An Act of Being: The Thinking Poetics of George Oppen with Robert Creeley and Nam Le in Response

Abstract

The aim of this thesis is to examine the poetics of George Oppen as an embodiment of thinkingand phenomenology, and how the poetry of Robert Creeley and Nam Le responds to Oppen with a similar interest in the failure of language and the intersubjectivity of being in the world. A close reading of these poets reveals intersections with the philosophy of Maritain, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, and Wittgenstein. This thesis seeks to examine how Oppen’s political poetics is made possible by his interest in phenomenology and philosophy of language. The poems surveyed are as follows: Discrete Series, “Psalm,” “Street,” and Of Being Numerous by George Oppen, “For Love” by Robert Creeley, and 36 Ways of Writing a Vietnamese Poem by Nam Le. In order to achieve a poetics that highlights the contradictions and limits of language and perception, these poets utilize craft elements including fragmentation, juxtaposition, enjambment, multiple voices, subtle soundplay, and disjunctive linearity.