Date of Award

2009

Degree Name

English

College

College of Liberal Arts

Type of Degree

M.A.

Document Type

Thesis

First Advisor

Mary B. Moore

Second Advisor

Chris Green

Third Advisor

Janet Badia

Abstract

This thesis examines the narrative development of The Dream Songs while viewing Henry as the locus and the impetus of the various narrative strategies deployed therein. Through the abundance of generic and literary allusions present in The Dream Songs, Berryman's sequence functions both to engage and to interact with the Western literary canon. The first chapter of this thesis locates The Dream Songs within Petrarchan sequences. The second chapter treats Henry's and the unnamed speaker's local language and shows how their competing speech genres inform the sequence's modes. The third chapter examines the role of epic codes in creating the text's generic expectations and the generic modulations unique to the Songs. Though the narrative development of The Dream Songs functions to appropriate canonical texts of the Western literary tradition, the sequence refuses to adhere to generic expectations evoked by the texts appropriated and ultimately is revealed to be an inter-text.

Subject(s)

Poetry.

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