Date of Award
2023
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Bachelors
Department
Humanities
First Advisor
Zamsky, Robert
Area of Concentration
English with Rhetoric and Writing Secondary Field
Abstract
This thesis will be exploring the definition, potential forms and outcomes of ritual poetics, as observed in three poets during the 1950s modernist poetic movement, also known as the San Francisco Renaissance, into the present day. By examining the poetry of Robert Duncan and CAConrad primarily, as well as some of the work of Jack Spicer as a transitional poet between the two, elements of Gnostic poetics and non-traditional community formation can be observed as key components of ritual poetics. This thesis considers how various American social and political factors throughout these poets’ careers—including their queer identities—further influences the kind of work that ritual poetics can perform for these particular figures, as well as the similarities and differences between how they build poetic identities around these factors.
Recommended Citation
Brown, Sophia, "“POETRY AS EXORCISM, AS PURIFIER, / IT FELT POSSIBLE”: AN EXAMINATION OF RITUAL POETICS THROUGH ROBERT DUNCAN AND CACONRAD" (2023). Theses & ETDs. 6333.
https://digitalcommons.ncf.edu/theses_etds/6333