"Women and Honor: Some Notes on Lying" by Adrienne Rich

In the midst of the 1960s, Adrienne Rich, a Radcliffe graduate and later Robert Frost Silver Medal recipient, reinvented herself as a political radical and feminist. Her essay, Women and Honor: Some Notes on Lying, began as notes concerned with relationships between and among women. She first shared these notes at a women writers' workshop in Oneonta, New York in 1975. In this speech-turned-essay, she discusses the complexities of lying, and invokes the questioning of honor and truth between and among women. Rich begins the essay by discussing the old, male idea of honor, relating to his integrity. As well as discussing the male idea of women's honor, which is focused around her husband and duties as a wife. She writes, "honesty in women is not considered important" (Rich 412). Rich acknowledges how women lie to keep control of a male-dominated situation and as a barrier from discomfort; but argues that lying not only causes alienation from others, it also cuts us off from ourselves. As she analyzes the complexities of lying, she invokes the question of honesty and truth. She uses many examples and metaphors throughout to support her opinion. For example, Rich writes, "when we look closely, or when we become weavers, we learn of the tiny multiple threads unseen in the overall pattern" (Rich 414). She uses this metaphor to compare the concept of truth to a carpet and its  multiple unseen threads. Rich identifies lying as a false source of power, which a woman clings to because "she is afraid that her own truths are not good enough" (Rich 417). To reiterate and enhance her point that women have been driven mad for centuries, due to experience and instincts in a culture that only validates the male experience, she inserts rhetorical questions throughout about the need to lie. Rich's argumentative essay continues full circle, as she successfully accomplishes her purpose, by provoking women readers to be honest with themselves and fend against the male influenced environment. Adrienne Rich makes an impressionable mark and calls for honesty in all relationships.

Lying: A False Source of Power
Women must become courageous enough to be honest with everyone, including themselves.
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