As we talked in today's class, Adrienne Rich's poetry is saturated with her utopian visions and her commitment to feminist/LGBT/anti-war/civil rights movements. As a poet who dares to dream, she shows us the power of imagination, which can be strong enough to make us question, challenge the status quo and conceive of alternative becomings. In the following video,you can see an interview with Adrienne and her inspiring talk on poetry, love, human relationships, and imagination. Take on any topics she mentions in the video (love, poetry writing, the unspeakable, etc) and try to draw any possible analogies/connections between the topic of your choice and the poems we discussed today.
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In the beginning, Rich said that "it's dangerous for people in love." The reson for this one,as she said, is "cultural eyes." She mentioned that why the public always follow the society rules and not to think about do they really want that or not. It is all because of the cultural concepts that two men/women or black and white could not be in love. She starts the rethink about this idea as we can see in "My mouth hovers across your breasts" and "History." The former one describes the sex between two women. They were in the bed, playing rings around each other, and enjoy themselves. Besides, in "History" she questioned that "Don't ask how I began to love men./Don't ask how I began to love women." In the end of the poem, she struck out that "We cannot choose what we are fee to love?" It is all because we are under the eyes of culture and society, we are framed by it. We lsoe our abolity to rethink the rules again. So, in Adrienne Rich's poem, she said that only in the writing of the poem, we can find out what we not see, and still to pushing against. By her poem, we can rethink and reimagine things in our own point of view.
at first, Rich mentioned that "it's dangerous for two people in love because of cultural frame work." i think the speaker herself is now still trying to find the truth of human love; however, all human love work with the society. Take one of her poem, Planetarium,for example; there's one line saying "What we see, we see and seeing is changing." She definitely refers to the change of the value which the society gives us. our seeing will transform in the end by going with the current.
that's why she decides to stand out her mind doing what she wants.
Compare Adrienne Rich's early and late poems, they do have great changes. As she mentioned in the video, she approached poetry when she was young and wrote poetry in a traditional way. We can see that in one of her early poems--"At a Bach Concert," she put emphasis on order, purity, and discipline; she detached herself from her emotions. But when she growed older, her thoughts changed and she held a revolution within herself. She said in the video,"there are other ways of writing than the one you've learned to use." Through writing poetry, she finds out what she still has to rethink and reimagine. Poetry is always for her a kind of probe into the unspeakable; it is a way of speaking indirectly about things she can speak directly about. Hence, we can find out that in Adrienne Rich's later poems(such as Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law and Planetarium), she cares not outer forms but some controversial social problems.
I think what Rich wants to exprss is not only the danger of love about cultural views, but about all disapproving conceptions toward the "unacceptable affctions" which ordinary consider.
She also mentioned of her writing at younger age, and it reminds of all of her life story. I think it really takes effort and braveness to divorce while having three childern, and to realize what one really wants, such as which gender one likes. What's more, I think her husband's death must also stroke her a lot.
Seeing a female walking through so much difficulties really makes me touched. I like her and her poetry.
I think Adrienne is a strong woman,pioneer woman.To be specific,she is a woman,who has her own thoughts.She againsts the"cultural eye",she thinks it is too conservative.This kind of viewpoint is also image in her writing style.In the interview,she said:"rethink,reimagine.It is not so much a question to think it." Sometimes,things are not like what you see on the surface,just like poetry,you have to look deeper,think deeper,then you can catch the meaning that poet wants to send you.
At the beginning, Adrienne Rich mentioned about that it is dangerous to not consider "cultural biased" between two lovers. All the people were framed as a kind of person by the society that they should pay more work to overcome the difference between them particularly when they are in love. She also mentioned about that she does not do the research for poems and poems will come out the reading that she does. In my opinion I think it has a connection between “Planetarium”, because the poem is so casual just like she was telling the things that she wanted to say without any plan , and I believe the she may wrote the poem just after reading the biography of Caroline Herschel.
I think that Adrienne Rich is a outstanding woman without doubt,because she always thinks about the relationship between men and women;she tries to use her poems to break.In " Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law",I realized that a woman always tries to beaome the traditional female in a tradtiional way. In fact, a mother always use her conventional thought to teach and limit her daughter.It is a frame that put on female for long.
I think the main thought Adrienne Rich wants to show most is the break of common cultural bias. She is a strong woman who initially acts as a normal person but in the end turned to be the person violating kind of “common customs”. And she protects the feminine rights and gives them a place to stand on after she became different from before. Telling all the people that not the things that the accepted by the public called the normal one. To me, Adrienne Rich defeats the danger of two people in love not to think about what their relationship is.
I definitely think that Adrienne Rich is born to be a port, for she mentioned in the video clip that “I don’t do research for poems. What happens is that the poems come out of the reading I do,” which makes me praise for her talent. In her early life, she began to read poetry that was traditional and very formal, which can be related with the first we discussed last week, “At a Bach Concert.” In this poem, she was still the young poet who obeyed the orders so well. However, after reading some other modern poetry, she began to think “there are other ways of writing tan the ones you’ve learned to use.” What she said reminds me of another poem called “Snapshots of a Daughter-in-law,” which breaks the orders and tells women to rebel instead of enduring. More importantly, this poem also criticize the unequal status that society gives upon women, which was corresponded to what Adrienne said in the end “ poetry was a way of speaking indirectly about things I couldn’t speak directly about.” Ps, I think in the beginning she said culturally “biased.” (but I’m not sure)
We often influenced by framework of society. She wants to break these traditional thoughts. The society is changing little by little, and we should learn to respect any kinds of love. Unlike her earlier poems, and she begins to express her thoughts of feminism in her later poems. In the line "she's long about her coming"(in Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law),and she expects a brave woman appeared. I agree with the poet W.S.Merwin's word. He has said, "All her life she has been in love with the hope of telling utter truth, and her command of language from the first has been startlingly powerful."
I am fond of Rich's thought. Before we can see the world with our real eye, we are always influenced by the culture. I think there are many intelligent women who can do things as well as men. Women should not be looked down because women still have their advantages. In "Planetarium," we can see Rich's idea that women can cease the torture from men. It is time to break the old frame and stand out our real mind.
I think Rich is a powerful woman, she did not affected by the people, use her own way to express her thought. Everything we used to or familiar with, is not represent that those things are right, we have to rethink it, to break the old idea and form. Like her poem, in her early time, her poem were very neatness and detachment, but then, she realized that poem should be related to the experiance, and her poem became more personal and more political, and she created her own style. I think this is what we should learn:do not be limited by the old thing.
i really admire for someone who starts to know what they really want or want to do something for the world and dont care about what others thought about them. she said it needs works, for....like two people are in love or for a lots of things. yeah,culturual frame work gives a lot of pressures on us, she uses poems to talk about what she thinks, giving us a good example for speak out for ourselves. she grew up with her poem, from tradition type to modern ones. for her, its a way that she could speak indirectly for what she couldnt say directly.
In the beginning, Rich mentioned that "cultural biased." I think "cultural biased" is some kind of enormous pressure on everyone. We obey the rules,although we know they are passe. Because of the pressure from others, people neglect what they want. In "Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law," married women are like birds imprisoned in marriage. Once women step into marriage, they lose their freedom and dreams. Under the old rules women are oppressed by paternity, the talent of women were killed by the rules. Therefore, we should rethink the rules and reimagine all the possibilities in our lives. The commonalty should get rid of the "cultural biased."
i think she is an advant-garde woman.her opinion of love is innovative and shake our mind.
From her poet,we can get totally different ideas.After reading her poets,we may begin to think something that are different from the original that we thought in the past.
Rich mentioned that it was dangerous for people in love because of coutural rules. no matter one man one woman, two men two women, all of them need to be respected. As a figure(poet) known to everyone, she must have to withstand a more tremendous pressure.
She also think that women will lose their freedom when they get marriage, just like a bird which was be imprisoned and lost its freedom. The time is changing, i hope everyone who lives in our world can break the framework of society and reestablishes the thought of gender in our mind.
poetry is a tool to help us express what we aren't expressing in life. we use our thoughts, motivation, and imagination to help us connect to those that are listening. it is with her extraordinary poetry that we can relate to ourselves, see ourselves, and improve ourselves.
Adrienne Rich is well-known of contribution towards humanities and so on. In her opinions, it is dangerous for two people in love. Love is a very special ability which only human beings have. It takes work to neglect the cultural frameworks which has been constructed on ourselves. It brings misunderstandins, and it leads to conflicts. She said that poetry is a way to rethink and to reimagine your concepts of values. Poetry is the condensation of words. It can always evoke our senses, and it is a probe to the unspeakable.
i think women always live in the "frame" of the society which is limited by the traditional thought.But Adrienne Rich really speak for women and shows the personality of women's inside thought.And the gender problem between man and woman should stop now because the development of this society.Getting married is not losing freedom but attend to another level of life.
I think it's hard for people to ignore the sight of this society. Since we are children, we were told to the same thing like others and I never thought to change it anyway.Culture framework is really programing everyone's life. I think it's interesting to hear different voice from the different area and people since I enter into college. Just during this year, I've change my thought about love in many way. In this vesio, she said that love is dangerous when the culture bias between two person. I totally agree this opinion because even the people are similar can argue, not mention to the people with different background
I agree with Adrinne Rich's opinion that in the begining she said that it is dangerous for two people in love because of cultural bias. If we have be framed in this thought(the differences between men and women), we will have to pay more time or mental and physical efforts to break though it and may cause someone be restricted;however,the limited one is often the female by traditional or social bias. Ithink this is the reason that she wrote so many poems about men and women. In "Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law", we can see that how a traditional women oppressed the other women by traditional ways just because of the social and cultural bias.
What Rich said inspires me most is her conception of breaking the universal values and the society rules that we thought we should obeyed. As a member of the human beings, she was also imbued with the traditional and regulated concepts. We can see that in her early works like "At a Bach Concert." However, she made a change. She devoted herself to scrutinizing the "social and political forces" such as the anti-war, civil rights and momen's movements, and her work has also become more social, political, and historical. In her later poems like "Planetarium" and "Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law" we can see her changes.
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