Poetry by Women in America : Esthetics in Evolution

Abstract

Unborn sisters, look back on us in mercy where we failed ourselves, see us not one-dimensional but with the past as your steadying and corrective lens. —Adrienne Rich, "Turning the Wheel"' In the past sixty years women in America have come to enjoy a general recognition for their poetry that their ancestors could not have imagined. Although women have written poetry throughout history, and a great deal from earlier periods is now being rediscovered, the quantity of published work was small, the audience select or non-existent, and the general attitude negative. Muriel Rukeyser sums up the problem of women poets in courses and anthologies: "One undergraduate said to me There are no women until after Easter.'"2 Historical editions of literature present an extremely low per- centage of women, but contemporary anthologies are becoming better balanced.3 Women are simply writing more today, are writing as women to a universal audience, and are being taken seriously as poets. Yet this deve- lopment has come about gradually, and the form and character of poetry by women in the twentieth century is still in a state of evolution. Although this phenomenon seems to be true of many western countries, the radical development of poetry by women is so pronounced, so extreme and self-aware in the United States, as to constitute a unique experience. Three specific stages may be distinguished: the period beginning with the enfranchisement of women following World War I and concluding with the reintroduction of the "feminine mystique" in American culture following World War II; the period between World War II and the politicization of women's lives through the war protest, the civil rights movements, and other national concerns; and the present period of the psychological, political and social revolution in the form of the feminist movement. The three parts of this essay trace these stages.