Introduction


Sappho

Emily Dickinson

Anne Sexton
The relationship of women to their own poetry is a problematic one. One issue is the female poet’s marginal position with regard to literary tradition. Is she a part of it? Can she use its images and figures, myths and history, to express her specifically female experience? How has she done so in the past? Does her revisionary work allow her greater expression? How does the inclusion of women’s work provide a more complete picture not only of the history of poetry, but also of cultural history? A second problem concerns a great irony in the history of women’s poetry. For women to be considered as artists, they have had to claim modesty, for becoming a public figure (a published writer) was as good as bringing shame on one’s family for illicit behavior. Moreover, when the public has approved of a female poet, it has often been exactly for her modesty: Even Adrienne Rich’s first volume was said by W. H. Auden to contain poems “neatly and modestly dressed.” Female poets also have been praised for the gentle virtues embodied in the Victorian ministering angel: delicacy, spirituality, and grace. Genius and originality displayed by female poets often have been seen as accidental or masculine, and the recording of women’s experiences as inferior because it is not universal. Female poets have been seen as neurasthenic oddities, as strident Amazons, and as the angels of the house of literature. Rarely has their work been considered without the application of moral judgments. Feminist criticism and scholarship, however, have asked new questions in the late twentieth century: Is there a specifically female voice in poetry? Does it express a female worldview? Are there metaphors, tropes, forms typically used or adapted by women? What have been the material circumstances—education, financial independence, freedom, and the survival of childbearing—necessary for women to write? -- Women Poetry Criticism
 

Recommended Resources

  1. A Narrow Fellow in the Grass Study Guide (eNotes) - Emily Dickinson
  2. Adrienne Rich (Feminism in Literature)
  3. Sappho (Classical and Medieval Criticism)
  4. Sylvia Plath (Critical Survey of Poetry)
  5. Women Poetry and Poets (Women’s Issues: Ready Reference Series)

All Resources

Display as: Categories, List
  1. A Narrow Fellow in the Grass Study Guide (eNotes) - Emily Dickinson
  2. Adrienne Rich (Contemporary Literary Criticism: Vol. 125)
  3. Adrienne Rich (Critical Survey of Poetry)
  4. Adrienne Rich (Cyclopedia of World Authors)
  5. Adrienne Rich (Feminism in Literature)
  6. Anne Bradstreet (Critical Survey of Poetry)
  7. Anne Bradstreet (Cyclopedia of World Authors)
  8. Anne Bradstreet (Dictionary of World Biography: The 17th and 18th Centuries)
  9. Anne Sexton
  10. Anne Sexton (Critical Survey of Poetry)
  11. Anne Sexton (Cyclopedia of World Authors)
  12. Anne Sexton (Dictionary of World Biography: The 20th Century)
  13. Anne Sexton (Feminism in Literature)
  14. Anne Sexton (Identities and Issues in Literature)
  15. Blackberrying Study Guide (eNotes) - Sylvia Plath
  16. Courage Study Guide (eNotes) - Anne Sexton
  17. Emily Dickinson
  18. Emily Dickinson (Critical Survey of Poetry)
  19. Emily Dickinson (Cyclopedia of World Authors)
  20. Emily Dickinson (Dictionary of World Biography: The 19th Century)
  21. Gwendolyn Brooks
  22. Gwendolyn Brooks (Feminism in Literature)
  23. Hymn to Aphrodite Study Guide (eNotes) - Sappho
  24. I felt a Funeral, in my Brain Study Guide (eNotes) - Emily Dickinson
  25. Knoxville, Tennesee Study Guide (eNotes) - Nikki Giovanni
  26. Much Madness Is Divinest Sense Study Guide (eNotes) - Emily Dickinson
  27. My Life Closed Twice Before Its Close Study Guide (eNotes) - Emily Dickinson
  28. Nikki Giovanni (Critical Survey of Poetry)
  29. Nikki Giovanni (Cyclopedia of World Authors)
  30. Nikki Giovanni (Magill’s Choice: American Ethnic Writers)
  31. Nikki Giovanni (Poetry Criticism)
  32. Phillis Wheatley (Critical Survey of Poetry)
  33. Phillis Wheatley (Literary Criticism: 1400-1800)
  34. Poems of Emily Dickinson (American History Through Literature)
  35. Rusted Legacy Study Guide (eNotes) - Adrienne Rich
  36. Sappho (Classical and Medieval Criticism)
  37. Sappho (The Oxford Companion to English Literature)
  38. Sara Teasdale (Critical Survey of Poetry)
  39. Sara Teasdale (Dictionary of World Biography: The 20th Century)
  40. Sylvia Plath (Critical Survey of Poetry)
  41. Sylvia Plath (Dictionary of World Biography: The 20th Century)
  42. The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson (Masterplots II: Women’s Literature Series)
  43. The Diary of Emily Dickinson (Magill Book Reviews)
  44. There Will Come Soft Rains Study Guide (eNotes) - Sara Teasdale
  45. To His Excellency General Washington Study Guide (eNotes) - Phillis Wheatley
  46. Women Poetry and Poets (Women’s Issues: Ready Reference Series)