Milk And Honey Rupi Kaur

[Louann Mauffray]

Thisbook is divided into four chapters, and each chapter serves a different purpose. Deals with a different pain. Heals a different heartache. milk and honey takes readers through a journey of the most bitter moments in life and finds sweetness in them because there is sweetness everywhere if you are just willing to look.

Milk and Honey (stylized in all lowercase as "milk and honey") is a collection of both abstract fiction and non-fiction poetry and prose by Indian-Canadian poet Rupi Kaur. The collection's themes feature aspects of survival, feminism and relationships, and is divided into four sections, with each section serving a different purpose and relevance to Kaur's personal experiences. The sections further explore the themes of violence, abuse, love, loss, and femininity, accompanied by simple line art illustrations.[1] These sections are titled "the hurting", "the loving", "the breaking" and "the healing".[2] Kaur has cited her cultural background as an inspiration for the book's style, as well as an attempt to make the book more accessible to a wide demographic or readers.[3] The book's simplistic style and themes have drawn forth some negative criticism and alleged rumours about Kaur herself.[4] Critics have sometimes referred to Kaur's work as "Instapoetry" due to Kaur's usage of social media platform Instagram to market her poems and illustrations.[5]

Kaur was born in India and later moved to Canada at the age of four.[6] Her household continued to center the values of the Punjabi-Sikhs people as they spoke only the Punjabi language at home.[7] After arriving in Canada, at the age of 5, Kaur began reading, drawing, writing poetry, and painting because she could not speak English and struggled to make friends.[8] Kaur eventually learned English by the fourth grade and credited her love for spoken word poetry to community open microphone nights.[7] As she got older, she continued reciting her poems at open mic events and gathered a group of followers who showed interest in Kaur expanding her poems in the book.[8]

Milk and Honey is divided into 4 themed chapters: "the hurting," (30 poems), "the loving," (32 poems), "the breaking," (60 poems), and "the healing," (57 poems).[9] Some of the singular poems, which follow the theme of the overall section, have drawings by Kaur. This collection uses sexual terminology, accessible language, and discusses personal trauma. The book itself is recommended for ages 18+. Kaur jumps between first and second-person pronouns, and breaks the conventional rules of traditional poetry to honor Punjabi, the language of her birthplace.[3] She writes with lowercase letters and uses little punctuation similar to the writing features in Punjabi.[3][10]

The first chapter, "the hurting," is about the author's experience with sexual assault, abuse, and family issues.[11] The next chapter, "the loving," has a lighter tone as the topic overall is about positive experiences. The poems have been described by critics as sweet, and being filled with the emotions of falling in love with love and life.[11][9] "The breaking" brings the reader back to a dark place in the author's life. These poems relate to Kaur's sad feeling after a breakup.[11] While speaking about the effects after love is gone, Kaur discusses a break-up to-do list.[9] The last chapter, "the healing," is an attempt to comfort and show women that they should embrace who they are and that they are valuable, no matter what they had to endure.[11] This section also speaks to embracing one's emotions as they are important to improving one's internal strength and abilities.[12]

Milk and Honey was published on November 4, 2014.[13] The poetry collection has sold over 3 million times.[14] As of June 7, 2020, it has been listed on The New York Times Best Seller list for 165 weeks, and has helped Kaur to amass a large following on social media.[15][16] Kaur was not able to find a publisher, so, having learned how to design and edit in college, she decided to self-publish Milk and Honey.[13][8] The book was later re-released under Andrews McMeel Publishing.[14] It has also been translated into 25 languages.[14]

Kaur's poetry has been described as easy and simple to read, not intellectually demanding, 'pablum' and it is credited with changing people's views of poetry, because "she tells it how it is", according to Rob Walker of The Guardian.[17] The book received criticism regarding its reliance on the style of "InstaPoetry", with Bustle stating that Kaur and the book have "by far borne the brunt of these critiques. For every positive review of Kaur's work, there is at least one scathing critique, ranging from actual engagement with her writing to cheap shots claiming she had 'commodified [sic] her South Asian heritage'".[18] Critic John Maher of Publishers Weekly has described Kaur as a "polarizing figure" for literacy, publishing, and media, who might be able to make poems sell again.[19] Maher stated that while a 2015 survey reported a drop in poetry reading between 1992 and 2012, poetry sales figures doubled in 2017, two years after Kaur published Milk and Honey.[19]

Chiara Giovanni critiqued Kaur's ability to be a representative for female empowerment, stating, "'there is something deeply uncomfortable about the self-appointed spokesperson of South Asian womanhood being a privileged young woman from the West'".[4] The book also received criticism over claims that Kaur's work plagiarized that of Nayyirah Waheed. Critics cited similarities between the two poets' writing style of short poems with jagged punctuation and line breaks, and for the same imagery.[20]

Many of you may have heard of poet, Rupi Kaur. She has written poetry, performed spoken word, and engaged in other forms of art as a way of expressing herself. Rupi recently published her first book of poems, Milk & Honey and kindly sat down with Kaur Life to talk about her journey.

Rupi Kaur is a writer based in Toronto, Canada. She studied Rhetoric and Professional Writing at the University of Waterloo. She travels globally to speak and teach workshops on topics such as trauma and healing while also performing her spoken word poetry. Rupi devours words, art, metaphors, bodies of water, and storytelling. She shares her writing with the world as a means to create a safe space for progressive healing and forward movement. You can find more of her work at www.rupikaur.com. You can contact her at: in...@rupikaur.com

The opinions expressed on Kaur Life are those of the authors of the articles and do not necessarily state or reflect the views of Kaur Life. Publication on this website should not be considered an endorsement.

milk and honey is a collection of poetry and prose about survival. It is about the experience of violence, abuse, love, loss, and femininity. It is split into four chapters, and each chapter serves a different purpose, deals with a different pain, heals a different heartache. milk and honey takes readers through a journey of the most bitter moments in life and finds sweetness in them because there is sweetness everywhere if you are just willing to look.

There is no rhyme or reason to this, no rhythmic qualities or underlying purpose of writing the poems this way. Kaur does a great job of bringing out emotions from the readers, using pathos to make them understand. This is the strongest point of milk and honey and one of the reasons why I think so many people like this collection. She writes about many important ideas of feminism and being a woman and heartbreak.

This can be seen all around YA literature as more and more authors are throwing plot twists and adding unnecessary action or steam to novels just to make sure the readers are engaged enough to finish the book.

Looking at the statistics, 50% of adults in the U.S. cannot read a book written at an eighth grade level and 45 million are functionally illiterate and read below a 5th grade level (Literary Project Foundation). This shows the changing dynamic of what people are reading and what they can read.

I think part of the hype surrounding milk and honey comes from how aesthetic it is with its line drawings and minimalistic style and the simplicity of the words. This is definitely what lures a lot of people in because of its pretty cover and drawings, but on a more literary standpoint, it does not make poetry.

There are still strong messages about feminism, relationships, family, and other serious topics which make this a novel choice suited for older teens & adults. Kaur shows the importance of these well, and I know this appeals to many people.

I unfortunately would not recommend milk and honey to someone looking to read poetry. I would recommend it for someone looking for an aesthetic collection of prose that can be interpreted at almost any reading level (though the subject matter is not for kids). You can get into poetry without having to cut it up with scissors to make it easier to read, you just have to find the poet you like reading and go from there.

ahaha and I totally get the whole not knowing how to rate things because sometimes I read books and have no idea what happened, but I still liked reading it even though I had no idea what happened which makes the whole thing confusing ahahah

Totally agree, you have really summarised how I felt about milk and honey! I really just did not get the hype around it, it feels amateurish. I enjoyed parts of the collection because some poems are passionate and raw. I think Kaur does a lot of spoken word poetry and I feel like this might be better performed than read?

milk and honey is a

collection of poetry about

love

loss

trauma

abuse

healing

and femininity

it is split into four chapters

each chapter serves a different purpose

deals with a different pain

heals a different heartache

milk and honey takes readers through

a journey of the most bitter moments in life

and finds sweetness in them

because there is sweetness everywhere

if you are just willing to look

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