Tekstanalyse og –historieF06

Session Six: Poetry I

Agenda

• Repair work

• What is Poetry? (According to Sylvia Plath)

• American Poetry After 1945

• Group Work: Sylvia Plath, ”Lady Lazarus”

• Group Discussion

• The essay assignment

What is Poetry? (According to Sylvia Plath)

• Taking ”Daddy” as your point of departure, define the genre of poetry

• Find contrasts and similarities with other genres (narrative, drama)

Romanticism, Modernism and American Poetry After 1945

• The poem in relation to the moment of feeling: Temporal relations: emotion and composition (Wordsworth, Eliot)

• The poem in relation to the nature of feeling: Relations of significance: public – private, universal – personal (Eliot)

• The poem as an object: (in)completeness and (im)permanence (the New Criticism)

Romanticism, Modernism and American Poetry After 1945

• Frank O’Hara and the diary poem: ”A Step Away from Them”– Who is a step away from whom in the poem?

Who is O’Hara, the poet, a step away from– Why?– What does it mean to be a step away?– How is the poem a diary?– How is the poem a poem?

Group Work: Sylvia Plath, ”Lady Lazarus”

• What did Plath mean by the remark, ”I cannot sympathise with those cries from the heart that are informed by nothing except a needle or a knife. … I believe that one should be able to control and manipulate experiences, even the most terrifying … with an informed and intelligent mind” (NAe, p. 2968)

• Find examples of her ability ”to control and manipulate experiences”

Group presentation and Discussion

The Essay Assignment (BA-students, 2005)

• Genres:– Travel writing– Drama– Film– Poetry

The Essay Assignment (BA-students, 2005): Examples

• Mary Wollstonecraft, Letters Written during a Short Residence in Sweeden, Norway, and Denmark. Analyse the text as a piece of travel writing. Your essay must also comment on the aspect of gender.

The Essay Assignment (BA-students, 2005): Examples

• Susan Glaspell, Trifles. Analyse the play, focussing especially on staging.

The Essay Assignment (BA-students, 2005): Examples

• Thomas Hardy, ”The Man He Killed”. Analyse the poem, focussing on its stanzaic and syntactical organisation. Your essay must also include a discussion of the poem’s tone.