Customer Reviews

Of Woman Born: Motherhood As Experience and Institution

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Those who have criticized this book thus far here are women who derive their sole identity and sense of importance, sadly, from their role as mothers. I know women who thoroughly enjoy being mothers, but they are few and their circumstances are unique. And even some of them still have a clear need to have another identity and a life of the mind they aren't permitted within the "institution" of motherhood. I myself, and most other mothers I know, struggle with the impossible expectations placed upon us to be perfect mothers/providers/etc., struggle to create a new and healthy understanding of motherhood, struggle to do right by our children and yet hold on to our own personhood, thinking, humor,... finding ourselves too often battling with self-hatred, resentment and guilt, knowing inside that no matter what, someone will criticize us for doing it all wrong. This book exposes this unfair situation in which many women who are mothers find themselves in. If to some Rich comes off as "angry," well of course she is. It's a righteous anger. My only criticism of this book is the lack of attention it gives to the experiences of women of color and working-class women.

When I first read OF WOMAN BORN, in the mid-seventies, it was a Godsend. Rich's feminist critique of the institution of motherhood elucidates the source of so many of the world's problems. When women, the source of life, the life givers, the ones who bear each one of us into the world, whether man or woman, are denigrated, oppressed, abused, imprisoned, and exploited by governments, religions, and cultures - everything is off-kilter. Rich accurately describes the state of motherhood in the mid-20th century and the toll it took on mothers and children. She helped me understand that the pressures mothers put on their daughters to conform to sexist stereotypes were part of the oppression they themselves were enduring. Re-reading this book over the decades, I've seen that while some things have improved for women since Rich wrote OF WOMAN BORN, we still have a long way to go before women are treated equally or given the respect they deserve for their role as life givers and nurturers. The worldwide upsurge in the revival of Fundamentalist religions that institutionalize the oppression and second-class status of mothers and their daughters is frightening, as is the rage expressed by some reviewers of this book. People who are threatened by the ideas in OF WOMAN BORN want to return to the days when women were chattel and children were seen but not heard. In the 21st century, don't we owe our children, grandchildren and the world more than the tired, worn-out worldviews that brought women and families so much pain?

We were asked to do a term paper on Adrienne Rich and some of her poetry. During my research I found this book and it changed my entire view of motherhood..or rather the institution of motherhood. I have never realized how literally confining motherhood is. I look back at what my mom used to tell me about how kids held her back from what she wanted to do, and I realize (with the help of this book) what she ment. Not that was being rude when she said this, just that it is a fact that our patriarchal society uses motherhood to put women in 'their place'. Please if their is one book you take time to read make it this one. Rich writes this analytical book in such a way as to make it sound personal and interesting...not dry and dull. Highly, highly recommend it if you are trying to understand your mother or mothers in general. What an EYE OPENER!

Right after the birth of my second child I was in a poetry class at the local community college. We were assigned to find a poet and give a presentation of their poetry. I found Adrienne Rich and it was a Godsend. I was in a postpartum depression, I was so angry at the world, at my children, and this made me feel guilty and thus angry at myself. Her poetry and the book Of Woman Born, helped me realize that I was not the only mother who felt like this. I was not alone. This did not change my circumstances, once a mother forever a mother. But, I started accepting my life and the roles that I was required to play. She will always be one of my favorite poets. If she is ever in Minneapolis on a lecture tour or for a book signing, I would love to meet her and tell her in person how much her work has meant to me.

This book is a miracle. I have read dozens of books about pregnancy, birth, babies and motherhood, and this blows them all out of the water. Rich's prose is poetry, and her research and scholarship are vast and impeccable. The critical reviews that report that she "didn't like motherhood" missed the point by a long shot (and misquote her). Rich's love for her three sons is clear throughout the book, but she does not shy away from acknowledging and facing the struggles that she faced as a mother. With this book, she explores the profound historical and cultural context in which all Western women experience both the bliss and the difficulties of motherhood. Of Woman Born is a huge gift to all people-- mothers, daughters, and sons. Read it and understand.

It is powerful, candid, bold, and important. She opened my mind about motherhood and other issues but never strayed -- she is a fierce feminist, unafraid of telling the truth, and this book is a gem.

This autobiography reads like the rantings of a woman who just needs to buck up and get over it. YES, motherhood is difficult (HELLOOO), and YES you have to submit your own individual needs, wants, and desires for those of your children. The book revealed to me the utterly selfless love that Rich apparenly doesn't possess. I wonder how her children feel as they read it.

Adrienne Rich's experience as a mother is what propelled her to write this depressing look at motherhood as an institution and at the the patriarchial society that imposes its restrictions and encourages its oppression. It is her own negative experience as a mother that compells her to condemn the entire history of womanhood and its accomplishments. Did Adrienne Rich ever think that perhaps she is projecting her own experiences onto the lives of the general public? A selfish, unloving mother who felt "depressed" throughout her entire experience raising children is certainly not the one to be writing about the experience of motherhood as the general public sees it. Rather than giving practical advice in terms of empowering women, she emasculates men, choosing this as the best method to raise women. Her suggestions as to how women can overcome their "oppression" are buried somewhere underneath poetic phrases relating to her own miserable experiences as a mother. If her kids, aren't in therapy, they should be!

I was forced to read this book in a class recently by the usual suspect, my feminist professor, and was very sad to see that this piece of lesbian hatred of the family was being pushed upon young women in my class at a vulnerable time of their lives. The usual atmosphere in universities now, in which young women are asked either to agree with feminist diatribes of this sort or be labelled weak and a tool of men, was so plainly at work here. I'm older than the others in my class, and a father and husband, and the book was so plainly the product of a neurotic, unhappy person that I was having difficulty understanding why we were reading it. The vast majority of women want families and to be mothers and wives, and they need help to do it better, not to be force-fed this sort of weak broth. When Rich says of her pregnancy and motherhood, "I only knew that I had lived through something which was considered central to the lives of women... a key to the meaning of life; and that I could remember little except anxiety, physical weariness, anger, self-blame, boredom, and divisions within myself," she admits to something sad, not hoepful, and demeans her children and their worth. Poor, sad, neurotic woman. I think young women would be best served to view this book as something to avoid -- or at least as something to view with pity, and not permit your professors force you to agree with it.