\u201cDialogue\u201d by Adrienne Rich communicates confusion and contemplation about one\u2019s sexuality and marital life. The speaker emits uncertainty to herself or to another as she reflects on her troubles. It is clearly something that has bothered her for a time considering the third to last line in the first stanza which states \u201cand this is what I live through over and over\u201d (Rich, lines 8-9). The line suggests that these thoughts have been either vocalized or dwelled on repeatedly\/frequently. In addition, throughout the poem the speaker appears to be repressing her feelings about her sexuality and the unsettling sensation that something is wrong. Rich portrays the inner emotions and doubts of the speaker in order to reveal the difficulties and social pressure someone outside of the heterosexual norm might experience.
\nExamples of the repression can be found in the second stanza, specifically in lines 11-14; \u201cI do not know\/ who I was when I did those things\/or who I said I was\/or whether I willed to feel\/what I had read about.\u201d The second stanza is all in italics, conveying that perhaps the speaker is lost in her thoughts or reliving the moments she is referring to in the stanza. Additionally, the repetition of \u201cI\u201d frequents the lines so much so that the reader can feel the speaker getting caught up in her thoughts. The \u201cI\u2019s\u201d can also be looked at as a search into her identity and what \u201cI\u201d can truly be defined as in terms of sexual orientation, pronouns, and even a sense of internalized homophobia. The subject of her concern seems to be referring to the popular happy heterosexual married couple fantasy she \u201cread about\u201d before her marriage. Now in the relationship she expresses doubt and confusion about the intimacy and\/or general relationship. \u201cI do not know\/who I was when I did those things\u201d focusing on \u201cthings\u201d alludes to sex. However, in this case, not knowing who she was did not mean she was lost in the moment but rather conveys the confusion as to why she was suppose to enjoy it as she now looks upon it filled with doubt and\/or regret. \u201cWho I said I was\u201d suggests her claim as heterosexual may be questionable. Lastly, \u201cor whether I willed to feel\/what I had read about\u201d expresses her want to feel what society insisted, however, the use of the word \u201cwilled\u201d strongly suggests that she was forcing herself to do something she did not like.
\nThe speaker, while expressing her thoughts, is repressing her emotions and truthfully her understanding. She knows she is different from what is expected of her by society and her reaction reveals the uncertainty and confusion she feels about her changing identity. Rich\u2019s poem speaks to those who feel similarly while also connecting other readers by using emotions of doubt and confusion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cDialogue\u201d by Adrienne Rich communicates confusion and contemplation about one\u2019s sexuality and marital life. The speaker emits uncertainty to herself or to another as she reflects on her troubles. It is clearly something that has bothered her for a time considering the third to last line in the first stanza which states \u201cand this is … Continue reading Blog Post “Dialogue” close reading<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4630,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[169398],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-78","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2021-blog-post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqhistoryandliterature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqhistoryandliterature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqhistoryandliterature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqhistoryandliterature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4630"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqhistoryandliterature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqhistoryandliterature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqhistoryandliterature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqhistoryandliterature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/lgbtqhistoryandliterature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}