Australian poet, writer, and environmentalist Judith Wright’s poem Eve to Her Daughters carries the central message that an age of scientific revolution often leads man astray from his Faith; he perceives himself as a god. Though Wright does not address women well until the eighth stanza, it is evident that the poem is an open call to women to not be the submissive gender and bring back faith and innocence into the world, which has fallen prey to the dangers of men’s arrogance and hubris. Wright’s poem can also be interpreted allegorically, where Adam and Eve represent the Aboriginal peoples whose land has been taken away by the coloniser since she was an active campaigner for Aboriginal land rights. God, as the coloniser, is who Adam seeks to emulate, destroying the natural resources of the land and decimating his own culture.

 Summary and Analysis of Eve to Her Daughters

 

Lines 1-6

It was not I who began it.

Turned out into draughty caves,

hungry so often, having to work for our bread,

hearing the children whining,

I was nevertheless not unhappy.

Where Adam went I was fairly contented to go.

In this poem by Judith Wright, Eve, the Biblical figure, addresses her daughters and describes the life she led with Adam after they fell from Eden. She reflects on her experience and shares it with her female descendants. She says that she is not responsible for the fall, and life has become much harder for them ever since; with the hunger to cope in caves. Eve, however, was willing to cope, as she was with the man she loved. The lines express a sense of resignation that women throughout history have felt; they have always been content with their husband’s fate, but they have had experiences of their own. Wright seems to give voice to those unsung experiences that women have voicelessly endured and made peace with. 

 

Eve To Her Daughters | Analysis, Lines 7-11

I adapted myself to the punishment: it was my life.

 But Adam, you know ….. !

 He kept on brooding over the insult,

 over the trick They had played on us, over the scolding.

 He had discovered a flaw in himself

 and he had to make up for it.

Outside Eden the earth was imperfect,

the seasons changed, the game was fleet-footed,

he had to work for our living, and he didn’t like it.

He even complained of my cooking

(it was hard to compete with Heaven).

Continuing as before, Eve says that she made peace with God’s punishment—banishment from Eden. However, she says, Adam was not as content as her, as he kept on “brooding” over the punishment and their deception by a higher power. Fixating on his flaw, Adam set out to create his own Eden on Earth, which was imperfect, with changing seasons and elusive games. He is dissatisfied with Eve’s cooking and hates that he has to work for sustenance. Wright comments on gender roles throughout history in the lines and reflects on how men have always tried to achieve things without a care for happiness or contentment as women. They have needed to create Earth into a paradise to find contentment in it, which is why they have always been ever unhappy. 

 

Eve To Her Daughters | Analysis, Lines 12-20 

So he set to work.

The earth must be made a new Eden

with central heating, domesticated animals,

mechanical harvesters, combustion engines,

escalators, refrigerators,

and modern means of communication

and multiplied opportunities for safe investment

and higher education for Abel and Cain

and the rest of the family.

Adam cannot accept their new status, seeking to become godlike in his arrogance and create an Eden of his own. The references to domesticated animals, central heating, mechanical harvesters and engines, refrigerators, etc. are instances of modern advancements by man, an age of industrialisation, symbolising the progress Adam wants to create. The poet highlights how, through these measures, man has tried to create heaven but has ended up destroying the planet he has. He also has the added burden of providing for his children and giving them a good life. Wright is an environmentalist and is conscious of the destruction the modern period, with its radical advancements in technology, has brought to humankind. The poem resonates with the ideas of Mary Shelley’s hugely famous novel Frankenstein, which cautioned against the rejection of natural human thought to value a scientific notion that will eventually lead to a more humane society. Wright uses a fictional narrative of the Biblical story of Adam and Eve to not only portray gender roles as they have always been but also present a similar cautionary tale of how attempting to achieve Eden on Earth will only beget destruction since man is not god. Such arrogance on the part of humankind cannot be fruitful. 

 

Eve To Her Daughters | Analysis, Lines 21-36

You can see how his pride had been hurt.

In the process he had to unravel everything,

because he believed that mechanism

was the whole secret – he was always mechanical-minded.

He got to the very inside of the whole machine

exclaiming as he went, So that is how it works!

And now that I know how it works, why, I must have invented it.

As for God and the Other, they cannot be demonstrated,

And what cannot be demonstrated

doesn’t exist.

You see, he had always been jealous.

Yes, he got to the centre

where nothing at all can be demonstrated.

And clearly he doesn’t exist; but he refuses

to accept the conclusion.

You see, he was always an egotist.

 Adam, in his arrogance, believes that once he gets down to the mechanism of something and understands how it works, he must have invented it, revealing his tragic flaw—his arrogance of personality, leading him to seek superiority over God, who has created everything. He justifies that since God’s existence cannot be demonstrated, it does not exist. Man seeks to be in control of all creations and forgets that he came from the Creator. Eve calls him an egotist who has become blind in his ambition to be godlike. These lines reflect the dangers of a purely rationalistic mindset, which man has adapted to in the modern age. Anything that cannot be proven or shown empirical evidence of is a subject of scepticism to Adam. 

 

Eve To Her Daughters | Analysis, Lines 37-46

It was warmer than this in the cave;

There was none of this fall-out.

I would suggest, for the sake of the children,

that it’s time you took over.

But you are my daughters, you inherit my own faults of character;

you are submissive, following Adam

even beyond existence.

Faults of character have their own logic

and it always works out.

I observed this with Abel and Cain.

Through the following lines, not only Eve but the poet too seem to be speaking a manifesto for women to take over. Eve says that in the cave, they had none of these fallouts that they now have, and life was simpler. She acknowledges that her daughters inherit her flaws because they too tend to follow in the footsteps of their respective Adams and are submissive. However, these faults have a way of working out; she elucidates this through the example of Abel and Cain. The poet explores the generational inheritance of gender roles in society, how inherited traits are perpetuated, and how the cycles in society go on and on. The poem is more of a manifesto than a cautionary tale, then, for women to take over the world since the men have been failing due to their arrogance.

Eve To Her Daughters | Analysis, Lines 47-56

Perhaps the whole elaborate fable

right from the beginning

is meant to demonstrate this; perhaps it’s the whole secret.

Perhaps nothing exists but our faults?

At least they can be demonstrated.

But it’s useless to make

such a suggestion to Adam.

He has turned himself into God,

who is faultless, and doesn’t exist.

Eve contemplates if the entire fable has only been constructed to prove our faults; perhaps nothing but our faults can be proven. She wonders if human faults are the underlying essence of existence and the core secret of life. Eve, however, notes that making such a suggestion to Adam and sharing with him her great finding is inevitably futile; he has become godlike in his arrogance and considers himself beyond flaws. Adam thus denies the existence of his own imperfections and the limitations of human life. 

 

The poem is thus largely allegorical in its narration, where Eve’s impediments on Earth symbolise her loss of innocence, and the whole poem can be read as man’s destruction of nature and the Earth in pursuit of god-like perfection. In his arrogance, man forgets that he is indeed not the creator, and what he strives to create for Earth to be a paradise ultimately destroys it. Wright’s poem is Eve’s manifesto to womankind to not be “submissive” to Adam and instead tell him that scientific advancements and the mechanisation of society should not lead it astray from Faith. 

 

 

 

About the Poet 

Judith Wright was an Australian poet, critic, environmentalist, and Aboriginal land rights activist. She is widely known as the greatest Australian poet, whose themes profoundly explore nature, social justice, Aboriginal culture, and the relationship between humans and nature. Because she grew up in a rural environment in New South Wales, Australia, it deeply enhanced her poetic sensibilities. She wrote numerous poetry collections throughout her life, including The Gateway (1953), The Two Fires (1955), and The Shadow of Fire (1971). Wright also played a central role in establishing The Australian Conservation Foundation. 

Eve to Her Daughters, as the title suggests, is Judith Wright’s letter to women using the biblical tale of Adam and Eve; she conveys that man, in his arrogance, has forgotten god, thinking himself to be one, and it is up to women to bring humankind back to Faith and restore the natural order of the world. The poem can also be read as European imperialism of natural African lands; much like colonisers, Adam too seeks to create Eden on Earth and ends up destroying the planet itself, which is what becomes the fate of a colony. Being the environmentalist that she is, Wright achieves a triple-fold analysis of her poem; she explores inherited gender roles, the dangers of colonisation, and the loss of Faith in the modern age.