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Example research essay topic: Modern American Poetry Adrienne Rich - 1,784 words

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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. "Adrienne Rich recalls her growing-up years clearly dominated by the intellectual presence and demands of the male in the family, her father, while correctly marked by the submerged tensions arising from the conflicts between the religious and cultural heritage of the father's Jewish background and her mother's Southern Protestantism" (Pope). In the year of 1951, Rich graduated from Radcliffe University. During this year, Adrienne Rich also won the Yale Younger Poets Prize for her first book, A Change of World.

In 1953, Adrienne Rich married Alfred Conrad who was a Harvard economist; during the next five years Rich had three sons. Deborah Pope says that Rich's journal entries, from these years, state that this was an "emotionally and artistically difficult period" (Pope). Rich's poems were mainly influenced by Robert Frost, Years, Stevens, and Auden. She became a major influence, through her essays and poetry, in many areas of modern-day women's movements, she had become one of the most provoking voices on the politics of sexuality, race, power, and women's culture. Adrienne Rich is a southern Jew who grew up during the forties. Rich lived in a gentle neighborhood and was never taught about her Jewish heritage.

She eventually had to deal with conflicts between the religious and cultural heritage of her father's Jewish background and her mother's southern Protestantism (Pope). Rich's father didn't show any signs of ethnicity in any way. He did this to fit into a society that was against Jewish people. In many of her works, Adrienne Rich talks about being oppressed. In her poem, " 1948: Jews, " Adrienne Rich refers to her college years. At Radcliffe University, she was to stay away from Jews.

No matter how much she wanted, she could not unite with them as a group because socially it was less acceptable. She had to avoid her own ethnicity to survive in the American culture. "A Vision, " is another poem Rich wrote that discusses the issue of racism. In this poem, Rich talks about a Jewish women who died during WWII. The reason why Rich talks about this woman is because she can relate to this woman. Adrienne Rich can relate to her because they both are Jewish women that grew up in the forties. They were both victims of racism or felt racism in society, The poem refers to being forced to lose your identity, character, and ethnicity.

Throughout her life Adrienne Rich has felt a loss of identity. Rich's father practically abandons his heritage to fit into a racist society (Pope). This hatred from society and the loss of identity has influenced Rich to write such great works. She has become a fervent activist against racism. In 1951, when Rich first began writing poetry, she portrayed her writing after the prevailing male influential writers of the period. Later during the 1970 s she began to change her way of writing and focused on feminism and lesbianism (American).

At Radcliffe University, she studied solely male poets and she was taught entirely by male professors. These male poets and professors credited the origins of her style and their influence really showed in her early poetry. In 1953, Adrienne Rich married Alfred Conrad, a Harvard economist; in the next five years she gave birth to three sons. This was an emotionally and artistically difficult period for Adrienne Rich.

Meagan Daniels explains that Rich felt it impossible for her to write without space (Daniel). She was struggling with conflicts over the given roles of womanhood versus those of artistry. 'I was writing very little, partly from fatigue, that female fatigue of suppressed anger and loss of contact with my own being; partly from the discontinuity of female life with its attention to small chores, errands, work that others constantly undo, small children's constant needs' (When We Dead Awaken). In this poem, she describes her long struggle to confront her condition as a woman. A stanza from the poem "Of Woman Born" also explains how Rich felt during time when she had just become a mother and was struggling between the role of a woman and that of a poet. 'I knew I had to remake my life; I did not then understand that we the women of that academic community-as in so many middle-class communities of the period-were expected to fill both the part of the Victorian Lady of Leisure, the Angel in the House, and also of the Victorian cook, scullery maid, laundress, governess, and nurse' (Of Woman Born 1976). Her next poem "Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law" was the first change and transformation in her poetic style.

After writing "Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law" she began to date her poetry like entries in a journal. Rich's life was beginning to change now and in 1970 she ended her marriage; that same year, her husband committed suicide. In 1976 Adrienne Rich wrote an essay titled It is the Lesbian in Us and in 1977 she published Twenty-One Love Poems, and in 1980, Rich wrote an essay titled Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence, all of these works revealed her lesbianism. In twenty-One Love Poems the poems recorded and explored a lesbian relationship. The essay It is the Lesbian in Us explains the term "lesbian" from Adrienne Rich's point of view: "nothing so simple and dismissible as the fact that two women might go to bed together, " as she wrote in the essay. Lesbianism for Adrienne Rich was a "sense of desiring oneself, choosing oneself; it was also a primary intensity between women... " (LITWEB).

Even before I wholly knew I was a lesbian, it was the lesbian in me who pursed that elusive configuration. And I believe it is the lesbian in every woman who is compelled by female energy, who gravitates toward strong women, who seeks a literature that will express that energy and strength. It is the lesbian in us who drives us to feel imaginatively, render in language, grasp, the full connection between woman and woman (Adrienne Rich). Concentrating on lesbians in general, Adrienne Rich's poetry has evolved into a passionate political force. Throughout her career, Adrienne Rich has done nothing less than seize and caress the word "lesbian. " She has worked hard for this whole new style of poetry.

This poetry that has opened up a whole new way of life. She has changed the thoughts of many that feared homosexuality and she has also changed the definition of the word "lesbian" from something slimy and nasty to something such as "sense of desiring oneself, choosing oneself; it was also a primary intensity between women... " (It is the Lesbian in Us). Adrienne Rich's childhood years were dominated by the influences of her father. Her relationship with her father was one of strong identification and desire for approval. Rich first began to write poetry conforming to his standards. In the 1960 s, Adrienne Rich began a powerful shift away from her earlier mode as she took up feminist themes. 'Her poetic techniques evolved into a more jagged and urgent style' (Rich).

She began to experiment with the form of her work and to deal with experiences and desires of women from a feminist perspective. During this period of time she accomplished such works as The Necessities of Life (1966), Leaflets (1969), The Will to Change (1971), and Common Language (1978) (Bedford). Also in Blood Bread and Poetry (1986) she identified herself as a radical feminist. Throughout the sixties, Adrienne Rich took part in all sorts of movements for liberation from a male dominated world. Rich's work reflected heavily the oppression she felt in her own life from men and also the lives of all the other women in society. I am a feminist because I feel endangered psychically and physically, by this society and because I believe that the woman's movement is saying that we have come to an edge of history when men-insofar as they are embodiments of the patriarchal idea-have become dangerous to children and other living things, themselves included (Adrienne Rich).

Rich's dream of a better language and a better world has turned her into the best known key figure in feminist poetry (Pettit). In her poetry, Adrienne Rich, has simply provided examples that are her life (Daniel). Her work is not only considered important in regards to women's issues but in relation to in relation to cultural and social issues as well. Adrienne Rich, through her poetry and other works, has developed into one of the most provoking voices on the issues of sexism, feminism, lesbianism, and racism. She wrote many brilliant poems with many great themes. Her influential poetry is taught in English programs and women's studies courses across the entire nation (Barclay).

She is a powerful and interesting writer with brilliant ideas on the world. At the age of twenty-one, in 1951, she received the Yale Younger Poets Award for her first book A Change of World. Other than the Yale Younger Poets Award, she has also received the National Book Award, the Fellowship of American Poets, the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, the Common Wealth Award in Literature, and much more. She has not ceased writing in her unique voice that is full of sound and fury (Barclay). She has fused politics and poetry and also revitalized the lost American institution of political poetry. Adrienne Rich depicts herself in her early 1980 's poem 'Sources, ' 'she is a woman with a mission, not to win prizes / but to change the laws of history' (Rothschild).

Works Cited "Adrienne Rich. " Barclay Agency 2004. 31 Oct 2004. "Adrienne Rich. " Bedford/St. Martin's 1999. 27 Oct 2004. American Literature Web Resources. May 1999.

Millikin University. 2 Nov 2004. Daniel, Meagan. "Adrienne Rich: To Make the Work Her Life, and Her Life the Work. " Empowerment 4 Women. 28 Dec 2004. LITWEB. W. W.

Norton & Company. 28 Dec 2004. Pope, Deborah. "Rich's Life and Career. " Modern American Poetry. (2000) 27 Oct 2004. Pettit, Rhonda. " Bibliography of Adrienne Rich. " Encyclopedia of American Poetry 2001. Compiled and hyperlinked by Gonna Bengtsson. American Poems. com. 30 Dec 2004. "Rich, Adrienne. " Benet's Reader's Encyclopedia of American Literature.

Ed. 1, 1991, Vol. 1 P 909. Tennessee Electronic Library. 29 Oct 2004. Rothschild, Matthew. "Rich 1994 Interview from the Progressive. " Modern American Poetry. (2000) 27 Oct 2004.


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Research essay sample on Modern American Poetry Adrienne Rich

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