Anne Sexton, “Her Kind” (1960)
I have gone out, a possessed witch, haunting the black air, braver at night; dreaming evil, I have done my hitch over the plain houses, light by light: lonely thing, twelve-fingered, out of mind.
A woman like that is not a woman, quite.
I have been her kind.
I have found the warm caves in the woods, filled them with skillets, carvings, shelves, closets, silks, innumerable goods; fixed the suppers for the worms and the elves: whining, rearranging the disaligned.
A woman like that is misunderstood.
I have been her kind.
I have ridden in your cart, driver, waved my nude arms at villages going by, learning the last bright routes, survivor where your flames still bite my thigh and my ribs crack where your wheels wind.
A woman like that is not ashamed to die.
I have been her kind.
Paraphrase I went out alone as a possessed witch without thinking about it. I understand that women who go out are not women. I discovered caves and started to put household items in there. I understand that women has to be seen to be organized. I went out to ride I found cool stuff in the caves in the woods. I also rode the driver’s cart and felt pain.
II. Thematic Analysis
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Anne Sexton outlines how women are originally in the household doing chores and works for a living. However, women are still looked down upon even if they fulfill their labeled duties, such as cooking. In the end, she clarifies that women who do not pass the feminine ideals are not ashamed of who they are because of the opportunities they have done besides the ideals of society. Through the use of various poetic techniques, Sexton depicts that deviant women understand the sufferings of each other because of how society misunderstands
This concept is symbolized in the fact that though Elisa raises her chrysanthemums out of pride and genuine appreciation of their beauty, her husband merely praises their basic quality and automatically urges her to re-allocate her efforts to a productive purpose, saying “I wish you’d work out in the orchards and raise some apples that big.” (Steinbeck 2). His unwillingness to appreciate the application of her “feminine” talent of gardening to create beauty and his intimation that only a lucrative fertility would be valued from her debases her womanhood to a mere execution of duty, undermining her worth and attractiveness as an individual. This theme is echoed symbolically in the fact that Henry and the tinker only approach her garden domain out of necessity; Henry to inform her in the most basic way and to dictate what they will do that evening, the tinker in hopes of targeting her as a domestic consumer and thereby coaxing her to provide him with means of sustenance (2, 4). The result of this is that it is ingrained in Elisa that the extent of the worth of her womanhood in society and at home is confined to her usefulness as a producer of low-level domestic assets and
In the novel,”Annie John”, by Jamaica Kincaid, it discusses the gender stereotypes placed upon women. By looking at the descriptiveness and tone of the passage, it can be told that the narrator feels that she is always treated less than the other gender, which she doesn't like, and the narrator doesn’t want to be in this position anymore. This is important because it reflects how the narrator feels about the gender stereotypes she has to go through, which essentially shape her into the person she will become. The tone the narrator uses to show that she is given a lesser role shows that this is a big problem for her.
Maybe life is just a period of time that we exist in this world. Even though we have to enjoy it purposely, not just living as the robots wait until the day we run out of energy. Some of us find ourselves strong, some of us think that ourselves as weak as we used to be but in fact none of us is weak, nor strong. The difference between us that is having our own different purpose in life. Some of us might have an easy purpose to achieve, some of us might have a tough one to accomplish it.
In times in hysteria and crisis, people will do all they can do to redirect blame from themselves. This is exemplified in The Crucible, by Arthur Miller, and “Half Hanged Mary”, by Margaret Atwood. The Crucible is a story about a Puritan village that experiences a major crisis in which people, predominantly women, are believed to be witches. This causes a series of events in which people are hanged, simply for being alive. Half Hanged Mary is a poem about a woman who is hanged for being a witch, but does not die.
Her poetry thrived on issues of the female incessant struggle, and her poems were “encoded with images of domesticity and motherhood – images which gender [her] poetry – and [her] employment of the first person pronoun” in her poetry (Crosbie 59). Kathleen L. Nichols, in her biographical account of Anne Sexton, states that “[Sexton]’s first three volumes of poetry contain many of the autobiographical themes that preoccupied her throughout her poetic career: mental breakdown and recovery, parent-daughter relationships, and women’s roles and identities” (331). She prolifically produced eight volumes of poems: To Bedlam and Part Way Back (1960), All My Pretty Ones (1962), Live or Die (1966). In 1969, she wrote a play entitled Mercy Street,
This essay will discuss the ways in which Angela Carter employs fashion as a thematic device that deconstructs rigid perceptions of gender roles in the short stories ‘The Bloody Chamber’ and ‘The Tiger’s Bride’ with regard to Entwistle’s statement. Halpin writes, “The women of The Bloody Chamber are not simple or idealized feminist restorations. Instead, each is crafted from a dark and intricate human framework (the same from which Carter creates her male characters) that allows them to transcend conventional gender roles. Across the collection, both female and male characters have been depicted as cruel or kind, passive or possessive, victimized or villainous.” (2015:1).
In Alice Munro's 'The Shining Houses', the themes of women's oppression and resistance are prominently depicted as female characters challenge patriarchal norms and fight for their rights and dignity. Women are often expected to conform to certain gender norms, and those who deviate from them face harsh consequences. Through a feminist lens, the story highlights how women are consistently perceived as inferior to men. This essay argues that Munro's portrayal of the treatment of women in the story serves to challenge traditional notions of gender roles and expectations. The essay will examine how men treat Mrs. Fullerton for her non-conformity and how Mary is treated when she does not adhere to the norms.
It is also important to see how she used stylistic devices, and how she set up the imagery using tone in her poem. Feminism was highly needed in Sexton’s time and it proves to be a pressing concern in society
This misunderstood, distanced woman is not afraid to die as she has nothing to be ashamed
A main theme of this poem is gender. Anne Sexton uses a female figure to be a symbol of what society fears about women and that women can be scary at times, which can be a good thing, (Shmoop Editorial Team). Another poem by Anne Sexton is “Housewife.” This poem reflects on how a woman is trapped in her position in the home. “Some women marry houses,” is the first line of the poem and it shows that for many women “the household was their job.
It is also through Kincaid 's use of her setting, constructive atmosphere, and one sentence structure that some readers can better understand the mother 's belief of how productivity will lead to a respected life. After reading "Girl" readers are now made more aware of the direct relation between domestic knowledge and strict gender roles being forced onto
When the girl starts challenging the maternal principles by disclosing her lesbian tendencies, the mother decides to adopt extremes remedial measures, thus turning into the archetypal character of the witch. While this strategy allows her to control her daughter’s behaviour, it destroys the reciprocal trust that links the two female characters. The mother is so determined not to give up on her plans for Jeanette’s future that she decides to turn the whole religious community against the girl, and to physically punish her through starvation and exhausting exorcisms in order to save her daughter’s soul and her own dreams. At this point, the mother seems to be willing to distinguish between Jeanette ‘the Wilful Sinner’, who rejected her teachings and betrayed her publicly, and Jeanette ‘the Perfect Missionary’, the holy instrument she created for the Lord. The maternal aggressive attitude profoundly affects the girl’s trust in the maternal figure.
For most people, gender is implicitly understood as a self-evident reality-a natural extension of our biology. Most of us are assigned to one of two gender categories at birth and follow the delineated and socially constructed path for that particular gender. However, in literature gender can characterize more than ones sex or future expectations. The short story ”A Wicked Woman” written by Jack London highlights the diversity of gender roles. ” A Wicked Woman” was published in 1906 emphasizes female and male roles in a relationship during the 20th century in The United States of America.
People tend to reduce others to stereotypes to better understand them and predict their behavior. Women especially find themselves being labeled as a static being so men don’t have to work to figure them out. Over the centuries, many stereotypes, mostly derogatory, have been used to describe women and keep them from evolving both in men’s minds as well as in reality. In “Her Kind”, Anne Sexton evaluates three different archetypes women fill using different rhetorical strategies but uses repetition to tie the images together. The first stanza portrays a woman as “a possessed witch” and uses detailed imagery to illustrate the need for women to fit into all prescribed societal roles for them.
In many stories, the characters are what define the narrative; they separate the engaging stories from the monotonous, the humourous from the somber, and the good from the great. Often, a reader’s understanding of a character changes as a story progresses and new perspectives emerge, allowing for characters to be shaped into three-dimensional, dynamic personas that resonate with the audience. In Alice Munro’s short story, “The Shining Houses”, the application of the feminist lens allows for a more profound understanding of both Mary and Mrs. Fullerton; bringing insightful perspectives on the traits both characters possess. More specifically, Mary is seen to be both self conscious and courageous when analyzing the need for masculine protection