Social Pressures In Anne Sexton's Poem, Her Kind

Anne Sexton’s poem, “Her Kind” presents a stark look at the roles that women place themselves in and are forced into by societal pressures. Throughout history, women have been expected to take on the role of obedient wife, and failure to do so can result in a barrage of retaliations on a woman and her lifestyle. Though Sexton’s troubled past of depression and eventual suicide has cast negative light on the meanings of her works--particularly speculation that her work is a confession-- “Her Kind” is not so much a personal story as it is the story of the three roles women continue to fall into, even to this day: a witch, an old-school midwife, and a whore. The title is repeated in the last line of every stanza, “I have been her kind.” This repetition connects the different first-person scenarios described by each stanza: a witch, an old-school midwife figure, and a whore. These scenarios are described mostly through connotations, such as “haunting the black air, braver at night” (2), “fixed the suppers for the worms and the elves: / whining, rearranging the disaligned” (11-12), and “I have ridden in your cart, driver, / waved my nude arms at villages going by” (15-16). Words like “haunting”, “black”, and “night” evoke an image of evil that strengthens the connotation of a witch as someone
who is not to be trusted or given mercy. “Over the plain houses” could easily be interpreted as a reference to the image of a witch riding a broomstick. Phrases like “fixed the suppers” and “rearranging the disaligned” in the second stanza bring to mind the image of an old-school midwife, whose actions are always in good faith, however misunderstood by those who are more conservative towards healing. If interpreted literally, this woman who feeds “worms and elves” might be seen as crazy, but “worms and elves” could just as easily serve as a metaphor for the outcasts in society who have nowhere to go, but were generously given a meal by a woman who cares for others. While more ambiguous, the word “nude” in description of the narrator’s arms in the third stanza connotes the idea of immodesty, often associated with a woman who is sexually liberal. “I have ridden in your cart” could serve as an innuendo, suggesting that the speaker is someone who the audience has had a liaison with, or be a literal message that the speaker is a person that the audience would not think any different of outside of her “working hours”.
By using the same rhyme scheme throughout the work--with one exception-- Sexton not only unifies the stanzas but shows the parallels in the plight of all three women. The second to last line in each stanza is the only pattern change, with this line rhyming with the second line in the first or third stanza, and the second to last line rhyming with the first line in the second stanza. The second to last line in each stanza is also the only line to not speak in the first person, as if the narrator is quoting someone else when she says, “A woman like that is not a woman, quite” (7). By altering the rhyme scheme of these three lines, it brings attention to the sudden shift in point of view, possibly alluding that instead of a single woman speaking or someone representing the feelings of all women, it is the voice of a single man speaking or someone representing the feelings of all people who don’t know what it is like to be in such roles.
Sexton alludes to a burning in the final stanza: “where your flames still bite my thigh” (18).
A burning reinforces the idea of the three female roles portrayed in “Her Kind” are immoral roles worthy of punishment. Many religious texts recommend that women should be burned or killed if they give up chastity. This shift in imagery and figurative language from strictly environmentally descriptive to more of the speaker’s action colors the final stanza differently from the first two, and states, “A woman like that is not ashamed to die” (20). While women were once social outcasts for what they did, the final stanza shows a deep-seated, ‘burning’ hatred towards women for their
morals.
The overarching message in Sexton’s work is that all women--regardless of age or circumstance--have been branded or filled the role of a witch, an old-school midwife, or a whore at some point in their lives. Though women in 21st century western countries no longer have to worry about being branded as a witch, the negative effects of being labeled as a slut or a whore lead to a form of verbal burning: if a woman is to venture outside the acceptable boundaries of her role as a woman in society--as Sexton put it-- “A woman like that is not a woman, quite” (7).