Poets and Newspapers- The Guardian

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Saturday March 15, 2008 11:04

by C Murray

British Dailies and Women Poets

Both Guardian and London Independent are giving away free poetic booklets in a series,
something which I.T has done over years with the 'Saturday Poem': Review section.

The Guardian , yesterday published, an opinion piece about poetry and gender by a
woman writer which alluded to the fact that only one woman was represented in the Guardian
Series. Sylvia Plath. (excellent Poet ,cf embedded video)

Thought I'd name a few women writers to redress the balance a bit...

Agnes Nemes Nagy (Magyar, Poet and Political activist)
Liliana Ursu (Romanian)
Tess Gallagher (US)
Sinead Morrissey (Irish)
Medb Mc Guckian (Irish)
Paula Meehan (Irish)
Maire Mhac an Tsaoi (Irish)
Adrienne Rich (US)
Eileen ni Chuileann (sic)
some of the founderesses:-
Julian Of Norwich.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
Emily Dickinson.
Emily, Anne and Charlotte Bronte (Brunty)
Tony Morrisson.
+
Countless un-named and un-famous singers, story-tellers, rhyme -readers and teachers
of children.

The Plath you-tube is a later film (Plath died in 1962, by her own hand), the Guardian
introduction by Margaret Drabble begins thusly:
"Sylvia Plath was the first poet to write great poetry about child-birth. Hr suicide
at th age of thirty made her a legend, but she left a legacy far richer than the story
of her tragic death. Her poetry is appalling but it is also exhilirating. She embodied
a seismic shift in consciousness which enabled us to feel and think as we do today,
and of which she was a supremely vulnerable and willing casualty. She changed
our world".

(I would add to that that she was a voice of diaspora and alienation who constantly
fought and strove to be a part of the world and ultimately lost the battle.)

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Comments (6 of 6)

Nagy review

by c murray

Mon Mar 17, 2008 18:13

The review of Agnes Nemes Nagy, an incredible woman writer came along with a discussion on poetry ireland
forum regarding the issue of translation (in collaboration and on the net)
http://www.poetryireland.ie/publications/book-reviews/r....html
http://www.poetryireland.ie/forum

Look...

by Fiery

Mon Mar 17, 2008 23:06

...some of those women are worthy (many I've never heard of, and I would be fairly widely read), but for each decent female poet out there, there are three brilliant male poets.
There is good poetry by women, but in terms of quality and volume, men still outshine women.

O well, I completely agree with that

Tue Mar 18, 2008 10:08

Thats why I started the thread...

Men would have more time to be inspecting the belly button fluff and blowing it into the air
to watch the rainbows. They have the peculiar quality beloved of us girlies to focus on
one issue at a time (multi-tasking fecks with poetry) , but they will never write the
giving birth nor multi-orgasmic poem in a manner that I would buy...(and I do not mean
that commercially).

Chris, read...

by Mark C

Tue Mar 18, 2008 10:32

Chris,

Have a read of the Molly Bloom soliloquy from Ulysses.

Mark.

I Love Joyce, Mark (yep)

Tue Mar 18, 2008 11:53

and I think he did write pretty amazingly on orgasms, periods and infant death.
His description of Rudy in his little helmet carrying the lamb is tremendous.

The walking through the city of Dublin by a cuckold to facilitate his wife's sex life
because he is impotent after the death of the baby is stunning, but I would not hold
it up as the only literary exemplar of writing on things female by a man.

I like Chaucer's Wyf of Bath too.

I found in college (years ago) that unless women specifically studied women's studies
that the curriculum (much like the Guardian newspaper) tended to be weighted toward
the male voice.

I never did women's studies.

I like to hear women's voices on things, many women do.

But I think Joyce amazing , and Eliot (murder in the cathedral- the chorus) and Chaucer.
am not saying that men cannot write women, just that women do seem horribly
under-represented in the 'great poet's series' (guardian newspaper)

description of Rudy in Ulysses (read it again today)

Tue Mar 18, 2008 19:51

"Silent, thoughtful, alert he stands on guard, his fingers on his lips in the attitude of
secret master.Against the dark wall a figure appears slowly, a fairy boy of eleven,
a changeling, kidnapped, dressed in an Eton suit with glass shoes and a little bronze
helmet, holding a book in his hand. He reads from right to left inaudibly, smiling, kissing the
page."
+
'Gazes unseen into Bloom's eyes and goes on reading, kissing, smiling. He has
a delicate mauve face. On his suit he has diamond and ruby buttons. In his free hand he
holds a slim ivory cane with a violet bowknot. A white lambkin peeps out of his
waistcoat pocket'...

(From 'Ulysses')

The question of birth and loss in a woman's voice can be found in Sylvia
Plath's 'Three Women' which was produced for the BBC or in any of the
poems she dedicated to her children. These are in 'The Selected Sylvia Plath'
(FF) and Ariel ('The Restored Edition' was edited by her Daughter and is also Faber
and Faber)

http://plagiarist.com/poetry/1454

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Poets and Newspapers- The Guardian

Comments (6 of 6)