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Unread 03-30-2012, 11:37 AM
Christopher ONeill Christopher ONeill is offline
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Join Date: Feb 2012
Location: Cardiff, Wales, UK
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Well into Adrienne Rich' adult years American Poetry courses were still being taught from anthologies like Conrad Aiken's Twentieth Century American Poetry or Van Nostrand and Watts The Conscious Voice. In both selections American poetry means overwhelmingly male, overwhelmingly privileged, and entirely white.
The first time anyone gave me a copy of The Conscious Voice (early 1970's) I honestly thought it was a spoof for well over a week. There couldn't be any academics anywhere in the world that thought that this was the USA (or ever had been).
Even if you think Adrienne Rich got shrill and polemic, it needed doing. She and her generation changed the meaning of Literature, they altered the canon.
Perhaps changing the canon is just as important as writing 'real' poems.
Perhaps it is more important.
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