“The Burning of Paper Instead of Children” by Adrienne Rich is a poem that compares the influence of literature to real life situations. One of the main themes in the poem is to live your life in the present and concentrate only on those things that you have control of. Literature does reveal what has happened and what will most likely happen, yet we should not feel constrained to the “knowledge of the oppressor (author)”. We should live life as we choose and to the best of our abilities and not follow the reoccurring actions of the past. Books may have an answer to all of our questions and problems, but we should not live our lives according to their answers. The oppressor gains total control of our lives when we become controlled by the knowledge of the past, similar to the woman in the “Melancolia” painting. She becomes obsessed with studying and understanding books and is unable to experience life and make decisions for herself.
Another theme in the poem is the present suffering of many individuals. Children are unfed, unclothed, and rely on stealing for survival. We have seen numerous examples of this suffering in books but have done nothing to help those people suffering. “There are methods but we do not use them.” For some reason, we tend to act no different than those did in books even though we know the outcomes (mostly negative). The burning of books might not upset the author of this poem because it would force people to make decisions for themselves and to take part in new positive ends. It is those people who are controlled by the oppressor that cause this suffering because they are unable to “tell the truth” and “touch you now” to help bring about positive change. Nick Curosh
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