INFORMATION TO USERS This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfilm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter face, while others may be from any type o f computer printer. The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleedthrough, substandard margins, and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction. In the unlikely event that the author did not send UMI a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, charts) are reproduced by sectioning the original, beginning at the upper left-hand comer and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. Each original is also photographed in one exposure and is included in reduced form at the back of the book. Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced xerographically in this copy. Higher quality 6” x 9” black and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations appearing in this copy for an additional charge. Contact UMI directly to order. UMI A Bell & Howell Information Company 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor MI 48106-1346 USA 313/761-4700 800/521-0600 TAKING EVERYTHING IN; POETIC PERSONA AND POETIC VOICE IN THE POEMS OF DEREK WALCOTT DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State Universit\ By Anne L. Knee, M.A. ***** The Ohio State Universitv 1998 Dissertation Committee Approved by Jessica Prinz, Adviser Jeredith Merrin Adviser Valerie Lee Department of Englis' UMI Number: 9900859 UMI Microform 9900859 Copyright 1998, by UMI Company. All rights reserved. This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. UMI 300 North Zeeb Road Ann Arbor, MI 48103 ABSTRACT Derek Walcott's career as a poet and dramatist, from 1948 to the present, spans the formative years of West Indian history and places him among the founding fathers of West Indian literature. His work is therefore inevitably judged by Caribbean critics and theorists as it defines and contributes to a characteristically West Indian literature. In his early poems, Walcott s commitment to a literary apprenticeship, based on the imitation of recognized poets, and his appropriation of styles and techniques adapted initially from the British tradition, lays his work open to the criticism that it is derivative and Eurocentric. Much of this criticism centers upon the persona presented in the poems and the poetic voice through which it finds expression. A study of his poems up to the publication o ï Another Life in 1973, shows Walcott adopting the post-colonial strategies of mapping and of engaging metropolitan voices in productive debate in an attempt to produce a West Indian poetry independent of the British tradition, while the style and language of those poems declare their dependence on that tradition, and the persona is a contemporary version of the romantic concept of self derived from that tradition. In Another Life he re-evaluates his poetic practice in the light of his mentor Harrold Simmons, accepting the need for his work to be rooted in a local materiality and to represent more fully the people of his region. Subsequent work from 1976 onwards demonstrates a concern to produce a poetic voice that represents the orality of West Indian culture, through a series of linguistic experiments, including code shifting and the exploitation of a varietv of vernacular codes into his work. During this period, dramatic monologue becomes a dominant genre in his poetry. The assimilation of West Indian voices into his poetiy' leads finally to the emergence of a multi vocal, inclusive voice, exemplified in Omeros ( 1990). This study traces the development of poetic voice and poetic persona in Walcott's work through these four stages of development, arguing that Walcott's contribution to a West Indian aesthetic lies in his creation of successive paradigms of the West Indian artist. Ill Dedicated to mv familv IV ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 1 wish to thank my adviser, Jessica Pnnz. for her unfailing support and encouragement at all stages of this project. I am also grateful to my committee members; to Ruth Lindeborg for her willingness to read and discuss my work at the draft stage and for the acute and penetrating questions that sent me back to think harder: to Jeredith Merrin for her helpful suggestions and patient correction of my errors of style: and to Valerie Lee for being prepared to take me on at a late stage in the project. 1 am very much indebted to Antonia MacDonald-Smythe for stimulating discussion of my dissertation topic, for giving me access to her own unpublished work and to other materials that were hard to find, and for making me really think about the West Indies. VITA February 7, 1945 ....................................Bom — Shefïleld, U.K. 196 6 ......................................................... B.A./ M.A. English Literature and Language, St. Anne's College, Oxford, U.K. 196 7 ........................................................ Graduate Certificate in Education, University of Hull, U.K. 1967-68 ...................................................Assistant Teacher of English, Sir Leo Schultz High School, Hull, U.K. 1974-197 5............................................... Temporary Assistant Teacher of English. Clare Park High School, East Mailing, Kent, U.K. 1975-198 3............................................... Assistant Teacher of English, Maidstone Grammar School for Girls, Maidstone, Kent, U.K. VI 1983-1985...................................................Second in English Department. St. Simon Stock R.C. High School, Maidstone. Kent. U.K. 1985- 1986 ..................................................Substitute Teacher, West Kent Area. 1986- 1988..................................................Second in English Department. Gravesend Girls' Grammar School. Gravesend, Kent, U.K. 1989 - ......................................................... Graduate Teaching Associate. The Ohio State University. Vll TABLE OF CONTENTS Patze Abstract..................................................................................................................................... ii Dedication ................................................................................................................................ iv Acknowledgments ................................................................................................................... v Vita............................................................................................................................................vi Chapters; Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 1 1. "Braving New Water in an Antique Hoax: " The Early Poems of Derek Walcott............................................................................. 6 2. "Where Else to Row, But Backward'.^ ” Walcott’s Re-evaluation of Early Influences ............................................................53 3. From Castaway to Fortunate Traveller .....................................................................103 4. Many Journeys, Diverse Voices: The Multiple Narratives of Omeros ........................................................................... 151 5. "The Poet C arrying Entire C 'uitures on his Back. ” ........................................... 192 Bibliography.........................................................................................................................233 V lll INTRODUCTION Derek Walcott's career as a poet and dramatist spans the years of struggle and planning towards independence in the West Indies, the abortive attempt to create a West Indian Federation, and the years of economic and social change which followed the Federation's collapse. It thus places him among the founding fathers of West Indian literature. Whether he were conscious of this role at the outset, and every indication in both his poetry and in published interviews indicates that he was, his work is inevitably judged by Caribbean critics and theorists as it serves the project of defining and contributing to a characteristically West Indian aesthetic. Edward Baugh remarks somewhat tartly in a review of the collection Sea (îrapes that “Walcott’s binding theme is Walcott, the pursuit and delineation of a fictive character based on an actual person named Derek Walcott." Sandra Pouchet Paquet, however, in her essay on West Indian autobiography, examines autobiographical and semi-autobiographical works by C.L.R. James, George Lamming, and V S. Naipaul alongside VJa.\cott's Another Life in order to demonstrate that in these works, which she describes as “the canonical texts of West Indian literature, " each author is engaged in the production of a version of self representative of the region from which he originates, and that each constructs the representative in a different way. My argument in this dissertation is that Walcott’s contribution to the West Indian aesthetic is to create successive paradigms of the West Indian artist, and that as his work develops over time he aims to become