DOCSLIB.ORG

Allen Ginsberg

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Allen Ginsberg Beat poetry and the twentieth century: Allen Ginsberg Haidee Kotze Beat poetry and the twentieth century: Allen Ginsberg Haidee Kotze B.A., B.A. Hons Dissertation submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Magister Artium in the Department of English at the Potchefstroorn-u-n-LvAr~itv fnr r.hri~ti::~n l-linh"' r Education I -_F'OTCHEFSTROOMSE UNIVEF:Sirt::n VIR CHO \I~:ttt:YH \'''"•:,¥} 1999 -04-2 1 ~~§.~}/ Supervisor: Mr. J.-L. Kruger Vanderbijlpark November 1998 Acknowledgements I would like to thank the following people and institutions: • My supervisor, Jan-Louis Kruger, for his expertise, empathy and constant support. • Edward, for his love, patience and motivation. • My parents and family, for their continued encouragement and involvement throughout my academic career. • Vernon, for his friendship and compassion. • All my friends, colleagues and lecturers whose interest in this study contributed to it in various ways. • San Geldenhuys, Lizette Marais, Yvonne Engelbrecht and Christelle Oosthuizen of the Ferdinand Postma Library (Vaal Triangle Campus), for their helpful, enthusiastic and prompt assistance. • The Centre for Science Development (HSRC South Africa), for financial assistance. Opinions expressed and conclusions arrived at are not necessarily to be attributed to the Centre for Science Development. • Sentrachem, for the additional financial support which made this study possible. Table of contents 1. Introduction: statement of problem, aims and methods ...... .. ................................. 1 1.1 Contextualisation and problem statement.. ....................................................... 1 1.2 Aims ................................................. .. .. ... ... ......................... ... .................... ...... 6 1.3 Thesis statement ... ... ................... .... .... ...... ..... .... ... .... .............................. .. .. ..... 7 1.4 Method .................. ........ ................................... .............................. .................. 7 1.5 Selection of texts ..... ............................... ..... ....................... ................. ............. 9 2. Background ..... .... ..... ......................................................................... ... ............... 11 2.1 Introduction ... .... ........ .. .. .. .......................... .. .. ...... .. .......... .. ............................. 11 2.2 The Beat Generation as literary and sociological movement ...... ... ................. 11 2.2.1 Beatness and the development of the movement. .................................... 13 2.2.2 Who are the Beats? ....... ... ............ .......................................... .......... .. ..... 17 2.2.3 The social context: culture and counterculture in post-war America ..... .. .. 19 2.2.4 The general characteristics of Beat writing ............................. ... ..... .. ........ 24 2.2.4.1 Spontaneity .. ............... .......... .. ... ... .. .................................. .... ..... ...... .. 25 2.2.4.2 The sanctity of individual experience ..................... ..... .. ...... .. ............ .. 28 2.2.4.3 Freedom of experience and expression .... ..... ...................... ......... ..... 31 2.2.4.4 Spirituality ..... .... ........ .. .. .... .. ....... ... .............. .. ... ... ....................... ........ 33 2.2.5 The literary context ... .. ... .... .... .... .. .. .. .. .. ............... ... ................ ..... .............. 37 2.2.6 A working definition of the Beat movement ........................... .. .... .......... ... 39 2.3 Modernism .................................................. ................................ ... ... .. ............ 41 2.3.1 Introduction .... .... ..... .. .... ...... .... ... ................. .. .. .... ..................................... 41 2.3.2 The term modernism ................................................... ........................... .. 41 2.3.3 The social perspective .......................... ... ... .. ...... .. .. ........................ .... ...... 43 2.3.4 The nature and development of the modernist movement .. .. .... .............. .. 45 2.3.5 Some general characteristics of modernism ..................................... ........ 48 2.3.6 A working definition of modernism ......... .................................. .. ............ ... 52 2.4 From modernism to postmodernism ............... ................................................ 53 2.4.1 Introduction .. .. ... .... .. .. .. .............. ... .. .... .... ... ............................................... 53 2.4.2 The term postmodernism .................. .. ............................ ............. ............ 55 2.4.3 Modernism and postmodernism .................. .. .. .... .. .......... ............ ............. 60 2.4.4 The development of postmodernism and its major manifestations ........... 67 2.4.5 The social perspective ............................................................ .................. 69 2.4.6 The concerns and features of postmodernism ......................................... 71 2.4.7 A working definition of postmodernism ... .. .. ...... ........................... ............. 74 Table of contents 1. Introduction: statement of problem, aims and methods ...... .. ................................. 1 1.1 Contextualisation and problem statement.. ....................................................... 1 1.2 Aims ................................................. .. .. ... ... ......................... ... .................... ...... 6 1.3 Thesis statement ... ... ................... .... .... ...... ..... .... ... .... .............................. .. .. ..... 7 1.4 Method .................. ........ ................................... .............................. .................. 7 1.5 Selection of texts ..... ............................... ..... ....................... ................. ............. 9 2. Background ..... .... ..... ......................................................................... ... ............... 11 2.1 Introduction ... .... ........ .. .. .. .......................... .. .. ...... .. .......... .. ............................. 11 2.2 The Beat Generation as literary and sociological movement ...... ... ................. 11 2.2.1 Beatness and the development of the movement. .................................... 13 2.2.2 Who are the Beats? ....... ... ............ .......................................... .......... .. ..... 17 2.2.3 The social context: culture and counterculture in post-war America ..... .. .. 19 2.2.4 The general characteristics of Beat writing ............................. ... ..... .. ........ 24 2.2.4.1 Spontaneity .. ............... .......... .. ... ... .. .................................. .... ..... ...... .. 25 2.2.4.2 The sanctity of individual experience ..................... ..... .. ...... .. ............ .. 28 2.2.4.3 Freedom of experience and expression .... ..... ...................... ......... ..... 31 2.2.4.4 Spirituality ..... .... ........ .. .. .... .. ....... ... .............. .. ... ... ....................... ........ 33 2.2.5 The literary context ... .. ... .... .... .... .. .. .. .. .. ............... ... ................ ..... .............. 37 2.2.6 A working definition of the Beat movement ........................... .. .... .......... ... 39 2.3 Modernism .................................................. ................................ ... ... .. ............ 41 2.3.1 Introduction .... .... ..... .. .... ...... .... ... ................. .. .. .... ..................................... 41 2.3.2 The term modernism ................................................... ........................... .. 41 2.3.3 The social perspective .......................... ... ... .. ...... .. .. ........................ .... ...... 43 2.3.4 The nature and development of the modernist movement .. .. .... .............. .. 45 2.3.5 Some general characteristics of modernism ..................................... ........ 48 2.3.6 A working definition of modernism ......... .................................. .. ............ ... 52 2.4 From modernism to postmodernism ............... ................................................ 53 2.4.1 Introduction .. .. ... .... .. .. .. .............. ... .. .... .... ... ............................................... 53 2.4.2 The term postmodernism .................. .. ............................ ............. ............ 55 2.4.3 Modernism and postmodernism .................. .. .. .... .. .......... ............ ............. 60 2.4.4 The development of postmodernism and its major manifestations ........... 67 2.4.5 The social perspective ............................................................ .................. 69 2.4.6 The concerns and features of postmodernism ......................................... 71 2.4.7 A working definition of postmodernism ... .. .. ...... ........................... ............. 74 2.5 In conclusion: some preliminary links ............................................................. 75 3. Modernism and the Beat poetry of Allen Ginsberg ... .... ........................................ 77 3.1 Introduction ................................. ....................................... ............................ 77 3.2 The reaction against modernist poetics .......................................................... 77 3.3 The integration of modernist poetics in the Beat poetry of Allen Ginsberg ...... 84 3.3.1 Imagism ....................
Load more

Recommended publications
  • American Beat Yogi
    Linda T. Klausner Masters Thesis: Literature, Culture, and Media Professor Eva Haettner-Aurelius 22 Apr 2011 American Beat Yogi: An Exploration of the Hindu and Indian Cultural Themes in Allen Ginsberg Klausner ii Table of Contents Preface iii A Note on the Mechanics of Writing v Introduction 1 Chapter 1: Early Life, Poetic Vision, and Critical Perspectives 10 Chapter 2: In India 21 Chapter 3: The Change 53 Chapter 4: After India 79 Conclusion 105 Sources 120 Appendix I. Selected Glossary of Hindi and Sanskrit Words 128 Appendix II. Descriptions of Prominent Hindu Deities 130 Klausner iii Preface I am grateful for the opportunity to have been able to live in Banaras for researching and writing this paper. It has provided me an invaluable look at the living India that Ginsberg writes about, and enabled me to see many facets that would otherwise have been impossible to discover. In the spirit of research and my deep passion for the subject, I braved temperatures nearing 50º Celsius. Not weather particularly conducive to thesis-writing, but what I was able to discover and experience empowers me to do it again in a heartbeat. Since the first draft, I contracted a mosquito-borne tropical illness called Dengue Fever, for which there is no vaccine. I left India for a season to recover, and returned to complete this study. The universe guided me to some amazing mentors, including Anand Prabhu Barat at the literature department of Banaras Hindu University, who specializes in the Eastern spiritual themes of the Beat Generation. She and Ginsberg had corresponded, and he sent her several works including Allen Ginsberg: Collected Works, 1947 – 1980.
    [Show full text]
  • Countercultural Reflections: the Beat Generation and Occupy Wall Street in Comparative Perspective
    Countercultural Reflections: The Beat Generation and Occupy Wall Street in Comparative Perspective. Name: Anita Schmale Student number: 3341623 MA Thesis, American Studies Program, Utrecht University Supervisor: Dr. Joes Segal Date of submission: 25 July 2013 Word Count: 19,892 Table of Contents 1. Introduction 1 2. Identifying the Beat Generation and Occupy Wall Street 7 2.1 Beat Generation 7 2.2 Occupy Wall Street 16 3. Expressions of Countercultural Ideas 26 3.1 Expressions of the Beat Generation 26 3.2 Expressions of Occupy Wall Street 31 4. Theories of Social Movements 35 4.1 Tilly & Tarrow 36 4.1.1 Beat Generation 38 4.1.2 Occupy Wall Street 43 4.1.3 Assessing the Theory 45 4.2 Klaus Eder 46 4.2.1 Beat Generation 49 4.2.2 Occupy Wall Street 52 4.2.3 Assessing the Theory 53 4.3 Gene Sharp 54 4.3.1 Beat Generation 57 4.3.2 Occupy Wall Street 60 4.3.3 Assessing the Theory 62 5. Conclusion 63 Works Cited 71 1. Introduction On September 18, 2011, one day after the so-called “Day of Rage”, The New York Times reports that a group of protesters gathered around the New York Stock Exchange and occupied Wall Street (Moynihan, “Protesters” par. 1). According to the newspaper, the protesters had been planning “September 17” for months and were aiming to occupy Wall Street “as an expression of anger over a financial system that they say favors the rich and powerful at the expense of ordinary citizens” (Moynihan, “Protesters” par.
    [Show full text]
  • Using Poetry to Teach Children About the Civil Rights Movement Elouise
    Using Poetry to Teach Children About the Civil Rights Movement Elouise Payton Objectives After teaching this unit, I hope that my students will be able to identify with their own history and value their own background and identities. I plan to provide my students with opportunities to reflect upon what they are learning and give them the opportunity to express their feelings in positive ways. I want to support them as they interact and think more critically about their own identities, cultural experiences and the world that they live in. Likewise, in this unit my students will learn about the active roles that African American children and others played in reforming their communities during the era. Furthermore, it is my hope that my students will view themselves as agents of change; understand that they too are active participants in history and that they can play key roles in shaping their own lives and communities. I want my students to read interesting texts related to the Civil Rights Era and be able to discuss, question, think, and infer what is happening in them. This can be accomplished as students respond to texts by asking questions, paraphrasing important information, creating visual images, making comparisons, analyzing and summarizing what they have learned. My students will be encouraged to read more literature written by and about African Americans to support their understanding of the events that happened during the era. I will have students interview relatives and have conversations with their relatives about what they have learned about the history of the Civil Rights Movement.
    [Show full text]
  • William Carlos Williams's the Great American Novel
    William Carlos Williams’s The Great American Novel: Flamboyance and the Beginning of Art April Boone William Carlos Williams Review, Volume 26, Number 1, Spring 2006, pp. 1-25 (Article) Published by Penn State University Press DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/wcw.2007.0000 For additional information about this article https://muse.jhu.edu/article/216543 [ This content has been declared free to read by the pubisher during the COVID-19 pandemic. ] William Carlos Williams’s The Great American Novel: Flamboyance and the Beginning of Art April Boone U N I V E R S I T Y O F T E N N E S S E E N the early 1920s in Rutherford, New Jersey, William Carlos Williams had serious doubts that the “Great American Novel,” as it Iwas then conceptualized, could ever be written. Though generally known for his revolutionary work in poetry, Williams was also quite an experi- mentalist in prose, claiming in Spring and All that prose and verse “are phases of the same thing” (144). Williams showed concern for the future of American litera- ture in general, including that of the novel. In response to what he viewed as spe- cific problems facing the American novel, problems with American language, and problems inherent in the nature of language itself, Williams created The Great American Novel in 1923. Williams was troubled by the derivative nature of American novels of the time, their lack of originality, and their dependence upon European models; the exhausted material and cliché- ridden language of the his- torical novels of his day; the tendency of such novels to oversimplify or misrepre- sent the American experience; and the formulaic quality of genres such as detec- tive novels.
    [Show full text]
  • Whitman's Civil
    Whitman’s Civil War: Writing and Imaging Loss, Death, and Disaster CLASS ONE • Video Transcript >>I am Christopher Merrill, the Director of the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa. And I'm Ed Folsom, Professor of English at the University of Iowa. And it's our pleasure to welcome you to the first session of our Massive Open Online Course, "Whitman's Civil War: Writing and Imaging Loss, Death, and Disaster." Ed and I began composing introductions and commentaries about Whitman's Civil War writings and poetry and prose last summer. And it's interesting to think about this at a moment in our history: we began our writing journey for this MOOC a hundred and fifty years after the end of the Civil War. At a moment in American history where, because of the deaths in Ferguson, Missouri, and in Baltimore, Maryland, as well as rippling around the world - wars in Iraq, in Syria, in Libya, and Yemen, and on and on, we are thinking that, Whitman's attempts to write and image loss and death and disaster have broad applicability. That, what he's trying to do with this great disaster in American history is something that writers face again and again in the 20th century, the bloodiest century of all, and now in our own century, where the forces of chaos seem often to be overwhelming. How did Whitman do that? Yes, and with Whitman, we really have the sense that we are at the beginning of the era that defines us - that still defines our era - this is the first great mechanized war of mass death.
    [Show full text]
  • 1 the Beat Generation the Beats Were a Criticism of American Complacency Under the Ike-Nixon Regime, an Expression of New Forms
    The Beat Generation The Beats were a criticism of American complacency under the Ike-Nixon regime, an expression of new forms of prose, and poetry and an exploration of consciousness, which joined the dissent of existing Bohemias [...] to produce a distinct style of literature and living, based on disaffiliation, poverty, anarchic individualism and communal living. A relaxation of 'square' (puritan, middle-class, respectable) attitudes towards sex, drugs, religion and art became the opposing uniformity of 'beat' -Eric Monstram: The Penguin Companion to Literature The “Beat Generation” is viewed as an influential cultural revolution or a literary movement that emerged in the late 1940’s in the aftermath of World War II. The Beat movement was made up of a broad geographical range, from New York City to San Francisco. At first the majority of the “beats” lived in Greenwich Village, New York. They usually hung out together in coffeehouses, jazz bars, and in Washington Square Park, sharing ideas, creating works of art -especially poetry, listening to music and having wild parties. The poetry and novels they wrote were always about their own life experiences and hence biographical. The autobiographical fiction novels of Jack Kerouac and his fellow Beat writers show that without a specific philosophy, the Beat Generation sought to redefine the American Dream and reject middle class values through the pursuit of kicks and escape from convention. Over View In the Beat Book edited by Ann Waldman, the origin of the phrase is traced back to Jack Kerouac’s conversation with John Clellon Holmes in 1948: 1 They were discussing the nature of generations, recollecting the glamour of the Lost Generation, and Kerouac said, "Ah, this is nothing but a beat generation." They talked about whether it was a "found generation" (as Kerouac sometimes called it), an "angelic generation", or some other epithet.
    [Show full text]
  • The Motive of Asceticism in Emily Dickenson's Poetry
    International Academy Journal Web of Scholar ISSN 2518-167X PHILOLOGY THE MOTIVE OF ASCETICISM IN EMILY DICKENSON’S POETRY Abdurahmanova Saadat Khalid, Ph.D. Odlar Yurdu University, Baku, Azerbaijan DOI: https://doi.org/10.31435/rsglobal_wos/31012020/6880 ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT Received: 25 November 2019 This paper is an attempt to analyze the poetry of Miss Emily Dickinson Accepted: 12 January 2020 (1830-1886) contributed both American and World literature in order to Published: 31 January 2020 reveal the extent of asceticism in it. Asceticism involves a deep, almost obsessive, concern with such problems as death, the life after death, the KEYWORDS existence of the soul, immortality, the existence of God and heaven, the meaningless of life and etc. Her enthusiastic expressions of life in poems spiritual asceticism, psychological had influenced the development of poetry and became the source of portrait, transcendentalism, Emily inspiration for other poets and poetesses not only in last century but also . Dickenson’s poetry in modern times. The paper clarifies the motives of spiritual asceticism, self-identity in Emily Dickenson’s poetry. Citation: Abdurahmanova Saadat Khalid. (2020) The Motive of Asceticism in Emily Dickenson’s Poetry. International Academy Journal Web of Scholar. 1(43). doi: 10.31435/rsglobal_wos/31012020/6880 Copyright: © 2020 Abdurahmanova Saadat Khalid. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice.
    [Show full text]
  • Culture and Humor in Postwar American Poetry
    Palacký University, Olomouc Culture and Humor in Postwar American Poetry Jiří Flajšar Olomouc 2014 Reviewers: doc. Mgr. Jakub Guziur, Ph.D. Mgr. Vladimíra Fonfárová “The research and publication of this book was in the years 2012–2014 financed by the Faculty of Arts, Palacký University, Olomouc from the Fund for the Research Advancement.” All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, now known or hereafter invented, without written permission by the copyright holder. © Jiří Flajšar, 2014 © Palacký University, Olomouc, 2014 First Edition ISBN 978-80-244-4158-0 This book is dedicated to my family. Contents Introduction 7 Crisis or Not: On the Situation of American Poetry and Its Audience 17 Humor as a Method in Postwar American Culture Poetry 33 Allen Ginsberg: Odyssey in the American Supermarket 43 Kenneth Koch: The Poet as Serious Comic 63 “Reality U.S.A.”: The Poetry of Mark Halliday 81 R.S. Gwynn: The New Formalist Shops at the Mall 107 Campbell McGrath: The Poet as a Representative Product of American Culture 127 Tony Hoagland: The Poetry of Ironic Self-Deprecation 185 Billy Collins: The Genteel Commentator 207 Culture, Identity, and Humor in Contemporary Chinese-American Poetry 215 Bibliography 227 Index 247 Introduction The United States themselves are essentially the greatest poem. —Walt Whitman Something we were withholding made us weak Until we found out that it was ourselves We were withholding from our land of living —Robert Frost What counted was mythology of the self, Blotched out beyond unblotching.
    [Show full text]
  • Sensing Sounding: Close Listening to Experimental Asian American Poetry
    University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations 2016 Sensing Sounding: Close Listening To Experimental Asian American Poetry Ashley Chang University of Pennsylvania, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations Part of the Aesthetics Commons, Asian American Studies Commons, and the English Language and Literature Commons Recommended Citation Chang, Ashley, "Sensing Sounding: Close Listening To Experimental Asian American Poetry" (2016). Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations. 2210. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2210 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2210 For more information, please contact [email protected]. Sensing Sounding: Close Listening To Experimental Asian American Poetry Abstract This dissertation examines a selection of Asian American experimental poetries from the 1960’s to the present day through the sensory paradigms of avant-garde aesthetic discourse. By approaching both the poem and racial formation in sonic terms, this dissertation project argues that rethinking the sensory as well as the political ramifications of sounding can help us ecuperr ate Asian American poets’ often overlooked experimentation with poetic form. Specifically, I read the works of Marilyn Chin, Theresa Cha, John Yau, Cathy Park Hong, Mei-mei Berssenbrugge, and Tan Lin. By tracing the historical conditions of Orientalist objectification and e-interrr ogating postmodern theories of
    [Show full text]
  • Beat Generation and Postmodernism: Deconstructing the Narratives of America
    2015 Beat Generation and Postmodernism: Deconstructing the Narratives of America Nicolas Deskos 10623272 MA Literary Studies: English Literature and Culture Supervisor: Dr Roger Eaton University of Amsterdam Contents Introduction 3 The American Dream 3 The Beat Generation 5 Postmodernism 8 Outline 9 Chapter 1: On the Road to a Postmodern Identity 11 Promise of the Road and Its Reality 12 What it Means to Be American 15 Searching for a Transcendent Identity 17 Chapter 2: Deconstructing Burroughs’ ‘Meaningless Mosaic’ 22 Language as a System of Control 23 Metafiction in Naked Lunch 27 Chapter 3: Ginsberg’s Mythical Heroes 32 Fragmentation of the Self 34 Heroes of the Past 39 Conclusion 43 Works Cited 47 2 Introduction This research aims to reinterpret and recontextualise the principal Beat writers – Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and William S. Burroughs – from the theoretical perspective of postmodernism. I aim to go beyond the traditional interpretation of the Beat Generation as a countercultural, counterhegemonic movement and challenge the “binary opposition between the establishment culture and a dissenting counterculture” (Martinez 7). Through the interpretative paradigm of postmodernism, I want to show that the Beat writers were concerned with the tension between the myths of America and its reality, appropriating one’s identity in the face of a dominant culture, and questions surrounding being, existence and reality. In doing so, I will locate their texts within the discourses of the mainstream as opposed to at its margins. Thus, I will argue that Burroughs, Kerouac and Ginsberg deconstruct, in their own ways, the official and mythical narratives of America, particularly the narrative on which the country is built: the American Dream.
    [Show full text]
  • Emerson's Poetic Theory
    University of Tennessee, Knoxville TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange Supervised Undergraduate Student Research Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects and Creative Work 5-2013 Awaiting the Seer: Emerson's Poetic Theory Rachel Radford [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_chanhonoproj Part of the American Literature Commons Recommended Citation Radford, Rachel, "Awaiting the Seer: Emerson's Poetic Theory" (2013). Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects. https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_chanhonoproj/1606 This Dissertation/Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Supervised Undergraduate Student Research and Creative Work at TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. It has been accepted for inclusion in Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects by an authorized administrator of TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The University of Tennessee Awaiting the Seer: Emerson’s Poetic Theory Rachel Radford First Reader: Dr. Coleman Second Reader: Dr. Griffin English 498 April 26, 2012 Radford 1 Who could stand among the ranks of Homer, Milton, and Shakespeare as America’s poet? Who could found a great American literary tradition? These questions reflected the eighteenth century concern about the state of American literature. William Cullen Bryant, an internationally acclaimed poet after the publication of Poems in 1821, was one who addressed these issues (Baym, “Bryant” 1044). In 1825 Bryant was invited to give a series of lectures on poetry before the New York Athenaeum (Bryant 3). The third of these lectures focused on the development of poetry in America as compared to its development in other places and times, responding to critics who questioned the ability of poetry to emerge in a time where “the progress of reason, of science, and of the useful arts has a tendency to narrow the sphere of imagination” (24).
    [Show full text]
  • America Singing Loud: Shifting Representations of American National
    AMERICA SINGING LOUD: SHIFTING REPRESENTATIONS OF AMERICAN NATIONAL IDENTITY IN ALLEN GINSBERG AND WALT WHITMAN Thesis Submitted to The College of Arts and Sciences of the UNIVERSITY OF DAYTON In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for The Degree of Master of Arts in English Literature By Eliza K. Waggoner Dayton, Ohio May 2012 AMERICA SINGING LOUD: SHIFTING REPRESENTATIONS OF AMERICAN NATIONAL IDENTITY IN ALLEN GINSBERG AND WALT WHITMAN Name: Waggoner, Eliza K. APPROVED BY: ____________________________________________________ Albino Carrillo, MFA Committee Chair ____________________________________________________ Tereza Szeghi, Ph.D. Committee Member ____________________________________________________ James Boehnlein, Ph. D. Committee Member ii ABSTRACT AMERICA SINGING LOUD: SHIFTING REPRESENTATIONS OF AMERICAN NATIONAL IDENTITY IN ALLEN GINSBERG AND WALT WHITMAN Name: Waggoner, Eliza K. University of Dayton Advisor: Mr. Albino Carrillo Much work has been done to study the writings of Walt Whitman and Allen Ginsberg. Existing scholarship on these two poets aligns them in various ways (radicalism, form, prophecy, etc.), but most extensively through their homosexuality. While a vast majority of the scholarship produced on these writers falls under queer theory, none acknowledges their connection through the theme of my research—American identity. Ideas of Americanism, its representation, and what it means to be an American are issues that span both Whitman and Ginsberg's work. The way these issues are addressed and reconciled by Ginsberg is vastly different from how Whitman interacts with the subject: a significant departure due to the nature of their relationship. Ginsberg has cited Whitman as an influence on his work, and other scholars have commented on the appearance of this influence. The clear evidence of connection makes their different handling of similar subject matter a doorway into deeper analysis of the interworking of these two iconic American writers.
    [Show full text]