Rupi Kaur is a 25-year-old poet best known for her book Milk and Honey. She is part of a growing
group of poets known as “Instapoets,” who achieve fame due to their large following
on social media. Kaur began her career by sharing her poems on Tumblr,
garnering such a wide following that she began to post them on Instagram as
well. There, she achieved so much positive feedback and support that she claims
without it she would never have created her first self-published poetry book.
Kaur writes in a minimalistic style, focusing on topics that
touch on love, death, and female empowerment. She accompanies her poems with simple
line images. According to her, the images “create a juxtaposition with the
words...[they] express [a] feeling of innocence” while the subject matter is
mature and even serious. However, due to her simple approach, the poems are
easy to digest and connect to. Many young women see their thoughts and fears
reflected in her writing, especially minority women, as Kaur draws from her
Punjabi background to comment on societal pressures and the hardships of
immigrants.
Rupi Kaur writes for the sake of being honest, a message that is carried out throughout her book. She draws inspiration from the experiences of the people around her to create poems that reveal the root of their emotions. It is the interweaving of different people's stories that makes her book feel like the bearing of a universal soul. Her passion for writing is felt deeply in her poetry. Kaur says when she begins a poem she can feel the words bubbling up inside of her, a feeling that does not go away until she sits and writes, getting them all out. This intrinsic motivation, as Amabile would call it, is the key to her success. It is what led her to self-publish despite the advice of her professor, who told her to avoid that route, and despite the initial rejection she faced from publishers.
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I love how Kaur's poems are short yet full of meaning! The line drawings are a nice touch too. Her work kind of reminds me of Shel Silverstein, although his art seems more rounded and innocent (but his works are impactful too, like The Giving Tree). Kaur's art seems sharp and mature and matches the mood of her writing. If anything, Kaur is like a literature and art creative. I wish I heard about Kaur before, her work sounds wonderful. Great post!
ReplyDeleteI just started following Kaur on Instagram after hearing an interview with her on NPR! It is really interesting how Instagram is being used as a form of blogging these days. The platform was really not created with the intention of displaying in-depth artwork, but it is now being used to by many young people for that purpose!
ReplyDeleteI love how Kaur was able to reach out to her audience over instagram and create a community that way. It is so important to have access to your target audience, especially if that audience would not normally see your work on a more traditional platform.
However, to be honest, seeing successful instagram artists makes me anxious about my own artwork. I feel like I should be making my work more instagram-friendly, even if I don't want to.
But of course new things always scare us, and maybe I will love instagram as a form of sharing my art in the future!
I absolutely adore Rupi Kaur's work. Regardless of your cultural background, she does an outstanding job of having her poems elicit inspiration and a sense of connectivity with her audience. Even her shortest verses speak volumes which shows experience and wisdom for such young artist as herself. What intrigues me the most about her poetry is the fearlessness of bringing up topics that are considered taboo in the Punjabi culture, and gracefully integrating them into her artwork. I admire her creativity and how empowering it is for women, and a person of color, and an immigrant, all at once. It is enthralling to see such a beautiful mind and creative process being translating into poetry.
ReplyDeleteI really love that you made a post about Rupi Kaur because of how much of a different approach she has to traditional poetry. To me she is a big C creative because she uses social media and her own outlets to publish her work, unlike most authors who are scared to do so. She also reminded me of my post about Stephen King because he would write about difficult experiences that people go through, such as car accidents and death, but each author approaches the topics very differently though poetry versus horror.
ReplyDeleteI personally relate so well to Kaur's poem that you posted about being a first generation immigrant, and I really appreciate that she writes about more than just traditional things like love, death, or tragedy. It's also incredible that she is able to make such an impact with just a few lines and a subtle drawing.
I have never heard of Kaur before reading your post, but now I am definitely interested in following her work on Instagram. I think her approach in using social media for poetry makes the art itself more accessible and relatable to the younger generation. Back in high school, my entire class would dread poetry week because it just felt like we were reading vague phrases with meanings that were way too complex. I really enjoyed the poems you included in your post because they were very real and relevant. I found her poems to be simple and honest. I especially liked the illustrations Kaur posted with her poems. They helped to make the poems seem even more personal, as if her readers were looking into one of Kaur's own brainstorming journals.
ReplyDeleteI have not had the chance to read her book yet but I have heard nothing but good things. I love that you mentioned the intrinsic motivation that helps her to write, but I think even more importantly was your mention of her extrinsic motivation in the way of going against her professor's and publishers advice and scrutiny. I wonder if she will continue to publish works or if she will be a one hit wonder. I can't wait to read and I hope that she continues to keep creative works coming rather than only having one piece, because if it is only one piece, we could argue that she is not truly creative.
ReplyDeleteI love Rupi Kaur's poetry! I find her poems very moving and articulate, but also relatable. Everyone I know that has read her poetry has loved it. I had no idea that she was so young. I guess it makes sense then that she started with social media to get to her target audience. I also thought it was interesting that she draws on other people's experiences when writing her poetry in addition to her own. I think a hallmark of her poetry is that it is often written so simply, but her words are still so meaningful.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading her book of poems over the summer, I found out that she got started on social media and I love that she took that platform to elevate herself and prove that it can be used positively and innovatively. I agree with Yuliya's insights in the above comments that Rupi Kaur created herself. She started small, posting on tumblr, an outlet where millions of posts go and are lost. But she was found because of her talent, her beautiful poems that reach across cultures and ages because of their simplicity. And yet she talks about seriously complex topics such as femininity, culture, childhood, love, and sex. Her passion and love for writing and drawing radiates from the pages as you flip through the pages (faster than you think). Her drawings also helped me pause and reflect on the poems and the words being said. Simply Beautiful.
ReplyDeleteI definitely think that Rupi Kaur, while creating in the form of her poems, has been extremely creative in how she has promoted her work. Her use of social media, especially Instagram, as a few other have mentioned, is really quite new. I feel it has only aided her in her mission to make poetry more accessible to the masses. She very creatively used those platforms to spread her work as far as it can possibly go. Despite being a huge poetry fan, I do love the simplicity and straightforward beauty of hers.
ReplyDeleteI find it very interesting that she is so famous for such simple poetry. It makes the reader feel like they can write such poetry themselves but Rupi went to extra mile and committed her young life to publicizing and promoting her work. Millions of people have brilliant and creative ideas but only a handful seize the opportunity and channel their creativity into action. She committed herself to the process and is now enjoying her celebrity status. Good for her!
ReplyDeleteThe first time I heard of Milk and Honey, it was because I had asked my friend about the book she was carrying around with post-it notes sticking out of every other page. I think you're absolutely right that young women can easily connect with her work, and I think we are living in a time where millennial women in particular are looking for female figures we can relate to, if only because we were raised during such a progressive time and our experiences have been so different from those of our mothers.
ReplyDeleteI find it incredibly interesting that she promoted her content cross platform and was able to cultivate enough interest to self publish. I think that young writers today have a leg up over writers from the past because of how easy it is to connect with readers from all over the world without ever leaving your desk. It is startling that these simple strings of just a few words have garnered such a large following!
Rupi is such an influential poet of this time as she integrates such simplicity with depth. I have heard a lot about Milk and Honey and just how amazing it is, but now I really want to open the book and see how it reads to me. She really channeled her talent in such a way that was able to not only be self fulfilling for her, yet simultaneously was able to touch others in many special ways. She is truly an admirable creative who deserves all of her success!
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