"I look everywhere for signs of that fusion I have glimpsed in the women's movement, and most recently in Nicaragua. I turn to Toni Cade Bambara's The Salt Eaters or Ama Ata Aidoo's Our Sister Killjoy or James Baldwin's Just above My Head; to paintings by Frida Kahlo or Jacob Lawrence; to poems by Dionne Brand or Judy Grahn or Audre Lorde or Nancy MorejĂłn; to the music of Nina Simone or Mary Watkins. This kind of art-like the art of so many others uncanonized in the dominant culture-is not produced as a commodity, but as part of a long conversation with the elders and with the future. (And, yes, I do live and work believing in a future.) Such artists draw on a tradition in which political struggle and spiritual continuity are meshed. Nothing need be lost, no beauty sacrificed. The heart does not turn to a stone. ("Blood, Bread, and Poetry: The Location of the Poet" 1983)"
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Educators from the United StatesAnti-war activistsWomen authors from the United States20th-century poets from the United StatesFeminists from the United States
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Imported from EN Wikiquote
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Adrienne_Rich
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Adrienne Rich
Adrienne Rich (16 May 1929 - 27 March 2012) was an American feminist, poet, teacher, and writer.
176 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Adrienne Rich →
Related Quotes
"We may feel bitterly how little our poems can do in the face of seemingly out-of-control technological power and seem…"
"As feminists, we need to be looking above all for the greatness and sanity of ordinary women, and how these women hav…"
"Aunt Jennifer's tigers prance across a screen, Bright topaz denizens of a world of green. They do not fear the men be…"
"A thinking woman sleeps with monsters."
"I have to say that what I know I know through making poems."
"instead of poems about experiences I am getting poems that are experiences, that contribute to my knowledge and my em…"
"The words are purposes. The words are maps. I came to see the damage that was done and the treasures that prevail."
"To become a token woman—whether you win the Nobel Prize or merely get tenure at the cost of denying your sisters—is t…"
"False history gets made all day, any day, the truth of the new is never on the news False history gets written every …"
"we need to know where we have been: we need our history."