a pathology professor and her mother, Helen Jones Rich , was a pianist and a composer. â€Å"Adrienne Rich recalls her growing-up years clearly dominated by the intellectual presence and demandsRead MoreFeminism, The Yellow Wallpaper, And Jackson s The Lottery1205 Words   |  5 Pagesrights, was a movement that many men did not believe in before the 1960s and 1970s. The feminist movement started after the 1970s. Women such as Adrienne Rich (poet), Charlotte Perkins Gilman (feminist) and Shirley Jackson (writer), are women that used their works of literature to show their views on the ways men controlled their wives physically and mentally. Rich wrote Living In Sin, Gilman wrote The Yellow Wallpaper, and Jackson wrote The Lottery. Although each work of literature is written by a differentRead MoreAdrienne C. Rich : A Cultural Poet1905 Words   |  8 PagesAdrienne C. Rich: A Cultural Poet Abstract: Adrienne Rich (1929-2012) seems to stand in consonance with thinkers of Cultural Studies like Raymond Williams, Stuart Hall, Dick Hebdige and many others who realized the power of the working class, as an agency of resistance to the prevalent ideology. She like them sees culture as venue to spread ideology and to resist it. Thus, deep understanding of Rich’s works reveals them to be an ideological struggle with a aim to empower the powerless. In her poetryRead MoreAnalysis Of The Poem Adrienne Rich1153 Words   |  5 Pageswas at twenty-five percent. (Plateris). Most women did not have the luxury of getting one due to the fact that most husbands of that time had control of the household finances, not to mention that it was a costly venture. Some marriages struggled with spousal abuse as well; be it emotional or physical yet domestic violence at this time was something that people really did not talk about, nor were there the resources for victims that we have toda y. In this haunting poem, Adrienne Rich uses symbolismRead More Examination of Womens Friendships through an Analysis of Katherine Philips Friendships Mystery4228 Words   |  17 Pagesto better understand Philips critique of Donne within the lines of her poetry, a reading of twentieth century critic Adrienne Richs essay When We Dead Awaken: Writing for Re-Vision may offer a possible theoretical reasoning for Philips approach. Rich explains readers must challenge the accepted, predominantly white male canon of literature. In her essay, Rich expresses [t)hat the argument will go on whether an oppressive economic class system is responsible for the oppressiveRead MoreAnalysis Of Judith Lorber s Susan M. Gilbert And Susan s Essay1952 Words   |  8 Pagesâ€Å"The poet’s pen is in some sense (even more than figuratively) a penis† (Gilbert 4). Many prominent female authors have spoken to the fact that males are seen at the supremes in the world of femininity, including Virginia Woolf, Alice Walker, and Adrienne Rich. Their commentary seems to point to a historical common sense of males being more skilled at creative work and the male superiority to complex as white, male authors as the standard of authorship, with all other works––by women, by minorities––needingRead MorePoetry Essay Prompt2545 Words   |  11 PagesEssay Prompts (1970–2011) 1970 Poem: â€Å"Elegy for Jane† (Theodore Roethke) Prompt: Write an essay in which you describe the speakers attitude toward his former student, Jane. 1971 Poem: â€Å"The Unknown Citizen† (W.H. Auden) Prompt: In a brief essay, identify at least two of the implications implicit in the society reflected in the poem. Support your statements by specific references to the poem. 1972 NO POEM 1973 (exam not available) 1974 Poem: â€Å"I wonder whether one expects...† (No poet given) Prompt:Read MoreThe Influences of Sor Juana and Julia de Burgos2050 Words   |  9 Pagesgirls (Trueblood 6). As Sor Juana became better known for her writing she corresponded to intellectuals in Spain and in the Spanish colonies of America. By 1689 Sor Juana wrote the plays: â€Å"The Trials of a Household† and â€Å"The Greater Labyrinth is Love† (â€Å"Sor Juana’s Chronology† 2). Even after Sor Juana died on April 17 of 1695, her writings continued to be published. Very well-known, the first edition of Volume III of Sor Juana’s works was published in 1700 (â€Å"Sor Juana’s Chronology† 2).