|
|
This is a limited free preview of this book. Please buy full access.
Prefatory Notes
What does poetry have to do with “society”? In any material sense it has very little social impact, but exists on the margins of discourse, sustained by its historical reputation, like a former colonial power whose economy now relies on tourism. I have based this study, however, on the assumption that poetry, in spite of its leanings toward the mystical and metaphysical, has moved toward an increased connectedness to worldly issues, and has done so without sacrificing its spiritual content. Such a claim runs contrary to all appearances, since modern Anglophone poetry is often seen by readers as obscure to the point of irrelevance. I argue that it was the drive to reconcile the concrete aspects of experience with the transcendental bases of poetry that led to the development of many innovative but outré styles. It also led, as I shall show, to a unique psychosocial vision based on a resolution of the corresponding ideological opposition between Romanticism and Liberalism.
In spite of my focus on Emerson and a selection of modern and postmodern poets, I intend this work to illuminate an issue central to the nature of poetry in general: the conflict between its religious or spiritual tendencies and its relationship to the external world.