A QUICK SEARCH FOR THE ‘GREATEST POETS’ OF ANY COUNTRY ACROSS THE GLOBE, and across time, invariably brings up names of men. To focus more concretely on this issue, I Googled the position of Poet Laureate in Canada, UK and the US. Australia, it seems, is quite ambivalent about appointing a Poet Laureate, given its ‘royal’ history and the implications for Australia’s political aspirations for being a republic.
As in all things we start at the very beginning, and here we find that the roots of the Poet Laureate go back to the 12th century and the English Royal House of Plantagenet. Poets were then known as ‘versifiers’ and were favoured by the reigning monarchs and awarded fees and pensions. The patronage of the English royal houses continued over the centuries by the Tudors and the Stuarts. The position of Poet Laureate was informally created by Charles I for Ben Jonson in 1617; however, the title did not become an official royal office until it was conferred by letters patent on John Dryden in 1670 (Wiki).
What is interesting is that, in a long line of Poet Laureates, there is only one woman Poet Laureate: Carol Ann Duffy (1955), appointed in 2009.
The history of the US Poet Laureate is more recent. The position has existed under two separate titles: from 1937 to 1986 as ‘Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress’, and from 1986 to the present as ‘Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry’. The name was changed, by an act of Congress, on December 20, 1985 (Public Law 99 – 194) and became effective on January 3, 1986 (Library of Congress Website).
Again, men dominate. There have been four female poets laureate – compared to thirteen male poets laureate) and six female consultants in poetry (compared to twenty-three male consultants (Library of Congress Website).
Canada’s Poet Laureate is a 21st century institution.The first ever Canadian Parliamentary Poet Laureate was awarded to George Bowering in 2002. In 2004 the title was transferred to Pauline Michel and in 2006 to John Steffler. His term ended on December 3, 2008 and nominations for the position were open to residents of Canada up to September 2008. Pierre DesRuisseaux was named the new laureate on April 28 (Wiki).
Across the seas in Japan, if one Googles ‘greatest Japanese poets’ we get the famous three – Basho (1644 – 1694), Buson (1716 – 1784) and Kobayashi Issa (1763 – 1828). Then there is a 20th century addition in the form of Kimiko Hahn (born 1955), a New Yorker of Japanese descent.
In India we get a similar picture. Take a random date – c.170 BC – and we get Kalidasa, whose work, the Meghaduta (Cloud Messenger), has been made into a Choral Fantasia by Gustav Holst (1874 – 1934). If we move further down history, again, among the great men poets (Kabir, Tulsidas) we have one woman poet, Mirabai (1403 – 1506: date of her birth still debated). Into the beginning of the 20th century, and here too we have a single woman poet, Sarojini Naidu ( 1879 – 1949). Her contemporary, the Bengali poet, Rabindranath Tagore (1861 – 1941), won the Nobel Laureate in 1913.
Take the case of another pair of man-woman contemporary poets – Ted Hughes (1930 – 1998) and Sylvia Plath (1932 – 1963). Hughes was the UK Poet Laureate and is considered as one of the greatest English poets, an accolade that Plath (even given her shortened writing period) has never been accorded in her native US.
So, do you think that men are better poets and therefore deserve their accolades, or do you know of any woman poet that deserves to be included in the poetic pantheon?
If women – for whatever reason – are less well regarded than men, is there some intrinsic reason (child bearing consumes their creative skills)?
Are there cultural obstacles, and what are these – given that women are well-represented as novelists? Lady Murasaki (11th century Heian Court), for example, wrote Tale of Genji – the first and possibly the greatest novel in Japanese, in which she started the practice of using prose and poetry together.
– Golden Langur
