Sarah Bevan |
Modernist poets, like Edna St. Vincent Millay, were focused on creating highly expressive and oftentimes political pieces that spoke to the culture in which they lived. Millay’s poem “I, being born a woman and distressed” was published in 1923, near the beginning of an era that would redefine female sexuality, and that would ultimately pave the way for women to be granted rights that had historically been reserved only for men. In this poem, the speaker is immediately assertive; she makes it abundantly clear to the lover she is addressing that she is in total control of their relationship dynamic, and that she simply wants sex from him, with no strings attached. Of course, Millay’s poetry was shocking to readers at the time, due to its boundary-pushing and quite political nature. We all could have guessed that. However, her work differs from that of other modernist writers, such as T.S. Eliot or William Carlos Williams, because she is highlighting a universal experience that only women readers could identify with. Her word choice is key in connecting her poetry with the gender politics of the time period. “To bear your body's weight upon my breast” appears to be ambiguous, as it can be read as a reinforcement of her desire to have sex with her lover, or it can be interpreted as a critique of the way women were treated by men in the early twentieth century.
Historically, sex was often a tool used by men to reassert their power over the women they engaged with. I believe that Millay is implying that female sexuality during that time was suffocating; sex was an enormous burden for women to “bear,” because it was often a power struggle for women, and because whether a woman was a virgin or was sexually active, she would be identified and treated as such. The speaker’s assertive tone conveys Millay’s beliefs that women do not exist to be subservient, that they are not waiting to be saved by a man, and that women can have agency over their sexuality (or virginity) without being defined by it.
2 Comments
9/15/2019 03:31:43 pm
I love the ideas you have presented here. Specifically when you discussed how the sexuality of the women was often controlled, and defined her worth in society. When I read this poem, I did not see the part about how the weight of sex women were forced to deal with went beyond the actual act and really did suffocate them in their regular lives as well. All in all I really enjoyed your post and made me see things that I hadn't when I had read the poem.
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sandra
9/15/2019 05:53:17 pm
This poem's assertiveness in that era was a total boss move on Millay's part, she didn't confine her art form but boldly expressed it. Power moves!
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