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Stony Brook University SSStttooonnnyyy BBBrrrooooookkk UUUnnniiivvveeerrrsssiiitttyyy The official electronic file of this thesis or dissertation is maintained by the University Libraries on behalf of The Graduate School at Stony Brook University. ©©© AAAllllll RRRiiiggghhhtttsss RRReeessseeerrrvvveeeddd bbbyyy AAAuuuttthhhooorrr... From Mourning to Meditation: Theorizing Ecopoetics, Thinking Ecology A Dissertation Presented by Jessica Lee Curran to The Graduate School in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English Stony Brook University August 2012 Copyright by Jessica Lee Curran 2012 Stony Brook University The Graduate School Jessica Lee Curran We, the dissertation committee for the above candidate for the Doctor of Philosophy degree, hereby recommend acceptance of this dissertation. Rowan Ricardo Phillips – Dissertation Advisor Associate Professor, Department of English Susan Scheckel - Chairperson of Defense Associate Professor, Department of English Peter Manning – Committee Member Professor, Department of English Lynn Keller Professor, Department of English – University of Wisconsin, Madison This dissertation is accepted by the Graduate School Charles Taber Interim Dean of the Graduate School ii Abstract of the Dissertation From Mourning to Meditation: Theorizing Ecopoetics, Thinking Ecology by Jessica Lee Curran Doctor of Philosophy in English Stony Brook University 2012 Composed of twelve chapters and argued through the months of the year, this dissertation analyzes the works of Emily Dickinson and Henry David Thoreau, situating them in a contemporary ecocritical context, but more importantly, in a widened sense of ecopoetics. The project’s thesis states that the ecopoet, in mourning the loss of nature as idealization and salvation, embraces a state of radical metaphor-making, which in turn allows for a heightened sense of intimacy and necessitates a commitment to meditation. The cultivation of intimacy and the practice of meditation lie at the heart of ecological thinking and being. In order to theorize ecology in relation to meditation, the project interrogates and rethinks "meditation" as a canonical term through an intervention of non-western epistemology. In moving with the calendar, the chapters address key ecopoetic figures (the stranger, the field, the garden, the heart), processes (mourning, breathing, singing), and literary practices (the notebook, the letter, the calendar). In shaping this narrative of ecopoesis , multiple genres are discussed in relation to meditative practice as a form of diurnal awareness, including the epistle, ode, haiku, journal, lyric fiction, and elegy. In turn, analysis of Dickinson and Thoreau is supplemented by a range of other voices, including contemporary poets Jane Hirshfield, W.S. Merwin, and Juliana Spahr. The project reaches back to Horace’s Stoic and Epicurean education for ecopoetic roots in the West and forward to contemporary global extensions and analogues, in particular, Korean poet Ko Un. As ecological thinking requires scale elongation in both temporal and spatial planes, this dissertation ultimately argues for a new mode of reading ecologically, recognizing patterns of interrelation and modes of questioning that widen and deepen a shifting set of perspectives. iii The poet is more in the air than the naturalist though they may walk side by side—Granted that you are out of door—but what if the outer door is open, if the inner door is shut. You must walk sometimes perfectly free—not prying nor inquisitive—not bent upon seeing things— Throw away a whole day for a single expansion—a single inspiration of air— -Henry David Thoreau It is up to the writer to recognize everything that happens to her as a gift, to love each thing that comes under the eye’s contemplation, inner and outer. To set up straw men is not only a failure of heart—it will also be an inevitable failure of writing. In this, the lessons of ecology, Zen, and artistic craft are the same. -Jane Hirshfield Forever—is composed of Nows— ‘Tis not a different time— Except for Infiniteness— And Latitude of Home— From this—experienced Here— Remove the Dates—to These— Let Months dissolve in further Months— And Years—exhale in Years— -Emily Dickinson iv Table of Contents List of Figures vi September “There is no end to the essence” Projective Projects & The Ecocritic’s Calendar 1 (Mourning) October “Notebooks of the Present” Four Seasons & The Genres of Ecology 15 November “That those who know her, know her less/ The nearer her they get” Dickinson, Ecological Infinity, and Letting Nature Go 30 December “Is’t then too late the damage to repair?” Henry David Thoreau and The Work of the Ecolament 42 (Metaphor) January “It was no longer beans that I hoed, nor I that hoed beans” Thoreau and the Metaphorical Field as Meditation 56 February “Late—my Garden of a Rock/ Yielded Grape—and Maise—” Living Metaphor & Garden Theory 70 March “From the Thousand Responses of My Heart Never to Cease” Dickinson, Jane Hirshfield, and the Lives of the Heart 83 (Intimacy) April “Easing my Famine/At my Lexicon” Intimacy and the Ecology of Dear Emily 98 May “By a Flower—By A Letter—/By a nimble love—” Rhetorical Immediacy & Epistolary Ecology 112 v (Meditation) June Transcendental Meditation Ecopoetics & Dickinson’s Breath 123 July “Let the heart rejoice in what it has right now” The Domus , Ataraxia , and Horatian Garden Poetry 142 as Ecological Singing August 12 Views of Ecopoetics (On Hokusai & Blackbirds) 160 Bibliography 188 Appendix Collection of Figures 198 vi List of Figures Figure 1 “contents” 198 Figure 2 “the calendar” 199 Figure 3 “the notebook” 200 Figure 4 “the stranger” 201 Figure 5 “the winter” 202 Figure 6 “the field” 203 Figure 7 “the garden” 204 Figure 8 “the heart” 205 Figure 9 “the lexicon” 206 Figure 10 “the letter” 207 Figure 11 “the breath” 208 Figure 12 “the song” 209 Figure 13 “the blackbird” 210 vii September “There is no end to the essence” Projective Projects & The Ecocritic’s Calendar The ecological thought is as much about opening our minds as it is about knowing something or other in particular. At its limit, it is a radical openness to everything. -Timothy Morton, The Ecological Thought Really, universally, relations stop nowhere, and the exquisite problem of the artist is eternally but to draw, by a geometry of his own, the circle within which they shall happily appear to do so. He is in the perpetual predicament that the continuity of things is the whole matter, for him, of comedy and tragedy; that this continuity is never, by the space of an instant or an inch, broken, and that, to do anything at all, he has at once intensely to consult and intensely to ignore it. -Henry James, Preface to Roderick Hudson And you O my soul where you stand, Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space, Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them, Till the bridge you will need be form’d, till the ductile anchor hold, Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul. -Walt Whitman, “A Noiseless Patient Spider” Ecology’s most fundamental principle states that everything is connected. And so, ecology has to do with relations and the stories we tell ourselves about infinite connectivity. And as Henry James famously noted, “relations stop nowhere.” In fronting this infinite awareness, the artist draws a “circle” to make some sense and shape of the endless proliferation of relation. Ecology, as much as it is about interrelationships that end nowhere, also concerns the boundaries by which we do something about such expanse. Poeisis has to do with making and with creating—with both drawing boundaries and extending beyond them. Driven by radical openness, the ecopoet lets in as much as possible; she senses the work of knowing the self and world—navigating interiority and exteriority— never ends. She also knows creative making is a means of accessing and extending this awareness, even as she must draw boundaries to touch the edges of what is known, in order to verge on what is unknown. But this is not the only sense of the word. In the 21 st century, the word ecology often has to do with the environment, particularly with concern for the environment—with fear and sometimes paranoia. Ecology has to do with global warming, species depletion, toxins, and sustainability. In the 21 st century, ecology is green and green is for sale. Some call our current state a crisis; others call it a revolution. There’s an inescapable heaviness to ecology—a tremor accompanying such awareness. But with this tremor, there has also been defensiveness, fear, and 1 anger. Accordingly, many ecocritics have looked to this crisis, pointing fingers and speaking of better ways of being. They have read literature that draws attention to the damaged earth and championed texts that attempt to save it. It’s not that these modes of criticism are wrong, but that when we think of ecology in the context of poetry, we need to expand our associations. Ecology, if anything, asks for wideness. Ecology connects us. Ecology is terrifying and enrapturing and asks us to accept unknowing. Ecology asks us to accept everything. Ecology invites us to consider the implications of our continuity. Ecology demands we come to a fuller, and therefore more unstable, understanding of where and who we are. Ecology asks us to front and to forgive. And finally, as this dissertation will suggest, ecology asks us to mourn and to meditate. Every story starts somewhere. This story starts in the autumn. The seasons are the most pervasive metaphor in Western poetics for good reason; as their lesson is that of birth and death, the seasons offer a story that shapes our extremes—our suffering and our joy, our loss and our love. The poet’s emergence into ecological being starts with grief and suffering. The ecopoet first relinquishes her idealized notions of nature.
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