happen, however locally and on however limited
a scale—there is an energy there.
We’re in this for the long haul. That just
cannot be said too often. I mean, there’s not
going to be some miracle in the year 2001. It
seems to me our thinking is much less naive
than when I started out—about what it’s going
to take to make real human possibility happen,
to make a democracy that will really be for us all.
Q: You write in What Is Found There,
‘‘You’re tired of these lists; so am I’’—these lists
being sexism, racism, homophobia, etc. Do you
ever get so tired that you just don’t want to do
politics for a while?
Rich:No, I’m not tired of the issues; I’m
tired of the lists—the litany. We’re forced to
keep naming these abstractions, but the realities
behind them are not abstract. The writer’s job is
to keep the concreteness behind the abstractions
visible and alive. How can I be tired of the issues?
The issues are our lives.
Source:Matthew Rothschild, ‘‘Interview with Adrienne
Rich,’’ inProgressive, Vol. 58, January 1994, pp. 31–35.
Sources
Chafe, William H., The Road to Equality: American
Women since 1962, Vol. 10 ofYoung Oxford History of
Women in the United States, Oxford University Press,
1994.
Friedan, Betty,The Feminine Mystique, Norton, 1963,
pp. 37, 62.
———, ‘‘Television and the Feminine Mystique,’’ inIt
Changed My Life: Writings on the Women’s Movement,
Random House, 1976, pp. 48, 56.
Hole, Judith, and Ellen Levine,Rebirth of Feminism,
Quadrangle Books, 1971, p. 170.
Jong, Erica, ‘‘Visionary Anger,’’ in Adrienne Rich’s
Poetry, edited by Barbara Charlesworth Gelpi and Albert
Gelpi, Norton, 1975, p. 174; originally published inMs.,
July 1973, pp. 31–33.
Langdell, Cheri Colby,Adrienne Rich: The Moment of
Change, Praeger, 2004, pp. 118–19.
Martin, Wendy, ‘‘From Patriarchy to the Female Princi-
ple: A Chronological Reading of Adrienne Rich’s
Poems,’’ inAdrienne Rich’s Poetry, edited by Barbara
Charlesworth Gelpi and Albert Gelpi, Norton, 1975,
p. 185.
McDaniel, Judith,Reconstituting the World: The Poetry
and Vision of Adrienne Rich, Spinsters, Ink, 1978, pp.
15–16.
Papachristou, Judith,Women Together: A History in
Documents of the Women’s Movement in the United
States, Knopf, 1976, p. 220.
Rich, Adrienne, ‘‘Diving into the Wreck,’’ inDiving into
the Wreck: Poems, 1971–1972, Norton, 1973, pp. 22–24.Further Reading
Freedman, Estelle,No Turning Back: The History of
Feminism and the Future of Women, Ballantine, 2002.
In a global historical context, Freedman exam-
ines how patriarchy and gender segregation first
emerged and the history of women’s resistance
to it. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, she
discusses subjects including politics, economics,
race, and violence in relation to feminism.
Keyes, Claire,The Aesthetics of Power: The Poetry of
Adrienne Rich, University of Georgia Press, 1986.
In a brief excerpt in this work regarding ‘‘Div-
ing into the Wreck,’’ Keyes analyzes the poem
as a heroic quest, emphasizing the idea of
androgyny.
Schneir, Miriam, ed.,Feminism: The Essential Historical
Writings, Vintage, 1994.
This is a collection of more than forty historical
feminist writings, covering a period from the
American Revolution to the early twentieth
century. The collection includes excerpts from
books, essays, speeches, letters, poetry, and
fiction.
Templeton, Alice,The Dream and the Dialogue: Adrienne
Rich’s Feminist Poetics, University of Tennessee Press, 1994.
Templeton discusses the poems inDiving into
the Wreckin terms of Rich’s growing feminist
vision. She notes that in ‘‘Diving into the
Wreck,’’ Rich pays more attention to the proc-
ess of exploring the wreck than the nature of
the wreck itself.Diving into the Wreck