Healing Plants, Tamed Poisons:
Ecofeminist Resistance in Women Romantic Poets
Tanishka,
Ph.D Scholar,
Department of English,
University of Delhi,
Delhi, India.
Abstract: Opium narratives have
been an integral part of Romantic poetry and imagination. Traditionally this
discourse has been dominated by male poets who portrayed opium as a drug which
was used as a tool for escapism. This phenomenon kept the medicinal use of opium
marginalized as it was garnered by women in their domestic space as a herb, in
complete contrast to the capitalization of opium as a drug with unethical mass
production. This paper studies the domestication of opium by representative
women Romantic poets not as a production of colonial and masculine imagination
but as an ethical, domesticated and community substance used for its healing
properties. The paper theorises its core argument with reference to ecofeminist
Vandana Shiva’s ideas of nature and women being exploited by patriarchy and
capitalism which critiques patriarchal science and emphasizes on the domestic
space of women led community based medicines that aligns with the ecofeminist
resistance portrayed by women Romantic poets. The paper aims to look at opium
beyond its canonical depiction of a frenzy-causing drug by the masculine imagination
and in the context of its ethical and sustainable use as a healing plant
harvested in feminine domestic space.
Keywords:
Ecofeminism, Domestication, Opium, Romantic Poetry, Women Poets
In Romantic literature, nature is often depicted as a
romanticized and feminised entity which poets find praise worthy for its
sublimity. It is often associated with women for similarities in terms of
beauty and nurturing element. Romantic literature portrays various
representations of nature, its beauty, enormity and an all encompassing
sublimity which often works as a tool of escapism through imagination. One such
representation is of opium narratives in Romantic poetry. The study aims to
take into consideration the use of opium narrative in the women’s Romantic
poetry, countering the canonical representation by male poets. The beauty and
love for nature has been best captured through the movement and genre of
Romantic literature. The usual idea of Romantic literature comes as poets
yearning for a sense of escape into nature from the harsh struggles of their
daily lives, significantly caused by the industrial revolution. In such
conditions, opium has been a significant part of Romantic imagination and
poetry. While traditionally opium narrative in Romantic poetry has been seen
through the male poets’ eyes, the current studies counters this narration by
looking specifically into the women Romantic poets’ use of opium narratives.
The domestication of opium is a cultural phenomenon that is
majorly found in the women Romantics poetry. This essay talks about the
domestication of opium as a counter discourse by women poets of Romanticism
against the male Romantics' idea of escapist sublimity of the ‘orient’ through
opium, and along with it the cultural, social and imperial reasons of this new
discourse of opium and how it brought a new light to the relation between opium
and Romanticism. It looks at the counter discourse on the use of opium as a
herb by women Romantic poets who instead of using it as an exotic phenomena of
escapism, domesticise its use as more of a medicine.
When it
comes to the depiction of opium in poetry, this realm is canonically dominated
by the male Romantic poets. Two of the most famous opium narratives can be
found in Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Kubla Khan (1816) and Thomas De
Quincey's Confessions of an English Opium-Eater (1821). These
narratives depict opium as a means and tool that has transcendental qualities
which results in heightening the imagination power of the poet and provides him
with the experience of sublimity and works as a means to escape as well, rooted
in masculine and colonial imagination. Hannah Cowles Freeman argues that this
opium narrative of the male Romantic poets is challenged by the Romantic women
poets, she explains that these women poets’ poetry "offers a counter
discourse to the traditional opium canon" by "incorporating opium use
into the domestic hearth, its medicinal effects aiding in their wifely and
motherly duties" (Freeman 01). The use of opium became a common thing
during the 18th century. It was used by common people on a regular basis for
different purposes which mainly included its use for its medicinal benefits. It
was used for curing the common and recurring illnesses, on babies to help them
sleep quietly and for soothing the body aches. This fact demonstrates that
opium was a very much part of the daily domestic life of 18th century England.
Historical evidence shows that only in 1868 with the Pharmacy Act, its sale was
limited. But despite this depiction of opium has been that of some other place
which transcends its consumer to another place as a means of escape in an
imaginative frenzy until it was challenged by the Romantic women writers such
as Maria Logan, Henrietta O'Neil, Anna Seward and Sara Coleridge. These women
poets depict opium as a familiar, domesticated and everyday presence in their
lives.
The
contrast in the depiction of opium use in male Romantics and women Romantic
poets results into the "opium use highlighting a competing discourse of
cultural perspectives on opium: one being that it is associated with the
‘orient’ and one which locates it squarely in the middle class British
home" (Freeman 02). This depiction is problematized when one explores the
idea of indigenization of opium. Traditionally opium requires warm weather to
grow which is not common in England. Opium works as a link between the east and
the west. Opium, which was born out of imperialism, has now become a necessity
for women who have no place to articulate their desires and raw emotions and no
place to escape from their daily domestic duties. Opium works as a means which
allows women to express their desires, the desires which are silenced in male
Romantics' poetry. At this juncture, Vandana Shiva’s ideas of nature and women
exploited parallelly by capitalism and patriarchal science comes into play as
it highlights the universality of nature and women’s exploitation at the hands
of patriarchy, capitalism and industrialized use of natural resources. Shiva’s
theory of modern reductionist science as a patriarchal project. Shiva
articulates the parallel between exploitative modern science and women’
marginalisation through it as “Modern reductionist science, like development, turns
out to be a patriarchal project, which has excluded women as experts, and has
simultaneously excluded ecological and holistic ways of knowing which
understand and respect nature's processes and interconnectedness as science”
(Shiva 14-15).
The spirit
of Shiva’s ideas is captured vividly in the representative women Romantics’
poetry with reference to opium narratives. One of them is Anna Seward
(1742-1809). Known as the ‘Swan of Lichfield’ Seward was also a respected woman
of letters besides being an honoured poet of her times. She is majorly known
for reviving the sonnet tradition in English poetry. Interested in literature
from the early years of her childhood she developed her love for literature by
reading Shakespeare and Milton. She was also a regular contributor to major
magazines of her times, specifically Gentleman's Magazine. In her sonnet
To The Poppy (1799), she depicts a "love- crazed maid"
who smiles "aghast" (660) standing in the field of poppy. This image
of a woman expressing her melancholy who has lost her love finding solace in
the opium field is quite radical to the image of the female protagonist in the
male Romantics' poetry who meets her fate in the face of death when separated
from her lover. Anna Seward counters the masculine opium narrative by using the
plant as a means to bear pain while at the same time expressing emotions of the
speaker. The striking difference through her sonnet lies in her awareness of
opium as she calls it, “Thou flimsy, shewy, melancholy weed” which helps in
“lulling grief and pain” (660), instead of eradicating the pain and suffering
completely and escaping into an alternative reality of frenzy. This feminised
portrayal of opium is much more realistic, familiar and natural in contrast to
unrealistic, dreamlike and exotic masculinised portrayal in male Romantics’
poetry. Seward mentions that this herb is able to provide temporary relief to
“a love-craz'd Maid” who is, “smiling aghast” (660). This emphasises on the
medicinal use of opium for mental sufferings as well and this portrayal is
radical as women Romantics portray the rawness of emotions through this where
the feminine subject seeks comfort and refuge in the use of opium, instead of
meekly succumbing to her pain as objectified by masculine imagination of
femininity.
The idea of sublimity is centered on the understanding of
one of the major differences in the male Romantics and women Romantic poets'
depiction. The idea of sublimity for the male Romantics has been that of a
transcendental process which escapes them in order to heighten their
imagination. Anne K. Mellor argued about the "domestication of
sublimity" (97) which is central to understanding the role of opium in
challenging the idea of sublimity. The idea of escape and sublimity in these
women poets’ writings is different from the male Romantics. The opium which
brings sublimity to the male poets is not depicted as a means of sublimity for
these women writers but it rather works as a brief moment of being allowed to
feel what they are feeling. The ladyhood of women does not allow them to be
expressive of their emotions and desires but with the help of opium they can
escape these restrictions even if it is just for a while.
Maria Logan, another major poet, wrote her collection of
poetry called Poems on Several Occasions. It was published in 1793 with
an inscription that mentioned that the poet has dedicated this collection to
her intimate friends to express gratitude for their consistent company in her
years of sickness. Logan has long suffered through sickness and it was during
this time she began to use opium to soothe her chronic pain. Due to her illness
her writing practice was affected and imagery of sickness and death looms over
in her poetry. In her poem To Opium (1793) she talks about the quality
to transcend through the healing power of opium. Logan refers to the opium
plant as “the balm, whose sov'reign pow'r/ Can still the throb of Pain” (539),
emphasising on the medicinal properties of the plant which helps in relieving
physical and psychological pain. She states the use of opium as a herbal plant
in contrast to capitalist and material wealth. It is significant to note that
Logan also mentions the ability of the plant to increase the artistic ability
to produce a work of art as she mentions “Reviv'd by thee, my drooping Muse/
Now pours the grateful strain” (440). But the striking difference between the
male Romantics use of opium for creating art and Logan’s description that, for
Logan opium works as a medicine which helps in soothing her physical and mental
discomfort, bringing back her innate ability to produce arts, against the male
Romantics use of opium as a magical substance which escapes them into an
unnatural and unrealistic artistic frenzy. Similarly Henrietta O'Neill
(1758-1793),is another major Romantic poet who wrote on the use of opium
in women’s daily lives. O’Neill was the patron and close friend of another
Romantic poet Charlotte Smith, on whose request she wrote Ode to the Poppy.
Her work is significant to understand the realistic use of opium in contrast to
its fantasized use by male Romantic poets. In her Ode to the Poppy
(1792) describes opium as a “Soul-soothing plant” (521). Her focus is on the
healing properties of the plant for physical and mental pains. It is useful because
of it “the mourner bears to live” (521). Women used opium as a herbal medicine
for their everyday aches and pain relief. Such usage stands for the familiarity
and accessibility of it in the domestic and feminine space. O’Neill describes
this idea as she mentions her use of opium “spread, Thy spell around my aching
head…Thy balsam for a broken heart; And by thy soft Lethean power” (521). This
is important to note the portal of women romantics is rooted in familiarity,
domesticity and medicinal use of opium instead of colonized exotic
representation by male poets rooted in patriarchy and exploitation of nature.
As it has been argued in the paper, that women Romantic
poets revolutionised the use of opium narratives by domesticating it by
reclaiming the male dominated discourse around it which sees it as an exotic
drug Sara Coleridge’s (1802-1852) narration of opium becomes most vividly
feminine and healing. Sara Coleridge was the daughter of renowned Romantic poet
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Sara Fricker. She was also a translator, editor
and wrote extensively on fairy tales and children’s literature. These major
genres she worked on, also reflect in her poetry taken for the study as she
introduces her own son, Herbert in the poem to denote her long years of
familiarity with opium. She first began the use of opium in the form of a
sedative for better sleep and praised it for its usefulness to provide her
relief after long days of physical and mental exhaustion due to her motherly
responsibilities. Colreridge’s poetry represents that “The women poets
discussed here represent a larger cultural phenomenon where mothers and wives
used opium on a regular basis for its medicinal purposes, demystifying its
administration and its effects on the body” (Freeman 1). In her poem Poppies
(1834), She brings in her son Herbert and begins by looking at the plant
through her young son’s curious and joyful eyes, who finds the plant to be as
“nothing more /Than other brilliant weeds” (199). This introduction of her son
to plant draws a familiar image that associates a sense of familiarity and
easiness with the child as well. It highlights the commonality of opium plants
in the domestic space, specifically the kitchen that stands for the space
central to women and nurturing, which harboured it as an everyday used herb and
medicine. Coledrige has been pregnant for a decade when she began to depend
heavily on opium to fight against depression. She mentions “When poor Mama long
restless lies/ She drinks the poppy's juice” (199). This is why she goes on
talking about the significance and healing properties of it to soothe pain
caused by daily motherly duties and household chores, in opposition to its
exploitative use by the commercialization of it by patriarchal science and
capitalism.
The
domestication of opium also brings in the question of imperialism and its
problematics. The idea of daily use of opium indicates the fact that opium was
grown in the kitchen gardens of many households as England's climate is not
suitable for its growth. As much as the idea of growing opium in a kitchen
garden, a place for nurturing, is radical in itself, it also questions its
problematic aspects. Because this is how imperialism works. It removes an
indigenous thing from its native place and plants it elsewhere, and uses it in
a totally different manner there. Despite this whole discourse of domesticating
opium, it is interesting to notice that its mention in women's writings was
still seen as demeaning. The fact all these women poets only use the term
‘poppy’ indicates the need to censor the word opium for women, especially the
ones belonging to the aristocracy. The challenge to the traditional opium
narrative of male poets brought by the women writers through its domestication
is important to understand the shifting relation between Romanticism and opium
and how this provides with a new lense to see it in a gendered narrative of
opium being domesticated, a very much part of women's life and it challenges
the male idea of sublimity and escapism.
Works Cited
Coleridge,
Sara. “Poppies.” British Women Poets of
the Romantic Era: An Anthology, edited by Paula R. Feldman, The
Johns Hopkins UP, 1997, p. 199.
Freeman,
Hannah Cowles. “Opium Use and Romantic Women’s Poetry.” South Central Review, vol. 29, no. 1/2, 2012, pp. 1–20.
Logan,
Maria. “To Opium.” British Women Poets of the Romantic Era: An Anthology, edited by Paula
R. Feldman, The Johns Hopkins UP, 1997, pp. 439-441.
Mellor,
Anne K. Romanticism and Gender.
Routledge, 1993.
O'Neill,
Henrietta. “Ode to the Poppy.” British
Women Poets of the Romantic Era: An Anthology, edited by Paula R. Feldman,
The Johns Hopkins UP, 1997, pp. 520-521.
Seward,
Anna. “Sonnet LXXI To the Poppy.” British
Women Poets of the Romantic Era: An Anthology, edited by Paula R. Feldman,
The Johns Hopkins UP, 1997, p. 660.
Shiva,
Vandana. Staying Alive: Women, Ecology
and Survival in India. Kali for Women, 1988.