I have been a bit lax of late, to sit down and write clearly what I meant by
the "the struggle of the female voice" in my post on 7/7/00. It is really,
to give "voice" to the female point of view by writing about the female
(human) experience without being limited by masculine language. Once, the
"struggle" for women was to be able to write at all!, now the "struggle" is
to give voice to women who have no voice ie: those women who are still in
some way being subjugated. Is not one of the roles of the writer to speak
for those who have no voice? Whether it be in poetry, song-writing,
journalism, fiction, ficto-criticism and non-fiction, women need to speak
about the experiences that affect women. This includes voicing women's
hopes, joys, celebrations, fears, anger, hurt and frustrations. The once
'silenced' voice that emerges has a new unique sound, language, a voice that
has soul, a wealth of knowledge, rhythm, the voice that has been struggling
to surface to tell their story. A woman who has the courage to write about
being a rape victim during the Bosnian War, does not want to be told - 'the
case has been made.'

Earlier, I posted one of Grace Nicols poems. She has struggled to find her
female voice which speaks for all those black women who have no voice. Her
argument as a poet has been that she cannot write for all the downtrodden,
but she has helped through her poetry to give an opinion which she does in
one called 'Of Course, When They Ask For Poems About the Realities of Black
Women,' where she empathises with their plight:
             'And there are black women
              considered so dangerous
              in South Africa
              they prison them away.'
I know nothing of this. I want to read more of this kind of poetry. I want
to hear about the subjugated voice of the black woman. I want to hear the
calypso rhythms of the Caribbean poet.

Geraldine:  What do you mean about 'the gap has been filled, the case has
been made?
In this country we are only just starting to hear the voices of the female
Aboriginal poets. They all know about a 200 year gap.
A bigger gap yet to be filled - the voices of women jailed for adultery
under Islamic fundamentalism and what about the black voices of African
women who are still today being circumcised?

the case has been made - not likely!

HH
>
>I accept that at a certain point in time it may be important for poets,
>indeed writers generally, to explore a articular shere ofexperience - I'm
>thinking of the War poets, whose work Yeats excluded from the anthology of
>Modern Verse he edited - not a suitable subject for poetry apparently. The
>same has been trueof women but I'd argue that the gap has been filled, the
>case has been made. In some instances one could even say it's been too easy
>- the sort of sensitive lyric about 'feminine' (gritting my teeth
>here)subjects like childbirth and rearing seems to sit to well with an idea
>of femaleness I thought we were trying to get rid of.Not to mention that
>parenthood is a complex and demanding experience - there's a poem by Gwen
>Harwood most Australianlist members would know, I only wish I could
>remember the title -but it ends with a young mother saying of her children
>- they have devoured me.

>But sooner or later it's time to move on and this is where it should get
>interesting, and it has. When I think f the women poets (and I hate
>thinking in those terms) whose work I respect (do we need names, say
>Dickinson, Niedecker, Notley, Howe and Howe, Stein,  whose work I don't
>know >well but who really ought to bementioned), they have moved beyond a
>defined sphere of female experience without sacrificing
>whatever accrues from gender. And I've never been sure quite what that is.
>I've always thought and felt it's mre meaningful to say I'm a human.
>
>Finally, if it is possible that women might bring something new to poetry
>(of course, why must it just be one thing-) it won't be by writing about
>new subjects in an old way, expressing a paradigm of the poet as sensitive
>individual that,if probed, would probably reveal itself as grounded in the
>cultural biases of'masculine' society. Rather, it will be by atempting new
>ways of thinking (this is already happening), new forms perhaps and yes,
>new >and better words.


>best
>
>Geraldine
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>

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