Date of Award
6-2014
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy
Department
English
First Advisor
Dr. Nancy Eimers
Second Advisor
Dr. Elizabeth Bradburn
Third Advisor
Dr. Cynthia Hogue
Fourth Advisor
Dr. William Olsen
Keywords
Poetry
Abstract
This dissertation, Reassurance in Negative Space, is a poetry manuscript that deals with intersections of grief, gender, environment, and art in contemporary society. One of its guiding properties is an interest in the ekphrastic mode of composition: poetry in response to a work of visual art. American Hybrid poet-editor Cole Swensen discusses what has emerged as a new “hybrid” poetry that combines conventional approaches with more experimental forms; a stable first person narrator with fragmentation or juxtaposition, for example: “Hybrid poems often honor the avant-garde mandate to renew the forms and expand the boundaries of poetry—thereby increasing the expressive potential of language itself—while also remaining committed to the emotional spectra of lived experience.” This dissertation takes on that aesthetic and mandate, using the hybrid poem to combine traditional themes with modern perspectives.
Access Setting
Dissertation-Campus Only
Restricted to Campus until
June 2024
Recommended Citation
Hiscox, Elizabyth A., "Reassurance in Negative Space" (2014). Dissertations. 281.
https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/dissertations/281