Teses Defendidas
"I Know It Hurts to Burn": Joan of Arc as an Incendiary Metaphor in Adrienne Rich's Poetry and Prose
8 de Maio de 2013
Maria Irene Ramalho
This dissertation is broadly located in the scope of contemporary American poetry, being specifically concerned with socially committed poetry. As evidenced by its title, "'I Know It Hurts to Burn': Joan of Arc as an Incendiary Metaphor in Adrienne Rich's Poetry and Prose," I focus on the work of Adrienne Rich, exploring the recurrent presence of the French warrior saint as a metaphor igniting matters related to martyrdom, vision, and mission. Guided by Joan's incendiary imagery, I seek to examine her continuous re-emergence in Rich's poetry and prose, reflecting on its multiple intersections between power, body, language, testimony, pain, and community.
I begin by addressing the connection between power, language, and violence, accounting for Rich's stances on the politics of language, and describing her distancing from the formalist tradition in which she was raised as a poet. Next, I focus on Rich's fascination with visual images, more specifically with the face of Joan of Arc, reflecting on its significance and on the ethical dimensions of the face. After giving a brief account of ekphrasis, I examine the aesthetic and political purposes of Rich's ekphrastic poetry. I then concentrate on the centrality of the material in Rich's writing, looking at her committed poetry as the dream of a common language that seeks to connect the poetical and the political. Besides explaining Rich's notion of common language, I explore her defiance of the space separating poetry and politics, focusing on her reconfiguration of the lyrical tradition.
Martyrdom, one of the most fundamental issues in this study, is approached from a political rather than a religious perspective. My focus on the body in pain in Rich's poetry emphasizes its openness and vulnerability, concentrating on its capacity to blur the boundaries between "I" and "other," the private and the public, the personal and the political. Bearing in mind the recurrent overlapping of the body poetic and the body politic, I understand Rich's representation of the body in pain as a somatic testimony, considering how these corporeal figurations bear witness to the upheavals of their time and place. My specific analysis of the somatic testimony of Ethel Rosenberg is motivated not only by the importance ascribed to the execution of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, but also by the similarities between the burning of Joan of Arc and the electrocution of Ethel Rosenberg.
Finally, I address Rich's mission "to change the laws of history," concentrating on her (re-)vision of nation, community, and history. First, I focus on her duty to tell the history of the dispossessed as a means of understanding her split roots, following her movement from a politics of location to a poetics of dislocation. I then approach Rich's dis-identification from her home(land), accounting for her poetry as a challenge to the hegemonic framework of the United States by emphasizing her rejection of Puritan rhetoric, and concentrating on Rich's voice of dissent by comparing her (re-)vision with Joan of Arc's prophetic mission.
Data de Defesa
Orientação
Resumo
I begin by addressing the connection between power, language, and violence, accounting for Rich's stances on the politics of language, and describing her distancing from the formalist tradition in which she was raised as a poet. Next, I focus on Rich's fascination with visual images, more specifically with the face of Joan of Arc, reflecting on its significance and on the ethical dimensions of the face. After giving a brief account of ekphrasis, I examine the aesthetic and political purposes of Rich's ekphrastic poetry. I then concentrate on the centrality of the material in Rich's writing, looking at her committed poetry as the dream of a common language that seeks to connect the poetical and the political. Besides explaining Rich's notion of common language, I explore her defiance of the space separating poetry and politics, focusing on her reconfiguration of the lyrical tradition.
Martyrdom, one of the most fundamental issues in this study, is approached from a political rather than a religious perspective. My focus on the body in pain in Rich's poetry emphasizes its openness and vulnerability, concentrating on its capacity to blur the boundaries between "I" and "other," the private and the public, the personal and the political. Bearing in mind the recurrent overlapping of the body poetic and the body politic, I understand Rich's representation of the body in pain as a somatic testimony, considering how these corporeal figurations bear witness to the upheavals of their time and place. My specific analysis of the somatic testimony of Ethel Rosenberg is motivated not only by the importance ascribed to the execution of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, but also by the similarities between the burning of Joan of Arc and the electrocution of Ethel Rosenberg.
Finally, I address Rich's mission "to change the laws of history," concentrating on her (re-)vision of nation, community, and history. First, I focus on her duty to tell the history of the dispossessed as a means of understanding her split roots, following her movement from a politics of location to a poetics of dislocation. I then approach Rich's dis-identification from her home(land), accounting for her poetry as a challenge to the hegemonic framework of the United States by emphasizing her rejection of Puritan rhetoric, and concentrating on Rich's voice of dissent by comparing her (re-)vision with Joan of Arc's prophetic mission.