R. K. Puma

Date of Award

Spring 1985

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

English

Program/Concentration

English

Committee Director

Bruce Weigl

Committee Member

Charles E. Ruhl

Call Number for Print

Special Collections; LD4331.E64P85

Abstract

The poems in Litotes: of the Unforgotten are about resiliency, the necessary ability to recover or adjust to changes, misfortunes. Themes of loss, of threatening circumstance, of insanity, are repeated; the resiliency, the willingness to rise from the experience appears in the voice which unifies the poems.

The predominant themes in this collection speak not so much of innocence as of experience; however "The Visit" is the only poem with a counterpart, the Spenserian sonnet "Chronicle." The former speaks to the positive side of heritage, the latter the negative. ''Chronicle'' is not too unlike Roethke's "My Papa's Waltz," a serious, if not frightening circumstance told matter-of-factly. Hopefully, all of the poems are understated. They speak of experience and ultimately of enlightenment. The enlightenment and the challenge to gain from the experience are the affirmative ingredients of the poems. The poems dealing with death and loss attempt to be unsentimental, yet affirmative as in "Litotes," "For Others' Beliefs," and "The Visit." ''Quarters Change'' deals with the end of a relationship similarly, as an opportunity for growth, even as a beginning associated in the poem with Spring.

Many of the poems focus on the parental relationship to the child. In the poems "Dixie Lee II," "Perfidy," and "For Others' Beliefs" the speaker is the inevitable link between the child and the experience; similarly in "The Visit" and Chronicle" we should gain a sense of reverberance and relearning.

Though the poems are intentionally understated in tone, hopefully there is a quality of high energy, as in "Litotes" or "Why I Write Poetry." In the latter, I'm suggesting that we bare ourselves primarily to cleanse ourselves and to make love. "Why I Write Poetry'' points out that baring ourselves is a form of self-expression when it involves others; in the analogy of stripping/writing poetry, it follows that in the baring of ourselves there is the greatest potential for learning. In addition, the poems should convey the message that life is too important to be taken too seriously.

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DOI

10.25777/19t3-3b54

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