Louise Glück

“Brilliant, passionate, thwarted women”

– Louise Glück on her public school teachers (brilliant women in her time apparently married lawyers and doctors, unable to have that profession themselves, and instead taught at schools)

I went to the Louise Glück poetry reading at Parker, as well as listening to her speak to my poetry class in school. I was wary going in to the event because great artists are often a bit painful: narcissistic, entitled, pretentious etc. Somewhat surprisingly, she was truly honest, about her experience, her life, and her work. She was definitely intense, suffering bronchitis after a week of not sleeping, writing poetry because she was suddenly inspired. But her poems are very intense, so her character isn’t surprising.

            As a teen, she suffered from anorexia. It was especially interesting to hear from her perspective in her essay, “Education of the Poet,” because at the time, anorexia was not such a common ailment. Glück’s anorexia developed from a need to border and define herself through will. Unfortunately, she had copious stores of will, and realized at sixteen, “at some point I was going to die.” Anorexia is interesting, from a psychological standpoint while being heartrending. But what made Glück’s portrayal of an oft-discussed illness unusual was its defeminization. Never did she mention, ‘body image,’ or ‘media pressure’ (though those causations should not be diminished.) Although the effect of anorexia is to become painfully, dangerously thin, the cause is not usually a desire to become painfully, dangerously thin, rather, a need to take ownership and control over oneself. Men have eating disorders as well, and this feminization of a gender neutral illness is arguably unsafe.

            Louise Glück’s lack of femininity in general was refreshing. Woman poets suffer dismissal even contemporarily (as you can read about here on my friend’s intelligent blogspost: http://civicengagementellory.blogspot.com/2015/04/elise-cowen-archetype-for-sexisms.html), but Glück didn’t discuss this at length, she seemed to define herself first as a human being. I don’t mean to say women who talk about their identity as women are less valuable, but it’s refreshing to hear a woman in a profession speak mainly about her profession, rather than her role as a woman.

            An audience member mentioned that Glück’s work must take courage, to which she responded, “There really is never any courage involved… you grab power from the world.” As well as being an unusual comment (most people vie to mention their courage,) I found it to applicable advice as a woman. You have to take power, whether you have courage, or lack it.

A favorite of her poems, "Mock Orange": http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/179759

Some scary truths about women in the art world: http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/8971-women-artists-still-face-discrimination#