Genial Thinking: Stevens, Frost, Ashbery

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dc.contributor.advisorWolfe, Caryen_US
dc.contributor.committeeMemberDoody, Terrence A.en_US
dc.contributor.committeeMemberWood, Philipen_US
dc.creatorKlein, Andrewen_US
dc.date.accessioned2013-09-16T15:17:23Zen_US
dc.date.accessioned2013-09-16T15:17:26Zen_US
dc.date.available2013-09-16T15:17:23Zen_US
dc.date.available2013-09-16T15:17:26Zen_US
dc.date.created2013-05en_US
dc.date.issued2013-09-16en_US
dc.date.submittedMay 2013en_US
dc.date.updated2013-09-16T15:17:26Zen_US
dc.description.abstractThis dissertation explores how Robert Frost, Wallace Stevens, and John Ashbery have responded to the problem of philosophical skepticism that they inherit from Emerson: that while things do in fact exist, direct knowledge of them is beyond our ken. Traditionally read within the framework of an evolving Romanticism that finds them attempting to resolve this problem through some form of synthesis or transcendence, I argue instead that these poets accept the intractability of the problem so as to develop forms of thinking from within its conditions. Chapter One explains why poetry is particularly suited to this sort of thinking and what it can achieve that philosophy (or at least a certain understanding of it) cannot. Chapter Two focuses on the act of listening in Stevens’s poetry as a way to show how Stevens is not, as is typically thought, interested in “the thing itself,” but in "the less legible meaning of sounds," the slight, keen indecision that resonates in between sense and understanding. Chapter Three focuses on those moments in Frost’s poetry when, instead of attempting to comprehend, seize, grasp, and represent reality through the use of metaphor, he chooses to regard its inappropriability or otherness. And Chapter Four focuses on how Ashbery’s constant shifts of focus are not just the wanderings of his mind, but a technique for disrupting our absorption in a single plane of attention so as to achieve new economies of engagement. Overall, though, the goal of this project is to move the discussion about this line of poets out of the epistemological register within which they are usually read and into an ethical one.en_US
dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdfen_US
dc.identifier.citationKlein, Andrew. "Genial Thinking: Stevens, Frost, Ashbery." (2013) Diss., Rice University. <a href="https://hdl.handle.net/1911/71974">https://hdl.handle.net/1911/71974</a>.en_US
dc.identifier.slug123456789/ETD-2013-05-561en_US
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/1911/71974en_US
dc.language.isoengen_US
dc.rightsCopyright is held by the author, unless otherwise indicated. Permission to reuse, publish, or reproduce the work beyond the bounds of fair use or other exemptions to copyright law must be obtained from the copyright holder.en_US
dc.subjectPoetryen_US
dc.subjectAmerican poetryen_US
dc.subjectPhilosophyen_US
dc.subjectRalph Waldo Emersonen_US
dc.subjectRobert Frosten_US
dc.subjectWallace Stevensen_US
dc.subjectJohn Ashberyen_US
dc.titleGenial Thinking: Stevens, Frost, Ashberyen_US
dc.typeThesisen_US
dc.type.materialTexten_US
thesis.degree.departmentEnglishen_US
thesis.degree.disciplineHumanitiesen_US
thesis.degree.grantorRice Universityen_US
thesis.degree.levelDoctoralen_US
thesis.degree.nameDoctor of Philosophyen_US
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