Adrienne Rich

In 1953, Adrienne Rich married Alfred Haskell Conrad, an Economics Professor at Harvard University. They settled in Cambridge, Massachusetts. They had three sons – David, Paul and Jacob.

By 1970, her marriage was considerably strained. Conrad began to believe that she had lost her mind. They separated in mid-1970. In October, Conrad drove into the woods and shot himself.

In 1976, Rich entered into a lifelong lesbian relationship with Jamaican-born novelist and editor, Michelle Cliff. Her relationship inspired her controversial book, ‘Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution’.

Adrienne Cecile Rich was born to Arnold Rice Rich, the Chairman of Pathology at The Johns Hopkins Medical School and Helen Elizabeth Jones Rich, a concert pianist and composer.

She was schooled at home and started attending school from fourth grade. She later attended the Roland Park Country School. She earned her college diploma from Radcliffe College, Harvard.

Her poems ‘Sources’ and ‘After Dark’ speak about her relationship with her father and the hard work she put in to fulfil her parents' ambitions.

In 1966, she moved to New York with her husband and children. She became involved in anti-war, civil rights and feminist activism. Her husband took up a teaching position in City College.

8For two years starting 1967, she gave lectures at Swarthmore College. She taught in the Writing Division of Columbia University School of the Arts, as an assistant professor.

As a protest against the Vietnam-American War in 1968, she signed the ‘Writers and Editors War Tax Protest’, pledging not to pay taxes. Her writings reflected her radical views on politics.

She began teaching in the SEEK program in City College of New York in 1968. During this period, she wrote poems like ‘Necessities of Life’, ‘Leaflets’ and ‘The Will to Change’.

In 1979, Adrienne Rich compiled and republished some of her essays in ‘On Lies, Secrets and Silence: Selected Prose’, wherein she asserted the need for sexual equality.

In 1951, Adrienne Rich’s first collection of poetry, ‘A Change of World’ was published. Renowned poet W.H. Auden selected it for the Yale Series of Younger Poets Award and also wrote its introduction.

In 1955, her second collection of poems, ‘The Diamond Cutters’ was published to critical acclaim. Her third collection, ‘Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law’, written after her marriage, expressed the struggle and turmoil she experienced as a wife and mother.

Her poems ‘Twenty-One Love Poems’, ‘A Wild Patience Has Taken Me This Far’, and ‘The Fact of a Doorframe’ expressed her views on lesbianism. She also wrote the critically appreciated essay, ‘Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence’.