Feminist Poetry

In the quote by Rushdie, 3 main concepts are brought about, of what poetry should achieve. Those 3 things are to name the unnamable, to take sides, which could be controversial, and to shape the world. These are arguably 3 of the most important aspects of poetry, and these are three aspects, which are present in the studied works, as well as the unseen work.

Firstly, the studied poems do take sides, even if they could be controversial. In the poems Phenomenal Woman by Maya Angelou, and Daddy by Sylvia Plath, two very contrasting sides to an argument or rather idea are presented; that idea being the control and influence that men can have on a woman’s life. Plath presents a view of the absolute control men can have on a woman, and she shows the damage that can be dealt by men on a woman’s life. She speaks of how the two men in her life, her father and her boyfriend. It all started with her father, who treated her terribly and damaged her emotionally. This was to the extent that she said “Daddy, Daddy, you bastard, I’m Through”, not a normal thing to say about ones father. In fact her father had such a large influence on her that even although she hated what he did to her, she fell in love with another man who did exactly the same to her. The ideas presented in Phenomenal Woman are very different. Woman are made to be an unstoppable force, and they in fact dominate men, having influence over the lives of males such as

“I walk into a room

Just as cool as you please

And to a man,

The fellows stand or

Fall Down on their knees.”

rather than having males influence their own lives. Woman are described as independent. These two ideas presented by Plath and Angelou, are both very much to a side of the spectrum of the idea; they have most definitely taken sides, and they have both presented views that could be controversial, that could start debates. Angelou’s view is very much a view that could completely oppose those of the stereotypical right wing conservative male. It promotes ideas of woman being equal to men, if not superior, and these are views that would most definitely offend sexist males, thus it takes a side and creates an argument. At the other end of the spectrum you get Daddy by Plath. She presents a view in which males exercise their dominance over woman, another view that would definitely offend woman wanting equal rights, or feminists. Thus between the two poems arguments are already created as the two take different sides on an issue. However these poems could take a while to be understood, from the readers point of view, and so the two sides to the argument are not immediately presented. This is where the unseen comes in, as everything is a process of kneading, and satisfaction and understanding takes time. So when Plath and Angelou write their poems, they are “Mixing the dough of experience with the yeast of inspiration” and they are kneading it for the first time. The second kneading and baking comes when the reader reads and tries to understand it. The reader then “Bakes it in the oven of their heart” until they take their own opinions and they come to their own conclusions of the poem. This is when the poem has been understood, once the reader has “kneaded” (analysed) the poem, this is when the poem can start debates and really show which side it has taken as it may not be immediately obvious.

The second point to that is most definitely brought about within the poetry