Muriel Rukeyser (December 15, 1913 – February 12, 1980) was an American poet and political activist, best known for her poems about equality, feminism, social justice, and Judaism. Kenneth Rexroth said that she was the greatest poet of her "exact generation".
One of her most powerful pieces was a group of poems entitled The Book of the Dead (1938), documenting the details of the Hawk's Nest incident, an industrial disaster in which hundreds of miners died of silicosis.
Her poem "To be a Jew in the Twentieth Century" (1944), on the theme of Judaism as a gift, was adopted by the American Reform and Reconstructionist movements for their prayer books, something Rukeyser said "astonished" her, as she had remained distant from Judaism throughout her early life.
Read more about Muriel Rukeyser: Early Life, Activism and Writing, In Other Media, Works
Famous quotes by muriel rukeyser:
“Never to despise in myself what I have been taught
to despise. Nor to despise the other.
Not to despise the it. To make this relation
with the it: to know that I am it.”
—Muriel Rukeyser (1913–1980)
“In our period, they say there is free speech.
They say there is no penalty for poets,
There is no penalty for writing poems.
They say this. This is the penalty.”
—Muriel Rukeyser (1913–1980)
“Erasing the failure of weeks with level fingers,
she sleeks the fine hair, combing: ‘You’ll look fine tomorrow!”
—Muriel Rukeyser (1913–1980)
“Split by a tendril of revolt
stone cedes to blossom everywhere.”
—Muriel Rukeyser (1913–1980)
“Whatever can happen to anyone can happen to me.”
—Muriel Rukeyser (1913–1980)