Editing Adrienne Rich

{{short description|American poet, essayist and feminist (1929–2012)}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=May 2022}}
{{Infobox writer
| image        = Adrienne Rich 1980.jpg
| caption      = Rich in 1980
| birth_name   = Adrienne Cecile Rich
| birth_date   = {{birth date|1929|5|16}}
| birth_place  = [[Baltimore, Maryland]], U.S.
| death_date   = {{death date and age|2012|3|27|1929|5|16}}
| death_place  = [[Santa Cruz, California]], U.S.
| occupation   = {{flatlist|
* Poet
* non-fiction writer
* essayist}}
| genre        = Poetry, non-fiction
| notableworks = ''Diving Into the Wreck and The Trees''
| awards       = {{awards|[[National Book Award]]|1974}}{{awards| [[Bollingen Prize]] |2003}}{{awards| [[Griffin Poetry Prize]] |2010}}
|spouse={{marriage|[[Alfred Haskell Conrad]]|1953|1970|end = died}}
|children = 3
|partner=[[Michelle Cliff]] (1976–2012)
| education     = [[Harvard University]] ([[Bachelor of Arts|BA]])
}}
'''Adrienne Cecile Rich''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|æ|d|r|i|ə|n}} {{respell|AD|ree|ən}}; May 16, 1929 – March 27, 2012) was an American poet, essayist and [[Feminism|feminist]]. She was called "one of the most widely read and influential poets of the second half of the 20th century",<ref>Nelson, Cary, editor. ''Anthology of Modern American Poetry''. Oxford University Press. 2000.</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/jacketcopy/2012/03/adrienne-rich.html |title=Poet Adrienne Rich, 82, has died |work=Los Angeles Times |access-date=March 29, 2012 |date=March 28, 2012}}</ref> and was credited with bringing "the [[oppression of women]] and [[lesbophobia|lesbians]] to the forefront of poetic discourse".<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/mar/29/adrienne-rich-poet-essayist-dies|title=Adrienne Rich, award-winning poet and essayist, dies|first=Alison|last=Flood|work=The Guardian |date=March 29, 2012|access-date=March 29, 2012}}</ref> Rich criticized rigid forms of feminist identities, and valorized what she coined the "lesbian continuum", which is a female continuum of solidarity and creativity that impacts and fills women's lives.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Routledge International Encyclopedia of Queer Culture|last=Gerstner|first=David A.|publisher=Routledge Taylor and Francis Group|year=2006|isbn=0-415-30651-5|location=New York|pages=[https://archive.org/details/routledgeinterna0000unse/page/484 484]|url=https://archive.org/details/routledgeinterna0000unse/page/484}}</ref>

Her first collection of poetry, ''A Change of World'', was selected by [[W. H. Auden]] for the [[Yale Series of Younger Poets Award]]. Auden went on to write the introduction to the book. Rich famously declined the [[National Medal of Arts]] to protest [[Speaker of the United States House of Representatives|House Speaker]] [[Newt Gingrich]]'s vote to end funding for the [[National Endowment for the Arts]].

==Early life and education==

Adrienne Cecile Rich was born in [[Baltimore]], Maryland, on May 16, 1929,<ref name="nytobit"/> the elder of two sisters. Her father, pathologist [[Arnold Rice Rich]], was the chairman of [[pathology]] at [[Johns Hopkins Medical School|The Johns Hopkins Medical School]]. Her mother, Helen Elizabeth (Jones) Rich,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/rich-adrienne-cecile |title=Adrienne Cecile Rich |publisher=Jewish Women's Archive |access-date=March 29, 2012}}</ref> was a concert pianist and a composer. Her father was from a Jewish family,<ref>{{cite book|last=Langdell|first=Cheri Colby|title=Adrienne Rich: the moment of change|year=2004|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group, Incorporated|isbn=978-0-313-31605-0|page=20}}</ref>  and her mother was a Southern Protestant;<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QyvXLgnTNpIC&q=%22around+that+time%22+Adrienne+Rich&pg=PA274 |title=A to Z of American women writers – Carol Kort |date=October 30, 2007|isbn=9781438107936|last1=Kort |first1=Carol |publisher=Infobase }}</ref> the girls were raised as Christians. Her paternal grandfather Samuel Rice was an [[Ashkenazi Jews|Ashkenazi]] immigrant from [[Košice]] in the Austro-Hungarian Empire (present day [[History of the Jews in Slovakia|Slovakia]]), while his mother was a [[Sephardi Jews|Sephardic Jew]] from [[Vicksburg, Mississippi]]. Samuel Rice owned a successful shoe store in Birmingham.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://blogs.baruch.cuny.edu/eng2100fall19/files/2019/11/rich-split-at-the-root.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220616044445/https://blogs.baruch.cuny.edu/eng2100fall19/files/2019/11/rich-split-at-the-root.pdf |archive-date=2022-06-16 |url-status=live |title=Split at the Root: An Essay on Jewish Identity |publisher=[[Baruch College]] |accessdate=March 26, 2022}}</ref> 

Adrienne Rich's early poetic influence stemmed from her father, who encouraged her to read but also to write poetry. Her interest in literature was sparked within her father's library, where she read the work of writers such as [[Ibsen]],<ref Name="Shuman1278">Shuman (2002)  p1278</ref> [[Matthew Arnold|Arnold]], [[William Blake|Blake]], [[John Keats|Keats]], [[Dante Gabriel Rossetti]], and [[Alfred, Lord Tennyson|Tennyson]]. Her father was ambitious for Adrienne and "planned to create a prodigy". Adrienne Rich and her younger sister were home schooled by their mother until Adrienne commenced public education in the fourth grade. The poems ''Sources'' and ''After Dark'' document her relationship with her father, describing how she worked hard to fulfill her parents' ambitions—moving into a world in which excellence was expected.<ref Name="Shuman1278"/><ref>''Critical Survey of Poetry'' (1992) Ed. Frank Northen Magill, Salem Press, p. 2752</ref>

In later years, Rich went to [[Roland Park Country School]], which she described as a "good old fashioned girls' school [that] gave us fine role models of single women who were intellectually impassioned."<ref Name="Martin">Martin, Wendy (1984), ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=bzml68WjzmcC&pg=PA174 An American triptych: Anne Bradstreet, Emily Dickinson, Adrienne Rich]'', The University of North Carolina Press, p. 174; {{ISBN|0-8078-4112-9}}.</ref> After graduating from high school, Rich earned her diploma at [[Radcliffe College]] of [[Harvard University]], where she focused on poetry and learning the writing craft, encountering no women teachers at all.<ref Name="Martin"/> 

In 1951, her senior year at college, Rich's first collection of poetry, ''A Change of World'', was chosen by the poet [[W. H. Auden]] for the [[Yale Series of Younger Poets Award]]. He went on to write the introduction to the published volume. Following graduation, Rich received a [[John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation|Guggenheim Fellowship]] to study at Oxford for a year. After visiting [[Florence]], she chose not to return to Oxford, and spent her remaining time in Europe writing and exploring Italy.<ref Name="Pioneer"/>

==Early career: 1953–75==
In 1953, Rich married [[Alfred Haskell Conrad]], an economics professor at [[Harvard University]] she had met as an undergraduate. She said of the match: "I married in part because I knew no better way to disconnect from my first family.  I wanted what I saw as a full woman's life, whatever was possible."<ref Name="Pioneer"/> They settled in [[Cambridge, Massachusetts]], and had three sons. In 1955, she published her second volume, ''The Diamond Cutters'', a collection she said she wished had not been published, saying "a lot of the poems are incredibly derivative," and citing a "pressure to produce again... to make sure I was still a poet."<ref Name="Pioneer"/> That year she also received the Ridgely Torrence Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America.<ref name="Langdell"/> Her three children were born in 1955 (David), 1957 (Pablo) and 1959 (Jacob).

{{quote box |width=300px |align=right |bgcolor=#FFFFF0 |salign=right
 |quote  ={{poemquote|
We are, I am, you are
by cowardice or courage
the one who find our way
back to this scene
carrying a knife, a camera
a book of myths
in which
our names do not appear.}}
 |source = —From "Diving into the Wreck"<br /> ''[[Diving into the Wreck: Poems 1971–1972]]'' (1973)<ref name="legend">{{cite web |url=http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15228 |title=Diving into the Wreck |publisher=The Academy of American Poets |access-date=March 29, 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120329124018/http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15228 |archive-date=March 29, 2012  }}</ref>}}

The 1960s began a period of change in Rich's life: she received the National Institute of Arts and Letters award (1960), her second Guggenheim Fellowship to work at the Netherlands Economic Institute (1961), and the [[Bollingen Foundation]] grant for the translation of Dutch poetry (1962).<ref Name="Langdell">{{cite book|last=Langdell|first=Cherl Colby|title=Adrienne Rich: The Moment of Change|year=2004|publisher=Praeger Publishers|location=Westport, CT|pages=xv}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=American Academy of Arts and Letters |url=http://www.artsandletters.org/awards2_popup.php?abbrev=Academy |work=American Academy of Arts and Letter Award Winners |access-date=December 12, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081013232000/http://www.artsandletters.org/awards2_popup.php?abbrev=Academy |archive-date=October 13, 2008 }}</ref><ref Name="Shuman1281"/> 

In 1963, Rich published her third collection, ''Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law'', which was a much more personal work examining her female identity, reflecting the increasing tensions she experienced as a wife and mother in the 1950s, marking a substantial change in Rich's style and subject matter. In her 1982 essay "[[Split at the Root: An Essay on Jewish Identity]]", Rich states: "The experience of motherhood was eventually to radicalize me." The book met with harsh reviews. She comments, "I was seen as 'bitter' and 'personal'; and to be personal was to be disqualified, and that was very shaking because I'd really gone out on a limb ... I realised I'd gotten slapped over the wrist, and I didn't attempt that kind of thing again for a long time."<ref Name="Pioneer"/>

Moving her family to New York in 1966, Rich became involved with the [[New Left]] and became heavily involved in anti-war, civil rights, and feminist activism. Her husband took a teaching position at [[City College of New York]].<ref Name="Shuman1281"/> 

In 1968, she signed the "[[Writers and Editors War Tax Protest]]" pledge, vowing to refuse tax payments in protest against the Vietnam War.<ref>"Writers and Editors War Tax Protest", January 30, 1968, ''New York Post''.</ref> Her collections from this period include ''Necessities of Life'' (1966), ''Leaflets'' (1969), and ''The Will to Change'' (1971), which reflect increasingly radical political content and interest in poetic form.<ref Name="Shuman1281"/>

From 1967 to 1969, Rich lectured at [[Swarthmore College]] and taught at Columbia University School of the Arts as an adjunct professor in the Writing Division. Additionally, in 1968, she began teaching in the SEEK program in City College of New York, a position she continued until 1975.<ref Name="Langdell"/> During this time, Rich also received the Eunice Tietjens Memorial Prize from ''Poetry Magazine''.<ref Name="Langdell"/> Rich and Conrad hosted anti-war and Black Panther fundraising parties at their apartment. Rising tensions began to split the marriage, and Rich moved out in mid-1970, getting herself a small studio apartment nearby.<ref Name="Pioneer"/><ref>Michelle Dean, [https://newrepublic.com/article/132117/adrienne-richs-feminist-awakening "The Wreck: Adrienne Rich's feminist awakening, glimpsed through her never-before-published letters."], ''The New Republic'', April 3, 2016.</ref> Shortly afterward, in October, Conrad drove into the woods and shot himself, widowing Rich.<ref name=NYTobit>{{Citation| title = Dr. Alfred H. Conrad, City College Professor, Dies | newspaper = The New York Times | location = New York, New York| date = October 20, 1970| url = https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1970/10/20/78818847.pdf}}</ref><ref Name="Pioneer"/><ref Name="Shuman1281"/>

In 1971, she was the recipient of the Shelley Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America and spent the next year and a half teaching at [[Brandeis University]] as the Hurst visiting professor of creative writing.<ref Name="Langdell"/> ''Diving into the Wreck'', a collection of exploratory and often angry poems, split the 1974 [[National Book Award for Poetry]] with [[Allen Ginsberg]], ''The Fall of America''.<ref name=nba1974/><ref name="Poets.org">{{cite web|title=Poets.org|url=http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/49|work=Adrienne Rich|access-date=December 12, 2011}}</ref>  Declining to accept it individually, Rich was joined by the two other feminist poets nominated, [[Alice Walker]] and [[Audre Lorde]], to accept it on behalf of all women "whose voices have gone and still go unheard in a patriarchal world."<ref Name="Shuman1276">Shuman (2002)  p1276</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=National Book Foundation|url=http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/adrienne-rich|work=National Book Awards Acceptance Speeches|access-date=September 13, 2014}}</ref> The following year, Rich took up the position of the Lucy Martin Donnelly Fellow at [[Bryn Mawr College]].<ref>{{cite web|title=The Poetry Foundation|url=http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/adrienne-rich|work=Adrienne Rich|access-date=December 12, 2011}}</ref>

==Later life: 1976–2012==
[[File:Audre Lorde, Meridel Lesueur, Adrienne Rich 1980.jpg|thumb|Rich (right), with writers [[Audre Lorde]] (left) and [[Meridel Le Sueur]] (middle) in Austin, Texas, 1980]]
In 1976, Rich began her partnership with Jamaican-born novelist and editor [[Michelle Cliff]], which lasted until her death. In her controversial work ''Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution'', published the same year, Rich acknowledged that, for her, lesbianism was a political as well as a personal issue, writing, "The suppressed lesbian I had been carrying in me since adolescence began to stretch her limbs."<ref Name="Pioneer"/> The pamphlet ''Twenty-One Love Poems'' (1977), which was incorporated into the following year's ''Dream of a Common Language'' (1978), marked the first direct treatment of lesbian desire and sexuality in her writing, themes which run throughout her work afterwards, especially in ''A Wild Patience Has Taken Me This Far'' (1981) and some of her late poems in ''The Fact of a Doorframe'' (2001).<ref>Aldrich and Wotherspoon (2000) ''Who's Who in Gay and Lesbian History, Vol 2''. Routledge p352 {{ISBN|0-415-22974-X}}.</ref> In her analytical work ''Adrienne Rich: the moment of change'', Langdell suggests these works represent a central rite of passage for the poet, as she (Rich) crossed a threshold into a newly constellated life and a "new relationship with the universe".<ref>Langdell, Cheri Colby (2004) ''Adrienne Rich: the moment of change''. p159 Praeger Publishers {{ISBN|0-313-31605-8}}</ref>  During this period, Rich also wrote a number of key socio-political essays, including "[[Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence]]", one of the first to address the theme of lesbian existence.<ref Name="Pioneer">{{cite web |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2002/jun/15/featuresreviews.guardianreview6 |website=The Guardian |title=Poet and pioneer |date=15 June 2002 |access-date=August 10, 2010 |first1=John |last1=O'Mahoney}}</ref> In this essay, she asks "how and why women's choice of women as passionate comrades, life partners, co-workers, lovers, community, has been crushed, invalidated, forced into hiding".<ref Name="Pioneer"/> Some of the essays were republished in ''[[On Lies, Secrets and Silence]]: Selected Prose, 1966–1978'' (1979). In integrating such pieces into her work, Rich claimed her sexuality and took a role in leadership for sexual equality.<ref Name="Pioneer"/>

From 1976 to 1979, Rich taught at City College and [[Rutgers University]] as an English professor. In 1979, she received an honorary doctorate from Smith College and moved with Cliff to Montague, MA. Ultimately, they moved to Santa Cruz, where Rich continued her career as a professor, lecturer, poet, and essayist. Rich and Cliff took over editorship of the lesbian arts journal ''[[Sinister Wisdom]]'' (1981–1983).<ref>[http://www.sinisterwisdom.org/about.html#history Sinister Wisdom history] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120208094710/http://www.sinisterwisdom.org/about.html |date=February 8, 2012 }}</ref><ref Name="CAWP"/> Rich taught and lectured at [[UC Santa Cruz]], [[Scripps College]], [[San Jose State University]], and [[Stanford University]] during the 1980s and 1990s.<ref Name="CAWP">Cucinella, Catherine (2002)  ''Contemporary American women poets: an A-to-Z guide''. p295 Greenwood Press {{ISBN|0-313-31783-6}}</ref> From 1981 to 1987, Rich served as an A.D. White Professor-At-Large for [[Cornell University]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://adwhiteprofessors.cornell.edu/all.html |title=Andrew D. White Professors-At-Large |publisher=Cornell University |access-date=March 28, 2012}}</ref> Rich published several volumes in the next few years: ''Your Native Land, Your Life'' (1986), ''Blood, Bread, and Poetry'' (1986), and ''Time's Power: Poems 1985–1988'' (1989). She also was awarded the Ruth Paul Lilly Poetry Prize (1986), the Elmer Holmes Bobst Award in Arts and Letters from [[NYU]], and the National Poetry Association Award for Distinguished Service to the Art of Poetry (1989).<ref Name="Langdell"/><ref name="Poets.org"/>

In 1977, Rich became an associate of the [[Women's Institute for Freedom of the Press]] (WIFP).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.wifp.org/who-we-are/associates/|title=Associates {{!}} The Women's Institute for Freedom of the Press|website=www.wifp.org|language=en-US|access-date=June 21, 2017}}</ref> WIFP is an American nonprofit publishing organization. The organization works to increase communication between women and connect the public with forms of women-based media.

[[Janice Raymond]], in the foreword of her 1979 book ''[[The Transsexual Empire]]'', thanked Rich for "constant encouragement"<ref name="What Kind of Times are These">{{cite web|last1=Boylan|first1=Jennifer|url=http://jenniferboylan.net/what-kind-of-times-are-these-on-adrienne-rich-and-trans-misogyny/|title=What Kind of Times are These?|website=www.jenniferboylan.net|date=April 18, 2012|language=en-US|access-date=March 5, 2021}}</ref> and cited her in the book's chapter "Sappho by Surgery."<ref name="Was Adrienne Rich Anti-Trans">{{cite web|last1=Mukhopadhyay|first1=Samhita|url=https://prospect.org/civil-rights/adrienne-rich-anti-trans/|title=Was Adrienne Rich Anti-Trans?|website=www.prospect.org|date=April 16, 2012|language=en-US|access-date=March 5, 2021}}</ref> "The Transsexual Empire" has been criticized by a number of LGBT and feminist writers for its [[anti-trans]] stance,<ref>Rose, Katrina C. (2004) "The Man Who Would be Janice Raymond." ''Transgender Tapestry'' 104, Winter 2004</ref><ref>Julia Serano (2007) ''Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity'', pp. 233–234</ref><ref>Namaste, Viviane K. (2000) ''Invisible Lives: The Erasure of Transsexual and Transgendered People'', pp. 33–34.</ref><ref>Hayes, Cressida J., 2003, "Feminist Solidarity after Queer Theory: The Case of Transgender," in ''Signs'' 28(4):1093–1120.</ref> and many have criticized Rich for her involvement in and support of its production. While Rich never explicitly disavowed her support for Raymond's work, [[Leslie Feinberg]] cites Rich as having been supportive during Feinberg's writing of ''[[Transgender Warriors]]''.<ref name="What Kind of Times are These"/><ref name="Was Adrienne Rich Anti-Trans"/><ref>{{cite web|last1=Ladin |first1=Joy|title=Diving Into the Wreck: Trans and Anti-Trans Feminism|url=https://eoagh.com/diving-into-the-wreck-trans-and-anti-trans-feminism/|website=eoagh.com|date=August 12, 2017|access-date=March 6, 2021}}</ref>

By the early 1980s, Rich was using canes and wheelchairs due to [[rheumatoid arthritis]]. Diagnosed with the condition at age 22, Rich kept her disability quiet for decades. The cold air in New England motivated Rich and Cliff to settle in California. A 1992 spinal operation required Rich to wear a [[Ilizarov apparatus|metal halo]] screwed into her head.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/12/hilary-holladay-adrienne-rich/616935/ |title=The Many Lives of Adrienne Rich |date=November 14, 2020 |publisher=[[The Atlantic]] |accessdate=March 27, 2022}}</ref>

In June 1984, Rich presented a speech at the International Conference of Women, Feminist Identity, and Society in [[Utrecht]], [[Netherlands]] titled ''Notes Toward a Politics of Location.''<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|title=Blood, Bread, and Poetry: Selected Prose, 1979–1985|url=https://archive.org/details/bloodbreadpoetry00adri|url-access=registration|last=Rich|first=Adrienne|publisher=Norton|year=1986|isbn=0393311627|location=New York|pages=[https://archive.org/details/bloodbreadpoetry00adri/page/210 210]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Rich |first=Adrienne |date=1984 |title=Notes toward a Politic of Location |url=https://openspaceofdemocracy.files.wordpress.com/2017/01/adrienne-rich-notes-toward-a-politics-of-location.pdf }}</ref> Her keynote speech is a major document on politics of location and the birth of the concept of female "locatedness".  In discussing the locations from which women speak, Rich attempts to reconnect female thought and speech with the female body, with an intent to reclaim the body through verbalizing self-representation.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Littman|first=Linda|year=2003|title="Old Dogs, New Tricks": Intersections of the Personal, the Pedagogical, the Professional|jstor=3650498|journal=The English Journal|volume=93|issue=2|page=66|doi=10.2307/3650498}}</ref> Rich begins the speech by noting that while she speaks the words in Europe, she has searched for them in the [[United States]].<ref name=":0" /> By acknowledging her location in an essay on the progression of the women's movement, she expresses her concern for all women, not just women in Providence. Through widening her audience to women across the world Rich not only influences a larger movement but she invites all women to consider their existence. Through imagining geographical locations on a map as history and as places where women are created, and further focusing on those locations, Rich asks women to examine where they were created. In an attempt to try to find a sense of belonging in the world, Rich asks the audience not to begin with a continent, country, or house, but to start with the geography closest to themselves –which is their body.<ref name=":0" /> Rich, therefore, challenges members of the audience and readers to form their own identity by refusing to be defined by the parameters of government, religion, and home.<ref name=":0" /> The essay hypothesizes the women's movement at the end of the 20th century. In an encouraging call for the women's movement, Rich discusses how the movement for change is an evolution in itself. Through de-masculinizing and de-Westernizing itself, the movement becomes a critical mass of many different voices, languages and overall actions. She pleads for the movement to change in order to experience change. She further insists that women must change it.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=DeShazer|first=Mary K.|year=1996|title="The End of a Century": Feminist Millennial Vision in Adrienne Rich's "Dark Fields of the Republic"|journal=NWSA Journal|volume=8|issue=3|page=46|doi=10.2979/NWS.1996.8.3.36 |doi-broken-date=November 1, 2024 |jstor=4316460}}</ref> In her essay, Rich considers how one's background might influence their identity. She furthers this notion by noting her own exploration of the body, her body, as female, as white, as [[Jews|Jewish]] and as a body in a nation.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Eagleton|first=Mary|year=2000|title=Adrienne Rich, Location And The Body.|journal=Journal of Gender Studies|volume=9|issue=3|pages=299–312|via=Academic Search Premier|doi=10.1080/713678003|s2cid=143486606}}</ref> Rich is careful to define the location in which her writing takes place. Throughout her essay, Rich refers back to the concept of location. She recounts her growth towards understanding how the women's movement grounded in [[Western culture]] and limited to the concerns of white women, then incorporated verbal and written expression of black United States citizens. Such professions have allowed her to experience the meaning of her whiteness as a point of location for which she needed to take responsibility.<ref name=":0" /> In 1986, she published the essay in her prose collection ''Blood, Bread, and Poetry''.<ref name=":0" />

Rich's work with the [[New Jewish Agenda]] led to the founding of ''Bridges: A Journal for Jewish Feminists and Our Friends'' in 1990, a journal for which Rich served as editor.<ref>{{cite book|last=Rich|first=Adrienne|title=Arts of the Possible: Essays and Conversations|year=2001|publisher=W.W. Norton & Company|location=New York|pages=138–144}}</ref> This work explored the relationship between private and public histories, especially in the case of Jewish women's rights.  Her next published piece, ''An Atlas of the Difficult World'' (1991), won both the ''Los Angeles Times'' Book Award in Poetry and the Lenore Marshall/''Nation'' Award as well as the Poet's Prize in 1993 and Commonwealth Award in Literature in 1991.<ref name="Langdell" /><ref name="Poets.org" /> During the 1990s Rich joined advisory boards such as the Boston Woman's Fund, [[National Writers Union]] and Sisterhood in Support of Sisters in South Africa. On the role of the poet, she wrote, "We may feel bitterly how little our poems can do in the face of seemingly out-of-control technological power and seemingly limitless corporate greed, yet it has always been true that poetry can break isolation, show us to ourselves when we are outlawed or made invisible, remind us of beauty where no beauty seems possible, remind us of kinship where all is represented as separation."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/m_r/rich/onlineessays.htm |title=Adrienne Rich: Online Essays and Letters |publisher=English.illinois.edu |access-date=March 28, 2012}}</ref> In July 1994, Rich won the [[MacArthur Fellowship]], the "Genius Grant" for her work as a poet and writer.<ref>{{cite web|title=MacArthur: The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation|url=http://www.macfound.org/site/c.lkLXJ8MQKrH/b.959463/k.9D7D/Fellows_Program.htm|work=Fellow Program|access-date=December 12, 2011}}</ref> Also in 1992, Rich became a grandmother to Julia Arden Conrad and Charles Reddington Conrad.<ref name="Langdell" />

{{quote box |align=right |width = 550px |bgcolor=#FFFFF0 |salign=right
 |quote  ={{poemquote|
There's a place between two stands of trees where the grass grows uphill
and the old revolutionary road breaks off into shadows
near a meeting-house abandoned by the persecuted
who disappeared into those shadows.

I've walked there picking mushrooms at the edge of dread, but don't be fooled
this isn't a Russian poem, this is not somewhere else but here,
our country moving closer to its own truth and dread,
its own ways of making people disappear.}}
 |source = —From "What kinds of times are these?"<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/181516#poem |title=What kinds of times are these? |website=Poetry Foundation|date=August 12, 2021 }}.</ref>
}}

In 1997, Rich declined the [[National Medal of Arts]] in protest against the House of Representatives' vote to end the National Endowment for the Arts as well as policies of the Clinton Administration regarding the arts generally, and literature in particular, stating that "I could not accept such an award from President Clinton or this White House because the very meaning of art, as I understand it, is incompatible with the cynical politics of this administration ... [Art] means nothing if it simply decorates the dinner table of the power which holds it hostage".<ref Name="Shuman1281">Shuman (2002) p1281</ref><ref>[https://www.nytimes.com/1997/07/11/us/in-a-protest-poet-rejects-arts-medal.html "In a Protest, Poet Rejects Arts Medal"], ''The New York Times'', July 11, 1997. Retrieved February 10, 2012.</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Rich|first=Adrienne|title=Arts of the Possible: Essays and Conversations|year=2001|publisher=W.W. Norton & Company|location=New York|pages=95–105|work=Why I Refused the National Medal for the Arts|editor=Adrienne Rich}}</ref> Her next few volumes were a mix of poetry and essays: ''Midnight Salvage: Poems 1995–1998'' (1999), ''The Art of the Possible: Essays and Conversations'' (2001), and ''Fox: Poems 1998–2000'' (2001).

In the early 2000s, Rich participated in anti-war activities, protesting against the threat of war in Iraq, both through readings of her poetry and other activities. In 2002, she was appointed a chancellor of the newly augmented board of the Academy of American Poets, along with [[Yusef Komunyakaa]], [[Lucille Clifton]], [[Jay Wright (poet)|Jay Wright]] (who declined the honor), [[Louise Glück]], [[Heather McHugh]], [[Rosanna Warren]], [[Charles Wright (poet)|Charles Wright]], [[Robert Creeley]], and [[Michael Palmer (poet)|Michael Palmer]].<ref Name="Langdell"/> She won the 2003 Yale Bollingen Prize for American Poetry and was applauded by the panel of judges for her "honesty at once ferocious, humane, her deep learning, and her continuous poetic exploration and awareness of multiple selves."<ref name="Poets.org"/> In October 2006, Equality Forum honored Rich's work, featuring her as an icon of LGBT history.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.lgbthistorymonth.com/adrienne-rich |title=Adrienne Rich |publisher=LGBTHistoryMonth.com |date=August 20, 2011 |access-date=December 3, 2020}}</ref>

In 2009, despite initially having reservations about the movement, Rich endorsed the call for a cultural and [[academic boycott of Israel]], denouncing "the Occupation's denial of Palestinian humanity, destruction of Palestinian lives and livelihoods, the "settlements", the state's physical and psychological walls against dialogue."<ref>{{cite web|url=https://mronline.org/2009/02/08/why-support-the-u-s-campaign-for-the-academic-and-cultural-boycott-of-israel/ |title=Why Support the U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel? |date=February 8, 2009 |publisher=[[Monthly Review]] |accessdate=March 30, 2022}}</ref><ref name=":1">{{Cite journal |last=Cable |first=Umayyah |date=2022-04-03 |title=Compulsory Zionism and Palestinian Existence: A Genealogy |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0377919X.2022.2040324 |journal=Journal of Palestine Studies |language=en |volume=51 |issue=2 |pages=66–71 |doi=10.1080/0377919X.2022.2040324 |s2cid=248281682 |issn=0377-919X}}</ref>

Rich died on March 27, 2012, at the age of 82 in her Santa Cruz, California, home. Her son, Pablo Conrad, reported that her death resulted from long-term [[rheumatoid arthritis]].<ref>{{cite news|url=http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/jacketcopy/2012/03/adrienne-rich.html|title=Poet Adrienne Rich, 82, has died|work=Los Angeles Times|date=March 28, 2012|access-date=March 28, 2012}}</ref> Her last collection was published the year before her death. Rich was survived by her sons, two grandchildren<ref name="nytobit">{{Cite news|last=Fox|first=Margalit|date=March 28, 2012|title=Adrienne Rich, Influential Feminist Poet, Dies at 82|language=en-US|work=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/29/books/adrienne-rich-feminist-poet-and-author-dies-at-82.html|access-date=October 16, 2021|issn=0362-4331}}</ref> and her partner [[Michelle Cliff]].<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/9174640/Adrienne-Rich.html|title=Adrienne Rich|work=The Daily Telegraph|date=March 29, 2012|access-date=March 29, 2012}}</ref>

== Views ==

=== On feminism ===
Adrienne Rich wrote several pieces that address the rights of women in society. In ''Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law'' she offered a critical analysis of the life of being both a mother and a daughter-in-law, and the impact of their gender in their lives.  ''Diving Into the Wreck'' was written in the early 'seventies, and the collection marks the start of her darkening tone as she wrote about feminism and other social issues.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Contemporary Women's Poetry: Adrienne Rich's 'Diving into the Wreck' and Harryette Mullen's 'She Swam On from Sea to Shine'|last=Kloeckner|first=Christian|publisher=Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier (WVT)|year=2015|isbn=9783868216103|location=Trier, Germany|page=400}}</ref>  In particular, she wrote openly about her outrage at the patriarchal nature of the greater society.  In doing so, she became an example for other women to follow in the hopes that continued proactive work against sexism would eventually counteract it.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Understanding Adrienne Rich|last=Riley|first=Jeannette E.|publisher=The University of South Carolina Press|isbn=9781611177008|location=Columbia, South Carolina|pages=39–41|date=August 31, 2016}}</ref>

Her poems are also famous for their feminist elements. One such poem is "Power", which was written about [[Marie Curie]], one of the most important female icons of the 20th century. In this poem, she discussed the element of power and feminism. Curie was slowly succumbing to the radiation that she absorbed in her research, to which Rich refers in the poem as her source of power. The poem discusses the concept of power, particularly from a woman's point of view.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Power for Women: Poems of Adrienne Cecile Rich|last=Selvalakshmi, S. & Girija Rajaram}}</ref>

Besides poems and novels, Rich also wrote nonfiction books that tackled feminist issues. Some of them were: ''Of Woman Born, Motherhood as Experience and Institution, Blood, Bread and Poetry, etc.'' Especially, ''Bread and Poetry'' contains the famous feminist essay entitled "Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence", and ''Feminism and Community. ''

Her works, interviews, and documentaries demonstrated Rich's in-depth perspective on feminism and society.

For one, Rich had something to say about the use of the term itself.  She preferred using the term "women's liberation" rather than feminism. She thought the latter term was more likely to induce resistance from women of the next generation. Also, she feared that the term would amount to nothing more than a label if used extensively. On the other hand, using the term women's liberation means that women can finally be free from factors that can be seen as oppressive to their rights.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Adrienne Rich and the Women's Liberation Movement: A Politics of Reception|last=Sheridan|first=Susan}}</ref>

Rich also wrote in depth about "white feminism" and the need for [[intersectionality]] within the feminist movement. In ''Blood, Bread, and Poetry'', Rich wrote that "feminism became a political and spiritual base from which I could move to examine rather than try to hide my own racism, recognize that I have anti-racist work to do continuously within myself". She went on to write that "so long as [feminists] identify only with white women, we are still connected to that system of objectification and callousness and cruelty called racism".{{citation needed|date=January 2023|reason=page needed}} Rich implored white feminists to consider the fact that "[they], as victims of objectification, have objectified other women" through their role as the oppressor, and through the white privilege they inherently possess under a racist regime.

Rich's views on feminism are evident in her works. She says in ''Of Woman Born'' that "we need to understand the power and powerlessness embodied in motherhood in patriarchal culture."<ref>{{Cite web |date=2021-06-23 |title=Adrienne Cecile Rich |url=https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/rich-adrienne-cecile |access-date=2024-06-23 |website=Jewish Women's Archive |language=en}}</ref> She also speaks regarding the need for women to unite in her book ''On Lies, Secrets and Silence.'' In this book, she wrote:

"Women have often felt insane when cleaving to the truth of our experience. Our future depends on the sanity of each of us, and we have a profound stake, beyond the personal, in the project of describing our reality as candidly and fully as we can to each other."{{citation needed|date=January 2023|reason=page needed}}

Given the feminist conditions during the 1950s–1970s, it can be said that Rich's works on feminism were revolutionary. Her views on equality and the need for women to maximize their potential can be seen as progressive for the time. Her views strongly coincided with feminist thinking during that period. According to Rich, society was founded on patriarchy and limits the rights of women. For equality to be achieved between the sexes, the prevailing notions must be readjusted to accommodate the female perspective.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Collins|first=Michael J|title=The Unearthing of the Body in Adrienne Rich's Politics|url=http://scholarship.shu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1067&context=theses|journal=Seton Hall ERepository, Seton Hall University}}</ref>

=== On racism ===
Rich wrote at length on the topic of white feminism and intersectionality within the feminist movement. Citing such prominent black feminist activists and academics as [[Akasha Gloria Hull|Gloria T. Hull]], Michele Russel, [[Lorraine Bethel]], and [[Toni Morrison]] in her works, Rich dedicated several chapters of her book ''Blood, Bread, and Poetry'' to the subject of racism. Of her essay ''Of Woman Born,'' Rich wrote that it "could have been stronger had it drawn on more of the literature by Black women toward which Toni Morrison's ''Sula'' inevitably pointed me."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Rich |first=Adrienne |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EfKyBwAAQBAJ&pg=PT50 |title=Blood, Bread, and Poetry: Selected Prose 1979-1985 |date=1980 |publisher=W. W. Norton & Company |isbn=978-0-393-34804-0 |publication-date=1994 |language=en |chapter=Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Rich |first=Adrienne |url= |title=Culture, Society and Sexuality: A Reader |publisher=UCL Press |year=1980 |isbn=978-1-85728-811-7 |veditors=Parker R, Aggleton P |location=London |publication-date=1999 |pages=220 |language=en |chapter=Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence}}</ref>

Touching on the privilege conferred to her as a white feminist author, Rich wrote in ''Blood, Bread, and Poetry'' that she "is probably going to be taken more seriously in some quarters than the Black woman scholar whose combined experience and research give her far more penetrating knowledge and awareness than mine. I will be taken more seriously because I am white, [..] and because the invisibility of the woman of color who is the scholar/critic ''or'' the poet ''or'' the novelist is part of the structure of ''my'' privilege, even my credibility."<ref>{{Cite web|title=Blood, Bread, and Poetry: selected prose, 1979–1985 – Four Poets|url=https://exhibitions.lib.udel.edu/four-poets/exhibition-item/blood-bread-and-poetry-selected-prose-1979-1985/|access-date=October 31, 2021|language=en-US}}</ref>

In 1981, Rich co-presented the keynote address for the [[National Women's Studies Association]] Convention in [[Storrs, Connecticut]], along with [[Audre Lorde]], delivering her speech entitled "Disobedience is What NWSA is Potentially About." The theme of the convention was "Women Respond to Racism", and Rich noted the [[homophobia]] and racism that still existed "in the enclave of Women's studies itself, where lesbians are still feared and women of color are still ignored". Rich went on to say that "women of color who are found in the wrong place as defined at any given time by the white fathers will receive their retribution unseen: if they are beaten, raped, insulted, harassed, mutilated, murdered, these events will go unreported, unpunished, unconnected; and white women are not even supposed to know they occur, let alone identify with the sufferings endured." Rich asked the audience: "how disobedient will Women's Studies be in the 1980s; how will this Association address the racism, misogyny, homophobia of the university and of the corporate and militist society in which it is embedded; how will white feminist scholars and teachers and students practice disobedience to patriarchy?" Rich implored the audience to rid themselves of the idea that "by opposing racist violence, by doing anti-racist work, or by becoming feminists white women somehow cease to carry racism within them", asserting that white women are never absolved of their white privilege and must continually commit to anti-racist work while they are still in the role of the oppressor.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Rich|first=Adrienne|date=1981|title=Disobedience Is What NWSA Is Potentially about|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/40003904|journal=Women's Studies Quarterly|volume=9|issue=3|pages=4–6|jstor=40003904|issn=0732-1562}}</ref>

In 2009, Rich came forward with a statement in support of the U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (USACBI), criticizing [[Israeli-occupied territories|Israeli occupation]] and expressing her “continued solidarity with the Palestinian people’s long resistance.”<ref name=":1" />

==Selected awards and honors==
Each year links to its corresponding "[year]() in poetry" article:
* [[1950 in poetry|1950]]: [[Yale Younger Poets Award]] for ''A Change of World''.
* [[1952 in poetry|1952]]: [[Guggenheim Fellowship]]
* [[1960 in poetry|1960]]: [[National Institute of Arts and Letters]] Award
* [[1970 in poetry|1970]]: [[Shelley Memorial Award]]
* [[1974 in poetry|1974]]: [[National Book Award for Poetry]] (a split award) for ''Diving into the Wreck''<ref name=nba1974>
[https://www.nationalbook.org/awards-prizes/national-book-awards-1974 "National Book Awards – 1974"]. National Book Foundation. Retrieved March 11, 2012. (With acceptance speech by Rich and essay by [[Evie Shockley]] from the Awards 60-year anniversary blog.)</ref>
* [[1979 in poetry|1979]]: Honorary Doctorate Smith College
* [[1986 in poetry|1986]]: Inaugural [[Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize]]
* [[1989 in poetry|1989]]: Honorary doctorate from [[Harvard University]]
* 1989: National Poetry Association Award for Distinguished Service to the Art of Poetry
* [[1990 in poetry|1990]]: [[Bill Whitehead Award]] for Lifetime Achievement (for gay or lesbian writing)
* [[1991 in poetry|1991]]: Common Wealth Award of Distinguished Service
* 1991: Fellow of the [[American Academy of Arts and Sciences]]<ref name=AAAS>{{cite web|title=Book of Members, 1780–2010: Chapter R|url=http://www.amacad.org/publications/BookofMembers/ChapterR.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060618090045/http://amacad.org/publications/BookofMembers/ChapterR.pdf |archive-date=2006-06-18 |url-status=live|publisher=American Academy of Arts and Sciences|access-date=April 7, 2011}}</ref>
* [[1992 in poetry|1992]]: [[Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize]]
* 1992: [[Poets' Prize]] for ''Atlas of the Difficult World''
* 1992: [[Frost Medal]]
* 1992: [[Fellowship of the Academy of American Poets|Academy of American Poets Fellowship]]
* [[1994 in poetry|1994]]: [[MacArthur Fellowship]]
* [[1996 in poetry|1996]]: [[Wallace Stevens Award]]
* [[1997 in poetry|1997]]: [[National Medal of Arts]] (refused)
* [[1999 in poetry|1999]]: [[Lannan Lifetime Achievement Award|Lifetime Achievement Award]] from the Lannan Foundation
* [[2006 in poetry|2006]]: <!-- NOT the Literarian Award -->[[National Book Foundation]] [[National Book Award#Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters|Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters]]<ref name=medal>
[http://www.nationalbook.org/amerletters.html "Distinguished Contribution to American Letters"]. National Book Foundation. Retrieved March 11, 2012. (With acceptance speech by Rich and introduction by Mark Doty.)</ref>
* 2006: David R Kessler Award for LGBTQ Studies, [[CLAGS: The Center for LGBTQ Studies]]<ref>{{Cite web |title=Fifteenth Annual Kessler Lecture Delivered by Adrienne Rich – CLAGS: Center for LGBTQ Studies |url=https://clags.org/articles/fifteenth-annual-kessler-lecture-delivered-by-adrienne-rich/ |access-date=2022-05-15 |language=en-US}}</ref>
* [[2010 in poetry|2010]]: Lifetime Recognition Award from the [[Griffin Poetry Prize]]
* [[2017 in poetry|2017]]: Finalist, [[Pulitzer Prize for Poetry]] (posthumous)<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.pulitzer.org/prize-winners-by-year/2017|title=2017 Pulitzer Prizes|website=Pulitzer|access-date=April 10, 2017}}</ref>
* 2019: In June 2019, Rich was one of the inaugural fifty American "pioneers, trailblazers, and heroes" inducted on the [[National LGBTQ Wall of Honor]] within the [[Stonewall National Monument]] (SNM) in [[New York City]]'s [[Stonewall Inn]].<ref name=":23">{{cite web|url=https://www.metro.us/news/local-news/new-york/stonewall-inn-lgbtq-wall-honor|title=National LGBTQ Wall of Honor unveiled at Stonewall Inn|last=Glasses-Baker|first=Becca|date=June 27, 2019|website=www.metro.us|access-date=June 28, 2019}}</ref><ref name="SDGLN">{{cite web|url=https://sdgln.com/news/2019/06/19/national-lgbtq-wall-honor-be-unveiled-historic-stonewall-inn|title=National LGBTQ Wall of Honor to be unveiled at historic Stonewall Inn|first=Timothy|last=Rawles|date=June 19, 2019|website=San Diego Gay and Lesbian News|language=en|access-date=June 21, 2019}}</ref> The SNM is the first [[National monument (United States)|U.S. national monument]] dedicated to [[LGBT rights in the United States|LGBTQ rights]] and [[History of LGBT people|history]],<ref>{{cite web|last=Laird|first=Cynthia|url=https://www.ebar.com/news/news//272833|title=Groups seek names for Stonewall 50 honor wall|website=The Bay Area Reporter / B.A.R. Inc.|language=en|access-date=May 24, 2019}}</ref> and the wall's unveiling was timed to take place during the [[Stonewall 50 – WorldPride NYC 2019|50th anniversary]] of the [[Stonewall riots]].<ref>{{cite web|last=Sachet|first=Donna|url=http://sfbaytimes.com/stonewall-50/|title=Stonewall 50|date=April 3, 2019|website=San Francisco Bay Times|access-date=May 25, 2019}}</ref>

==Literary Works==
{{Incomplete list|date=May 2017}}

===Nonfiction===
* [[1976 in literature|1976]]: {{cite book|title=Of Woman Born: Motherhood As Experience And Institution |publisher=Norton |isbn=978-0-393-31284-3|year=1995 }}
* [[1979 in literature|1979]]: ''[[On Lies, Secrets and Silence]]: Selected Prose'', 1966–1978
* [[1986 in literature|1986]]: ''Blood, Bread, and Poetry: Selected Prose'', 1979–1985 (Includes the noted essay: "[[Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence]]")
* [[1993 in literature|1993]]: ''What Is Found There: Notebooks on Poetry and Politics''
* [[1995 in literature|1995]]: ''If Not with Others, How?'' pp.&nbsp;399–405 in {{cite book | last1 = Weiss | first1 = Penny A. | last2 = Friedman | first2 = Marilyn | author-link2 = Marilyn Friedman | title = Feminism and community | publisher = [[Temple University Press]] | location = Philadelphia | isbn = 9781566392761 | year = 1995 }}
* [[2001 in literature|2001]]: {{cite book| title=Arts of the Possible: Essays and Conversations| publisher=W.W. Norton| isbn=978-0-393-05045-5 | year=2001}}
* [[2007 in literature|2007]]: ''Poetry and Commitment: An Essay''
* [[2009 in literature|2009]]: ''A Human Eye: Essays on Art in Society'', 1997–2008
* 2018: ''Essential Essays: Culture, Politics, and the Art of Poetry'', W.W. Norton, 2018 {{ISBN|9780393652369}}

===Poetry===
====Collections====
* [[1951 in poetry|1951]]: {{cite book| title=A Change of World| publisher=Yale University Press }}
* [[1955 in poetry|1955]]: {{cite book| title=The Diamond Cutters, and Other Poems| url=https://archive.org/details/diamondcuttersot0000rich| url-access=registration| publisher=Harper }}
* [[1963 in poetry|1963]]: {{cite book| title=Snapshots of a daughter-in-law: poems, 1954–1962| publisher=Harper & Row }}
* [[1966 in poetry|1966]]: {{cite book| title=Necessities of life: poems, 1962–1965| publisher=W.W. Norton }}
* [[1967 in poetry|1967]]: {{cite book| title=Selected Poems| publisher=Chatto & Hogarth P Windus }}
* [[1969 in poetry|1969]]: {{cite book| title=Leaflets| year=1962| publisher=W.W. Norton| isbn=978-0-03-930419-5 }}
* [[1971 in poetry|1971]]: {{cite book| title=The Will to Change: Poems 1968-1970| year=1971| url=https://archive.org/details/willtochange00adri| url-access=registration| publisher=Norton }}
* [[1973 in poetry|1973]]: {{cite book| title=Diving into the Wreck| publisher=W.W. Norton| isbn=978-0-393-31163-1| url-access=registration| url=https://archive.org/details/divingintowreck00adri| year=1994}}
* [[1975 in poetry|1975]]: {{cite book| title=Poems: Selected and New, 1950-1974| publisher=Norton| isbn=978-0-393-04392-1| url=https://archive.org/details/poemsselectednew00rich| year=1974}}
* [[1976 in poetry|1976]]: {{cite book| title=Twenty-one Love Poems| publisher=Effie's Press }}
* [[1978 in poetry|1978]]: {{cite book| title=The Dream of a Common Language| publisher=Norton| isbn=978-0-393-04502-4 | title-link=The Dream of a Common Language| year=1978}}
* [[1982 in poetry|1982]]: {{cite book| title=A Wild Patience Has Taken Me this Far: Poems 1978-1981| year=1981| url=https://archive.org/details/wildpatiencehast00rich| url-access=registration| publisher= W. W. Norton & Company, Incorporated| isbn=978-0-393-31037-5 }} (reprint 1993)
* [[1983 in poetry|1983]]: {{cite book| title=Sources| publisher=Heyeck Press }}
* [[1984 in poetry|1984]]: {{cite book| title=The Fact of a Doorframe: Poems Selected and New, 1950-1984| url=https://archive.org/details/factofdoorframep00rich| url-access=registration| publisher=W. W. Norton & Company, Incorporated| isbn=978-0-393-31075-7 | year=1994}}
* [[1986 in poetry|1986]]: {{cite book| title=Your Native Land, Your Life: Poems| year=1986| url=https://archive.org/details/yournativelandyo00rich| url-access=registration| publisher=Norton| isbn=978-0-393-02318-3 }}
* [[1989 in poetry|1989]]: {{cite book| title=Time's Power: Poems, 1985-1988| url=https://archive.org/details/timespowerpoems100rich| url-access=registration| year=1989| publisher=Norton| isbn=978-0-393-02677-1 }}
* [[1991 in poetry|1991]]: {{cite book| title=An Atlas of the Difficult World: Poems 1988-1991| url=https://archive.org/details/atlasofdifficult00rich| url-access=registration| publisher=Norton| isbn=978-0-393-03069-3 | year=1991}}
* [[1993 in poetry|1993]]: {{cite book| title=Collected Early Poems, 1950-1970| year=1993| url=https://archive.org/details/collectedearlypo00rich| url-access=registration| publisher=W. W. Norton & Company, Incorporated| isbn=978-0-393-31385-7 }}
* [[1995 in poetry|1995]]: {{cite book| title=Dark Fields of the Republic: Poems, 1991-1995| year=1995| publisher=W.W. Norton| isbn=978-0-393-03868-2| url=https://archive.org/details/darkfieldsofrepu00rich}}
* [[1996 in poetry|1996]]: {{cite book| title=Selected poems, 1950-1995| publisher=Salmon Pub.| isbn=978-1-897648-78-0 | date=January 1996}}
* [[1999 in poetry|1999]]: {{cite book| title=Midnight Salvage: Poems, 1995-1998| year=1999| url=https://archive.org/details/midnightsalvagep0000rich| url-access=registration| publisher=Norton| isbn=978-0-393-04682-3 }}
* [[2001 in poetry|2001]]: {{cite book| title=Fox: Poems 1998-2000| date=March 17, 2003| publisher=W W Norton & Co Inc| isbn=978-0-393-32377-1 }} (reprint 2003)
* [[2004 in poetry|2004]]: {{cite book| title=The School Among the Ruins: Poems, 2000-2004| year=2004| url=https://archive.org/details/schoolamongruin00rich| url-access=registration| publisher=W. W. Norton & Co.| isbn=978-0-393-32755-7 }}
* [[2007 in poetry|2007]]: {{cite book| title=Telephone Ringing in the Labyrinth: Poems 2004–2006| isbn=978-0-393-06565-7| url=https://archive.org/details/telephoneringing0000rich| last1=Rich| first1=Adrienne Cecile| year=2007| publisher=W.W. Norton}}
* [[2010 in poetry|2010]]: {{cite book| title=Tonight No Poetry Will Serve: Poems 2007-2010| isbn=978-0-393-07967-8| url=https://archive.org/details/tonightnopoetryw00rich| last1=Rich| first1=Adrienne| year=2011| publisher=W. W. Norton & Company}}
* [[2016 in poetry|2016]]: {{cite book| title=Collected Poems 1950-2012| isbn=978-0-393-28511-6| url=https://wwnorton.com/books/9780393285116/| last1=Rich| first1=Adrienne| year=2016| publisher=W.W. Norton}}

==See also==
{{portal|Poetry}}
* [[American philosophy]]
* [[List of American philosophers]]
* [[List of poets portraying sexual relations between women|Lesbian Poetry]]

==References== <!--obituary reportedly NYT Mar 28, 2012-->
{{reflist|25em}}

==Further reading==
* Colby Langdell, Cheri (2004) ''Adrienne Rich: The Moment of Change''  Praeger {{ISBN|0-313-31605-8}}
* [[Dana Gioia|Gioia, Dana]] (January 1999) "Midnight Salvage: Poems 1995–1998" (first published in ''San Francisco Magazine'')
* Henneberg, Sylvia (2010)  ''The Creative Crone: Aging and the Poetry of May Sarton and Adrienne Rich''  University of Missouri {{ISBN|0-8262-1861-X}}
* Holladay, Hilary (2020) ''The Power of Adrienne Rich: A Biography'' Nan A. Talese/Doubleday {{ISBN|0-3855-4150-3}}
* Keyes, Claire (2008) ''The Aesthetics of Power: The Poetry of Adrienne Rich''  University of Georgia Press {{ISBN|0-8203-3351-4}}
* Shuman, R. Baird (2002) ''Great American Writers: Twentieth Century''. Marshall Cavendish
* Yorke, Liz (1998) ''Adrienne Rich: Passion, Politics and the Body'' Sage Publications {{ISBN|0-8039-7727-1}}

==External links==
{{Sister project links|auto=y}}
* [https://adriennerich.net/ Official Adrienne Rich Website]. Managed by The Adrienne Rich Literary Trust.
* [https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poet/adrienne-rich Adrienne Rich: Profile, Poems, Essays at Poets.org]
* [http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/adrienne-rich Profile and poems written and audio at Poetry Foundation]. Retrieved 2010-01-08
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20120308160746/http://www.poetryarchive.org/poetryarchive/singlePoet.do?poetId=428 Profile and poems written and audio at Poetry Archive]. Retrieved 2010-01-08
* [http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/m_r/rich/rich.htm Profile at Modern American Poets] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090201025948/http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/m_r/rich/rich.htm |date=February 1, 2009 }}. Retrieved 2010-01-08
* [http://www.barclayagency.com/rich_a.html Profile at Barclay Agency] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111010232942/http://www.barclayagency.com/rich_a.html |date=October 10, 2011 }} [http://www.barclayagency.com/speakers/videos/rich_a.html and Rich videos] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120729133243/http://barclayagency.com/speakers/videos/rich_a.html |date=July 29, 2012 }}. Retrieved 2010-01-08
* [http://www.griffinpoetryprize.com/awards-and-poets/lifetime-recognition-award/adrienne-rich/ Griffin Poetry Prize Profile and videos] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210501045917/https://www.griffinpoetryprize.com/awards-and-poets/lifetime-recognition-award/adrienne-rich/ |date=May 1, 2021 }}. Retrieved 2010-01-08
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20110115215931/http://www.lannan.org/lf/rc/event/adrienne-rich/ Reading and conversation at Lannan Foundation September 29 1999 (audio, 48 mins)]. Retrieved 2010-01-08
* [http://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/x/Rich.html Extensive audio recordings of Rich at PennSound, University of Virginia.] Retrieved 2010-01-08
* [http://books.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1950812,00.html "Legislators of the world"] poetry article by Rich at ''[[The Guardian]]'', November 18, 2006. Retrieved 2010-01-08
* [http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:RAD.SCHL:sch00021 "Adrienne Rich Papers"]. Archive at [[Schlesinger Library]] from the Radcliffe Institute. Retrieved 2010-01-08
* [http://lccn.loc.gov/no2010203172 Adrienne Rich] at [[Library of Congress]] Authorities — with 61 catalog records
* {{IMDb name|id=1871108|name=Adrienne Rich}}

{{Lesbian feminism}}
{{Authority control}}
{{Subject bar|portal1 = Biography | portal2 = Literature | portal3 = Writing | portal4 = Feminism | portal5 = LGBTQ | portal6 = United States}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rich, Adrienne}}
[[Category:1929 births]]
[[Category:2012 deaths]]
[[Category:20th-century American poets]]
[[Category:20th-century American women writers]]
[[Category:21st-century American poets]]
[[Category:21st-century American women writers]]
[[Category:American anti-war activists]]
[[Category:American Ashkenazi Jews]]
[[Category:American feminist writers]]
[[Category:American people of Slovak-Jewish descent]]
[[Category:American tax resisters]]
[[Category:American women poets]]
[[Category:Jewish American poets]]
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[[Category:Lesbian academics]]
[[Category:Lesbian feminists]]
[[Category:Lesbian poets]]
[[Category:American lesbian writers]]
[[Category:Political lesbians]]
[[Category:Radical feminists]]
[[Category:American LGBTQ poets]]
[[Category:Proponents of Christian feminism]]
[[Category:Activists from Maryland]]
[[Category:LGBTQ people from Maryland]]
[[Category:Writers from Baltimore]]
[[Category:Radcliffe College alumni]]
[[Category:Harvard Advocate alumni]]
[[Category:Brandeis University faculty]]
[[Category:City College of New York faculty]]
[[Category:Columbia University faculty]]
[[Category:Cornell University faculty]]
[[Category:Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences]]
[[Category:MacArthur Fellows]]
[[Category:Bollingen Prize recipients]]
[[Category:Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Poetry winners]]
[[Category:National Book Award winners]]
[[Category:Yale Younger Poets winners]]
[[Category:Deaths from arthritis]]
[[Category:20th-century American LGBTQ people]]
[[Category:21st-century American LGBTQ people]]
[[Category:Members of the American Academy of Arts and Letters]]
[[Category:English-language poets]]
[[Category:Poets with disabilities]]
[[Category:American writers with disabilities]]
[[Category:20th-century American Sephardic Jews]] 
[[Category:21st-century American Sephardic Jews]]
[[Category:LGBTQ writers with disabilities]]