Adrienne Rich Quotes, Art Quotes, Writing Quotes

I think of poetry as something out there in the world and within each of us. I don't mean that everyone can write poetry - it's an art, a craft, it requires enormous commitment like any art. But there's a core of desire in each of us and poetry goes to and comes from that core. It's the social, economic, institutional gap that makes it difficult.

6 years ago

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Tags : Adrienne Rich Quotes , Art Quotes , Writing Quotes

The difficulty of saying I-a phrase from the East German novelist Christa Wolf. But once having said it, as we realize the necessity to go further, isn't there a difficulty of saying 'we'? You cannot speak for me. I cannot speak for you. Two thoughts: there is no liberation that only knows how to say 'I'; there is no collective movement that speaks for each of us all the way through.

6 years ago

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Tags : Adrienne Rich Quotes , Two Quotes , Phrases Quotes

The repossession by women of our bodies will bring far more essential change to human society than the seizing of the means of production by workers.

6 years ago

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Tags : Adrienne Rich Quotes , Mean Quotes , Aquariums Quotes

The words are purposes./The words are maps./I came to see the damage that was done/and the treasures that prevail.

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Language is as real, as tangible, in our lives as streets, pipelines, telephone switchboards, microwaves, radioactivity, cloning laboratories, nuclear power stations.

6 years ago

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One of the great functions of art is to help us imagine what it is like to be not ourselves, what it is like to be someone or something else, what it is like to live in another skin, what it is like to live in another body, and in that sense to surpass ourselves, to go out beyond ourselves.

6 years ago

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Tags : Adrienne Rich Quotes , Art Quotes , Skins Quotes

We who were loved will never unlive that crippling fever.

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Tags : Adrienne Rich Quotes , Love Quotes

Can individual psychic wounds really heal in an abusive and fragmented society? Audre Lorde has a poem which begins, "What do we want from each other/ after we have told our stories?" Where do we go to explore our stake with others in such a society?

6 years ago

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Tags : Adrienne Rich Quotes , Psychics Quotes , Stories Quotes

The channel of art can only become clogged and misdirected by the artist's concern with merely temporary and local disturbances. The song is higher than the struggle.

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Tags : Adrienne Rich Quotes , Song Quotes , Art Quotes

As her sons have seen her: the mother in patriarchy: controlling, erotic, castrating, heart-suffering, guilt-ridden, and guilt-provoking; a marble brow, a huge breast, an avid cave; between her legs snakes, swamp-grass, or teeth; on her lap a helpless infant or a martyred son. She exists for one purpose: to bear and nourish the son.

6 years ago

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Tags : Adrienne Rich Quotes , Mother Quotes , Heart Quotes

When a woman tells the truth she is creating the possibility for more truth around her.

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Tags : Adrienne Rich Quotes , Creating Quotes , Telling The Truth Quotes

One does not give birth in a void, but rather in a cultural and political context. Laws, professional codes, religious sanctions, and ethnic traditions all affect women's choices concerning childbirth.

6 years ago

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Tags : Adrienne Rich Quotes , Religious Quotes , Law Quotes

In the interstices of language lie powerful secrets of the culture.

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Tags : Adrienne Rich Quotes , Powerful Quotes , Lying Quotes