I found Buck's writing quite revelatory. I, for one, think that I have consistently fallen victim to the notion of modernism which I was taught about. As Buck demonstrates, seeing the "victory" of modernist poetic innovations as a kind of foregone conclusion (80). Moreover, because I identify so personally with the jaded disenchantment familiar in so much of modernism, my taste affects (at least partially) any quality judgements that I make. So, I appreciated Buck's urging to examine WWI women writings within their historical context and just within the context which we've been taught to associate with modernism. I'm left wondering though how can we account for the bias of hindsight without discrediting traditionaly favored works? In other words, I want to move past the biases that have flavored my taste (pun intended) without completely dismissing the validity of my taste.

I also really enjoyed reading The Freewoman looking at the issue that we read, as well as a few others, I was struck by the remarkably progressive tone which was taking place at the time, and not just in regards to traditional conceptions of Feminism. The review that West wrote for Owen's Women Adrift reveals a critical voice which is teeming with sarcasm. I certainly feel that I should read more of West's criticism now, partially because her criticism unlike the criticism of Pound and Eliot is not taught (doubtless because English departments of the new critics were not built of her philosophy). As a side note, I got an immense amount of enjoyment from her line: "If I belonged to a sex that was so transparently undesirable, that after only fifty years of the higher education women recoil from it in aversion, I should bury myself tidily in quicklime" (368).