Of Woman Born: Motherhood As Experience And Institution, By Adrienne Rich: An Analysis

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Recommended: Women and gender in American society in the 19th century

In Adrienne Rich’s book “Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution,” where Rich illustrates her own life experience as a woman, a poet, a feminist, and a mother she states, “We need to imagine a world in which every woman is the presiding genius of her own body. In such a world women will truly create new life, bringing forth not only children if and as we choose but the visions, and the thinking, necessary to sustain, console and alter human existence-a new relationship to the universe” (Rich, Adrienne). Rich’s feminist perspective of a woman’s role in a relationship is influenced through the time period she is married in and the life experiences she endures. Born in 1929, Adrienne Rich was raised in an educated household where …show more content…

During this time there was a general uprising for the idea that women deserved the same rights as men instead of viewing women solely as their husband’s property. Women wanted complete equality and rejected the social standards of sexism. After the war, when the feeling of empowerment was stripped away from women, women 's roles went back to the status quo from before the war, restricting them to household activities. The nation that needed women’s help in a time of crisis proved it was not yet ready for the greater social equality that women would slowly gain in the following …show more content…

Aunt Jennifer is “bound by her wedding ring. She, like the ring itself, is confined to a specific, limited space” ("Overview: “Aunt Jennifer 's Tigers”." Gale Online Encyclopedia. Detroit: Gale, 2016. Literature Resource Center. Web. 27 Mar. 2016.). “The massive weight of Uncle’s wedding band” symbolizes a stereotypical 1950’s marriage, one where a woman is tightly wound around the circumference of the husband 's universe. The wedding band is heavy and constricting symbolizing how women are held back in marriages. Aunt Jennifer’s “fluttering” fingers are weighed down by her wedding ring signifying that her weakness stems from her marriage. Because 1950’s marriages required women to be devoted to their husband’s, Aunt Jennifer’s only way of truly living is through sewing, yet her ring keeps getting in the way “find[ing] even the ivory needle hard to pull.” Although constrained in the male dominated relationship, Aunt Jennifer takes control of her artwork and designs an image of masculine tigers. Creating the tigers in this artwork allows Aunt Jennifer to feel freedom because she is the one sewing the picture. Like Aunt Jennifer, the tigers can 't break free from their stitched patterns, reflecting that Rich feels that in marriage a woman is stuck with no way out. Yet despite their

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