Adrienne Rich - Diving Into the Wreck

Adrienne Rich’s “Diving into the Wreck” sends one into a deep cultural descent. We look a one ones exploration into the rift in society between sexes, and the journey to rewrite that. The three parts that symbolize this are: the book of myths, the camera and the knife, the diver’s relationship with the wreck and the cargo found below.
The journey starts on a boat; the diver is alone and there not by choice but the need. The dive feels an obligation to free women from these myths, to “…heal the rift”. This is truly a brave woman, to stand up to the world she knows and cry: there is a different way! “First having read the book of myths, and loaded the camera, and checked the edge of the knife-blade”, the diver must know society and its myths, the stigmas of the two sexes and the supposed rules of life. She must learn the past to change it. The camera is to record the journey through our past, (McDaniel). The knife means two things; there will be danger and it will need to be used dissect our cultural myths. Checking the sharpness of the knife enforces this, confirming it will be a dangerous journey and rigorous action is needed to stay alive and free. She must cut away the ties of society to find the meaning behind theses myths, not the myths themselves. The diver wants to come back with “a book of myths in which our names to not appear”.
“There is a ladder. The ladder is always there, hanging innocently” The opportunity to change the world is always there and although described as innocent, it is anything but. The descent into the abyss is a dangerous one, hence the knife again. As the diver floats down, she notices it is comfortable down there and senses it is easy to get lost and forget what she came for. She notes the others who have lived there. It is almost as if the wreck symbolizes another world, “… you breathe differently down here”. The diver knows why she is there, to explore the wreck: to learn about the wreckage of society but not why, to note the