Violence in the Work of J.H. Prynne. Matthew John Hall 20347472 BA (Hons) The University of Western Australia 2009 BA The University of Saskatchewan 2003 This thesis is submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy of the University of Western Australia. School of Humanities (English and Cultural Studies) 2013. ii Abstract. This doctoral dissertation situates close readings of J.H. Prynne’s poetry in an investigation of the theoretic, philosophical and poetic contexts by which violence is represented and interrogated in his work. My readings of Prynne’s poetry are coextensive with the thematic continuity of Prynne’s poetic oeuvre, utilising specific textual examples that highlight a theoretical understanding of the manifold manners in which violence is handled by the poet. The texts adduced here displace a lengthy exegetical investigation across Prynne’s oeuvre by instead focusing on a systematic interpretation of texts in which the operation and representation of violence forms the basis of the exposition. This thesis and its attendant investigations focus upon specific poetry collections in which violence is a predominant theme, and bring awareness to the manner in which the operations of violence and its representation construct a position of ontological awareness. The poems are situated against a number of philosophical constructs which they utilise, contest and exceed. This dissertation tracks Prynne’s eventual distancing from Heideggerian thought, towards a lineage which instead relies upon the work of Alain Badiou. While Martin Heidegger’s work informs Prynne’s early poetic development and his conception of dwelling, Prynne begins to establish distance from the philosopher starting with the collection Brass. From this point onwards Prynne stresses the connection between political resistance and poetic creation which can be read through the late philosophy of Alain Badiou, and which would later inform Prynne’s essay ‘Poetic Thought’. The philosophical underpinnings of the text posit the poet’s role, through the depiction violence, as a representative of heightened political iii awareness supporting a position of ontological resistance. Such resistance is, in Prynne’s poetic philosophy, crucial to the creation of new poetic thought. This dissertation focuses on the connection between philosophical categories of being and theories of violence and bearing witness, as subtended through a discussion of Prynne’s poetics wherein these concepts are coextensive. It also investigates the relationships established between lyric, the authorial voice, and violence as a poetic theme. iv Student Declaration: Statement of Candidate Contribution: I certify that this thesis has been written by me, and reserve my rights as the author of this work. This thesis contains only sole-authored work, some of which has been published and/or prepared for publication under sole authorship. I certify that all sources of information and assistance used in the research for and writing of this thesis have been properly acknowledged. I certify that the work in this thesis has not been previously submitted, whole or in part, for the requirements of any other degree. Matthew Hall v vi Acknowledgements. I would like to begin by thanking my supervisor John Kinsella, for his generosity and friendship, for the guidance and inspiration he provided, and for his commitment to this project. Sincere thanks to Steve Chinna for his support and guidance and for always having an open door and being there to rely on. I would like to thank Ali Alizadeh and Van Ikin for their help and guidance along the way. I would also like to thank the academic and administrative staff at the University of Western Australia, whose support made each day proceed as smoothly as could be wished. I am indebted to the kindness of Azra Tulic and Suzanna Bosnjic at the University of Western Australia Scholar’s Centre. I wish to thank the University and the Commonwealth for their financial assistance; a Commonwealth Australian Postgraduate Award and University assistance to conduct research were instrumental in the creation of this work. I wish to extend the most heartfelt thanks to Michael Tencer who provided extraordinary advice in copyediting this dissertation. In addition to this, I would like to thank him for his dedication to maintaining J.H. Prynne’s bibliography, for his support throughout the duration of this dissertation and for a friendship of intellectual curiosity. I would like to acknowledge the raft of friends and colleagues working in critical and creative poetic communities, both nationally and internationally, whose support and discussions have been invaluable, and with whom I have shared every aspect of this journey. I would particularly like to thank Siobhan Hodge, Ann Vickery, Edric Mesmer and Jeremy Balius for their support and advice throughout. Finally, I wish to thank my family in Canada, who had the opportunity to spend the final years of this journey with us: my thanks for your curious eyes and understanding. To my partner and children, for their endless support and love, whose lives are my daily inspiration. For Layla, Cohen and Pamela: for whom, by whom and with whom this work was completed. vii viii Table of Contents. Abstract: …………………………………………………………………………… iii Declarations: ………………………………………………………………………. v Acknowledgements: ………………………………………………………………. vii Table of Contents: ………………………………………………………………… ix Introduction ……………………………………………………………………….1 Chapter One: ‘Es Lebe der König’. Introduction: ……………………………………………………………… 20 The Front Matter: ………………………………………………………… 25 The Idea of Subjectivity: …………………………………………………. 29 Elegy for Celan: …………………………………………………………... 31 Analysis: ………………………………………………………………….. 38 Fugue: …………………………………………………………………….. 50 ‘It is not possible’: ………………………………………………………... 53 ‘we are trustful’: …………………………………………………………... 61 ‘the alder’: ………………………………………………………………… 63 Violence, Love and Family: ……………………………………………… 68 Certainty: …………………………………………………………………. 72 Chapter Two: News of Warring Clans. Introduction: ………………………………………………………………. 77 Reading the Front Matter: ………………………………………………… 83 Criticism and ‘Consumptive Action’: …………………………………….. 94 Mythic Violence: …………………………………………………………. 98 ‘this / sincere account of the negotiations’: ………………………………. 107 ix Strategic Restraint and Truth: ……………………………………………. 114 Metatheatrics and News of Warring Clans:……….……………………… 118 Conclusion: ……………………………………………………………….. 133 Chapter Three: Bands Around the Throat. Introduction: ……………………………………………………………….. 136 The Economy of a ‘Fool’s Bracelet’: ……………………………………… 150 Language Acquisition and Children’s Verse: ……………………………… 160 Dwelling: …………………………………………………………………... 167 Chernobyl and Imaginary Plenitude: ……………………………………… 170 The ‘Rates of Return’: .…………………………………………………….. 177 Secular Music: ……………………………………………………………... 180 ‘Write-Out’ to the Conclusion: ……………………………………………. 187 Chapter Four: Acrylic Tips. Introduction: ……………………………………………………………….. 192 ‘Assuming banishment’: ………………………………………………….... 202 Guarded Knowledge: ………………………………………………………. 208 Command and Control: …………………………………………………….. 214 Land and Elegy: …………………………………………………………….. 220 The Domestic and the Technological: …………………………………….... 235 The Australian Narrative, Music, Botany and the ‘Burning child’: ………... 238 Conclusion: …………………………………………………………………. 254 Chapter Five: ‘Refuse Collection’. Introduction: ………………………………………………………………… 257 The Event: …………………………………………………………………... 271 The Body:…...……………………………………………………………….. 275 The Image Illiterates: ……………………………………………………….. 281 Democracy and Complicity: ………………………………………………… 285 x War and Language: …………………………………………………………. 294 Conclusion: …………………………………………………………………. 303 Conclusion: Summary: …………………………………………………………………… 306 New Lines of Exploration for Future Scholars: …………………………….. 313 Conclusion: …………………………………………………………………. 315 Works Cited: ………………………………………………………………………. 317 Appendices: ‘Es Lebe der König’: ……………………………………………………….. 331 ‘Refuse Collection’: ………………………………………………………... 333 xi Introduction. In the journal In lit, Jeremy Prynne delineated the foundations of a poetic project already many years in development, writing, ‘It has been my own aspiration, for example, to establish relations not personally with the reader, but with the world and its layers of shifted but recognisable usages; and thereby with the reader’s own position within this world.’1 Due to its scope, excess and complexity, Prynne’s poetry problematises an experience of the world inextricably knotted with the manners in which it may be understood. Prynne’s poetry and its political inclinations function in a manner which contest the need for and the function of poetry in contemporary culture. The perpetration of violence, its integration into power structures and its representation form systematic and methodological constructs by which Prynne begins to establish with the reader an awareness of this poetic and political questioning. This thesis is about violence. It sets out to develop a critical methodology for the analysis of violence operative in a poetic, using contemporary philosophical arguments and poetic theory to explicate and define the correlation between instances of violence and their effects upon a poetic. This thesis, and its attendant investigation, brings awareness to the manner in which violence and its representation are substantiated in the poems and condition the function of the poetic. The central task of this dissertation is to produce a survey of Prynne’s oeuvre which examines the ways in which an engagement