Acknowledgments

aH counts.1couldnothavehopedfor readers morelearnedandjudicious,

moreastuteandperceptivethanthoseheengaged-LawrenceLipkingand
JohnBurt.
Finally, 1thankmymostprecise, sensitive, andinexhaustiblereader.
While 1was writing this book, my thoughts were with the dead, but
CarolineRodyneverletmeforgetwhatitis tolive.
INTRODUCTION
THE MODERN ELEGY
Amongtheoldestandrichestofpoeticgenres, thee1egysurvivesthetwen-
tiethcentury'schallengetoinheritedforms. Indeed, thepoetryofmourn-
ingfor thedeadassumes inthemodern periodan extraordinarydiversity
and range, incorporating more anger and skepticism, more conflict and
anxietythaneverbefore.As warfarewas industrializedandmassdeathaug-
mented, as mourningriteswereweakenedandthe "funeraldirector" pro-
fessionalized, as the dying were shut away in hospitals and death itse1f
made a taboo subject, poetry increasingly became an important cultural
space for mourning the dead. God may have died, but the dead have
turnedtogodsfor manymodernpoets.Always afavorite muse, deathhas
outstrippedmostrivals bythetimethatStevensdeclares it"themotherof
beauty."Although PoundandEliotabstain from overte1egy, veilingtheir
griefin irony, myth, and"directtreatmentofthe'thing,'" Poundlaments
the"myriad"slaughteredintheFirstWorldWar, andEliotperforms"The
Burial ofthe Dead." "Every poem an epitaph," he later admits in Four
Quartets.
1
Hardy, an avowed e1egist, mourns all sorts oflosses, from the
deathsofhisfavoritecatandhismothertoQueenVictoriaandevenGod.
Owenlabe1s hiswarpoems "EnglishElegies," Stevens calls his earlyverse
"e1egiac poetry,"andPlathwrites thatherfather, deadwhenshewas eight,
became the"buriedmale muse" ofherwork.
2
Sometimes regardedas op-
posites,modernpoetryandthee1egyshouldbeseeninsteadas inextricable.
Despite thecommonmisconceptionthattwentieth-centurypoets forsake
mourningandgenre, manyofthem perpetuateand intensifY theancient
literarydialoguewiththedead.
3
Yet modern poets reanimate the e1egy notby slavishly adopting its
conventions;instead, theyviolateits normsandtransgress itslimits.They
conjoin the e1egiac with the anti-e1egiac, at once appropriating and re-
sistingthetraditionalpsychology,structure,andimageryofthegenre.The
apparentlyoxymoronicterm"moderne1egy" suggestsboththenegationof
received codes ("modern") and their perpetuation ("e1egy")-asynthesis
XVI
.....
lntroduction
of modernity and inheritance that is especially fruitful for poets like Hardy,
Stevens, Hughes, and Plath, who neither rehash nor neglect literary tradi-
tions. They make it new but make it old, rebel against generic norms but
reclaim them through rebellion. Theodor Adorno, in search ofthe defining
propensity of modern literature and the arts, isolates the negation of aes-
thetic tradition-an emphasis that helps bring into focus the anti-elegiac
dimension ofelegy (though I retutn later to enduring continuities, perhaps
underestimated by Adorno).4 In becoming anti-elegiac, the modern elegy
more radically violates previous generic norms than did earlier phases of
elegy: it becomes anti-consolatory and anti-encomiastic, anti-Romantic
and anti-Victorian, anti-conventional and sometimes even anti-literary.
To illustrate this negative pole of the modern elegy, William Carlos
Williams's poem "Tract" (1916-17), though not an elegy, is a useful start-
ing point, because it can be read as a brash manifesto not only of "how to
perform a funeral" but also of how to perform its poetic equivalent.
5
Whereas the subject of Tennyson's sumptuous "Ode on the Death of the
Duke ofWellington" was the neplus ultra ofVictorian funerals, the objec-
tive correlative of Williams's minimalist credo is the barest of rites.
Through successive negations, the poet renounces the opulent Victorian
funeral, transplanted to America and remade by the "funeral director."
Scrapping mortuary artifice, Williams proclaims its "rough plain" substi-
tute: the art of mourning must be stripped of hackneyed symbolism and
formal veneer (not black- / nor white either-and not polished!), of exter-
nal supports (no wheels at al!) , of nonfunctional ornament (Let there be no
glass- / and no upholstery, phew! / and no little brass rollers, no top at al!),
and of clichs from the vegetable world (No wreaths please- / especially no
hot house flowers). The hearse should proceed as might one of Williams's
elegies, without a driver-author visible on high. He must vanish into the
mourning procession: "Take off the silk har!" and "bring him down! / Low
and inconspicuous!" Admittedly, the author himself ignores this last de-
mand in his hortatory poem, as in many of his early works. Nor does he
truly banish the pathetic fallacy or other stock devices, instead furnishing
poetic habitat for birds, trees, and flowers in his later elegies.
6
But granted
this discrepancy between theory and practice, Williams in "Tract" defines
as adversarial his relation to the conventional art of mourning-an art that
necessarily includes the traditional elegy. In attacking mourning conven-
INTRODUCTlON
tion as a figute for all convention, Williams reminds us that the modernist
resistance to traditional elegy belongs to a broad cultural repudiation that
characterizes much twentieth-century literature in many genres, even as he
suggests the special importance of mourning art as a ground for modernist
self-definition.
While modern elegists participate in a transgeneric attack on conven-
tion, they focus their antipathy on the psychological structures and literary
devices specific to the elegy. Preeminent among their targets is the psycho-
logical propensity of the genre to translate grief into consolation. From
Spenser to Swinburne, as Peter Sacks and other critics have shown, most
canonical English elegists had depicted mourning as compensatory. Even
a poet as despondent as Tennyson represents himself as surmounting
doubts that his dead friend "lives in God."7 In the paradigmatic elegy of
English tradition, a shepherd "successfully" mourns his dead friend Lyci-
das-he reviews his abilities, recalls their friendship, attacks culpable dei-
ties, and, all passion spent, overrides remorse by displacing affection from
the dead man to the sunlike radiance of his immortal soul. He assures
himself that, much as the sun sets but rises, "So Lycidas sunk low, but
mounted high."8 Like many other bereaved shepherds and goatherds, Mil-
ton's swain dramatizes a psychological process that Freud redescribes in
analytic terms, calling it "normal mourning": "Each single one of the
memories and expectations in which the libido is bound to the object is
brought up and hypercathected, and detachment of the libido is accom-
plished in respect of it," enabling "withdrawal of the libido from this object
and a displacement of it on to a new one"; "when the work of mourning
is completed the ego becomes free and uninhibited again."9 Purged of sor-
row, the shepherd can proceed "Tomorrow to fresh woods, and pastures
new."IO Analogous with the shepherd's lament is, of course, the implicit
work of mourning carried out by the poet himself; he finds recompense
not only in religious substitution but in making this very poem, redirecting
his affection from the lost friend to the brilliant artifact that is in sorne
measure a replacement for the man it mourns. There are in the poem, as
in Freud's "normal mourning," hitches along the way to recovery: at several
points, Milton nearly vandalizes the elegy's consolatory machinery, at-
tacking the "thankless Muse" and deeming poetic consolation mere "false
surmise," an illusory effort "to interpose a little ease" for "frail thoughts."ll
2 3
lntroduction
':;.-"self-doubts and authenti-
.. _ poet'S final buoyant vislon of LYCldas happtly reJolcmg among
d1e,saints.
In contrast, modern elegists tend to enact the work not of normative
but of"melancholic" mourning-a term I adapt from Freud to distinguish
mourning that is untesolved, violent, and ambivalent. They are like the
Freudian "melancholic" in their fierce resistance to solace, their intense
criticism and self-criticism, even as they "mourn" specific deaths, not the
vague or unconscious losses of melancholia.
12
Unlike their literary fore-
bears or the "normal mourner" of psychoanalysis, they attack the dead and
themselves, their own work and tradition; and they refuse such orthodox
consolations as the rebirth of the dead in nature, in God, or in poetry itself.
In his "elegies ... in no sense consolatory," Owen, for example, mocks
traditional compensations for the dead, dismissing as "fatuous sunbeams"
the principal elegiac emblem of immortality.13 Hughes inverts another
stock elegiac figure for renewal in "The Bitter River," mourning two lynch
victims whose deaths no imaginary river can redeem. In his lynch elegies
and blues poems, he foregrounds the hopelessness and violence of melan-
cholic mourning. If the traditional elegy was an art of saving, the modern
elegy is what Elizabeth Bishop calls an "art oflosing." Instead of resurrect-
ing the dead in sorne substitute, instead of curing themselves through dis-
placement, modern elegists "practice losing farther, losing faster," so that
the "One Art" of the modern elegy is not transcendence or redemption of
loss but immersion in it.
14
No longer a stage that the poetic mourner sur-
passes, the initial anger and despondency of Milton's mourner become the
psychic tissue of elegy. Many modern elegists are "drunk with loss," as Ten-
nyson seems before repairing his faith; their elegies are not a cure but at
best a "sad mechanic exercise, / Like dull narcotics, numbing pain." To
switch medical similes, the modern elegy resembles not so much a suture
as "an open wound," in Freud's disturbing trope for melancholia.
15
Scorning recovery and transcendence, modern elegists neither aban-
don the dead nor heal the living. For Plath, the dead seem like barnac1es
and vampires. "1 can't get him out of my mind, out of my mind," groans
Berryman in his elegiac sequence for Delmore Schwartz.
16
Although poets
like Berryman and Plath deploy the coda, the apostrophe, and the pathetic
fallacy, these traditional mechanisms of elegy no longer afford consolation
4
INTRODUCTlON
or closure. Lamenting Schwartz's death, Berryman pulls down the portcul-
lis of the elegiac coda: "Ten Songs, one solid block of agony, / I wrote for
him, and then I wrote no more," but then he does write more (157:176).
Nor can he seal Schwartz's "unshaven, dissheveled eorpse" in the traditional
poetic tomb of idealization, partIy because oflingering regrets and rivalries:
"I'd bleed to say his lovely work improved / but it is not so" (156.'175,
'150:169). Of course, modern elegists are hardly the first to represent this
kind of grief-resistant to the standard elegiac salves, prolonged and com-
plicated by guilt and ambivalence. Self-reproach is familiar in the genre,
from Jonson's "On My First Son' to Tennyson's In Memoriam. But during
the twentieth century it plays a more prominent role, beginning with Har-
dy's masochistic elegies for his first wife. Hardyeven calls one ofhis poems
"An Upbraiding," a ventriloquized attack on himself for being "cold" dur-
ing the marriage, his self-contempt further exacerbated by his belated trib-
utes and "tenderness."17 Similarly, in "Penance" he pictures himself as play-
ing compensatory tunes for her on a harpsichord ("1 do to-day / What I
would not then"), but its wires sound like "vain desires / That have lagged
too late" and its keys look like "a skull's brown teeth" (2:403--4). His liter-
ary performances merely remind him of his failure and her death, inflam-
ing rather than assuaging guilt, renewing rather than overriding loss.
Hardy reinvigorates the elegy by helping to shift its psychic basis from
the rationalizing consolations of normative grief to the more intense self-
criticisms and vexations of melancholic mourning.
Sometimes punishing themselves, thereby avenging the dead and de-
flecting hostility inward, at other times modern elegists turn their rage out-
ward, attacking and debasing the dead. Suffusing the elegy with melan-
cholic anger and ambivalence, they slacken its traditional ties with love
poetry and encomium.
18
Earlier elegists like Milton and Shelley, though
they may have scourged nymphs, c1erics, and reviewers, honored the dead
without reservation. As if writing love poems, Tennyson mourned Hallam
as a "widower" weeps the loss of his wife, and Whitman lamented those he
calls "the dead lloved so well."19 Even when an elegist like Jonson alluded
to Shakespeare's smalllearning and ignorant audiences, he submerged his
antagonism in a poetry of homosocial rivalry and double-edged praise.
Only in satiric anti-elegies had poets like Swift and Matthew Prior openly
degraded the dead. Less willing to drape the dead in eulogy, many modern
5
L
Introduction
But these self-doubts and self-interrogations ultimately serve to authenti-
cate the poet's final buoyant vision of Lycidas happily rejoicing among
the saints.
In contrast, modern elegists tend to enact the work not of normative
but of"melancholic" mourning-a term I adapt from Freud to distinguish
mourning that is untesolved, violent, and ambivalent. They are like the
Freudian "melancholic" in their fierce resistance to solace, their intense
criticism and self-criticism, even as they "mourn" specific deaths, not the
vague or unconscious losses of melancholia.
12
Unlike their literary fore-
bears or the "normal mourner" of psychoanalysis, they attack the dead and
themselves, their own work and tradition; and they refuse such orthodox
consolations as the rebirth ofthe dead in nature, in God, or in poetry itself.
In his "elegies ... in no sense consolatory," Owen, for example, mocks
traditional compensations for the dead, dismissing as "fatuous sunbeams"
the principal elegiac emblem of immortality.13 Hughes inverts another
stock elegiac figure for renewal in "The Bitter River," mourning two lynch
victims whose deaths no imaginary river can redeem. In his lynch elegies
and blues poems, he foregrounds the hopelessness and violence of melan-
cholic mourning. If the traditional elegy was an art of saving, the modern
elegy is what Elizabeth Bishop calls an "art of losing." Instead of resurrect-
ing the dead in sorne substitute, instead of curing themselves through dis-
placement, modern elegists "practice losing farther, losing faster," so that
the "One Art" of the modern elegy is not transcendence or redemption of
loss but immersion in it.
14
No longer a stage that the poetic mourner sur-
passes, the initial anger and despondency of Milton's mourner become the
psychic tissue of elegy. Many modern elegists are "drunk with loss," as Ten-
nyson seems before repairing his faith; their elegies are not a cure but at
best a "sad mechanic exercise, / Like dull narcotics, numbing pain." To
switch medical similes, the modern elegy resembles not so much a suture
as "an open wound," in Freud's disturbing trope for melancholia.
ls
Scorning recovery and transcendence, modern elegists neither aban-
don the dead nor heal the living. For Plath, the dead seem like barnacles
and vampires. "1 can't get him out of my mind, out of my mind," groans
Berryman in his elegiac sequence for Delmore Schwartz. 16 Although poets
like Berryman and Plath deploy the coda, the apostrophe, and the pathetic
fallacy, these traditional mechanisms of elegy no longer afford consolation
INTRODUCTlON
or dosure. Lamenting Schwartz's death, Berryman pulls down the portcul-
lis of the elegiac coda: "Ten Songs, one solid block of agony, / I wrote for
him, and then I wrote no more," but then he does write more (]57:176).
Nor can he seal Schwartz's "unshaven, dissheveled corpse" in the traditional
poetic tomb ofidealization, partly because oflingering regrets and rivalries:
"I'd bleed to say his lovely work improved / but it is not so" (156:-175,
'150:169). Of course, modern elegists are hardly the first to represent this
kind of grief-resistant to the standard elegiac salves, prolonged and com-
plicated by guilt and ambivalence. Self-reproach is familiar in the genre,
from Jonson's "On My First Son" to Tennyson's In Memoriam. But during
the twentieth century it plays a more prominent role, beginning with Har-
dy's masochistic elegies for his first wife. Hardy even calls one of his poems
''An Upbraiding," a ventriloquized attack on himself for being "cold" dur-
ing the marriage, his self-contempt further exacerbated by his belated trib-
utes and "tenderness."17 Similarly, in "Penance" he pictures himself as play-
ing compensatory tunes for her on a harpsichord ("1 do to-day / What I
would not then"), but its wires sound like "vain desires / That have lagged
too late" and its keys look like "a skull's brown teeth" (2:403--4). His liter-
ary performances merely remind him of his failure and her death, inflam-
ing rather than assuaging guilt, renewing rather than overriding loss.
Hardy reinvigorates the elegy by helping to shift its psychic basis from
the rationalizing consolations of normative grief to the more intense self-
criticisms and vexations of melancholic mourning.
Sorn.etimes punishing themselves, thereby avenging the dead and de-
flecting hostility inward, at other times modern elegists turn their rage out-
ward, attacking and debasing the dead. Suffusing the elegy with melan-
cholic anger and ambivalence, they slacken its traditional ties with love
poetry and encomium. lB Earlier elegists like Milton and Shelley, though
they may have scourged nymphs, clerics, and reviewers, honored the dead
without reservation. As if writing love poems, Tennyson mourned Hallam
as a "widower" weeps the loss ofhis wife, and Whitman lamented those he
calls "the dead lloved so well."19 Even when an elegist like Jonson alluded
to Shakespeare's smalllearning and ignorant audiences, he submerged his
antagonism in a poetry of homosocial rivalry and double-edged praise.
Only in satiric anti-elegies had poets like Swift and Matthew Prior openly
degraded the dead. Less willing to drape the dead in eulogy, many modern
4 5
Introduction
elegists disdain the old dictllm, de mortuis ni! nisi bonum. Williams, for
example, exposes in "Death" a dead man's face and his own angry re-
sponses: "he's dead / theoldbastard," thespeakerremarks inapoemthat
is based, atleastinpart,onWilliams'sfeelings for hisownfatherandthat
anticipates Plath's explosive denunciation ofhers.
20
"He'ssick-dead," "in-
sufferable," Williams continues; "he's / a godforsaken curio," a "liar," "a
mockery."Gone,asWilliamsadvisedin"Tract,"areelegiacpolishandpre-
tense:
He's nothingatall
he's dead
Shrunkenuptoskin
AlthoughWilliams echoes the woeful reprise of"Lycidas," "he's dead" is
no longer an expression ofsorrow but ofdisgusto Once barred from the
elegy, suchdenunciationsof thedeadwill becomeallthemoreastonishing
when laterAmerican poets like Lowell, Plath, Berryman, Ginsberg, and
Sexton openlyturn them on their dead parents. Giving utterance to the
wayward and contradietory impulses ofgrief, they use their mourning
tonguesnotonlytoululatebutrather,likeGwendolynBrooks'sirreverent
AnnieAllen,
tomuseonbeingrid
Ofrelative beneaththecoffinlid.
Noonewas by. Shestuckhertongueout;slid.
21
Modern poets direct their melancholic ambivalence not only at
themselves and the dead, nor only at elegiac and social convention, but
also at their own elegies. Hardyberates himselffor fashioning numerous
poems outofhis wife's death, andOwenis uneasyaboutprofitingartisti-
callyfrom carnageonthebattlefield. Theseandothermodernelegistsare
wracked bywhat1call the economic problem ofmourning-theguilty
thoughtthat theyreap aestheticprofitfrom loss, thatdeathis thefuel of
poetic mourning. They scrutinize the economic substructure of their
work,oftenworryingthattheirpoemsdependondeathandhencecollude
withit. WhileSpenser'sColnearnsalambforhis Didoeulogy, andTen-
nyson anticipates collectingthe"far-offinterestoftears," modernelegists
represent themselves as more frequently dogged bymelancholicanxieties
l
6
INTRODUCTION
aboutredeeming10ss as poeticgain.
22
Waryof thereligiousandpsychiatric
norm of"healthy mourning," they see it as urging the exploitation and
betrayal ofthe dead. Contemporaryelegists as diverse as Seamus Heaney
andMichaelHarperrefuseafacile poetictherapy-namely,thetransfigu-
rationofthedeadintoconsolatoryartorheavenlybeings.
Thisrefusaltomourninthepoetryof mourningwasrenderedfamil-
iar byDylanThomas's "Refusal toMourntheDeath, by Fire, ofaChild
inLondon." Evoking arecurrentworryofmodernelegists, Thomassug-
gests thatinmourningthedeadchildhemayrisk"murder";"anyfurther/
Elegy" would "blaspheme" the girl. But in the endThomas's theologieal
rhetoric belies his rebuffofcompensatory mourning, since it evokes an
eschatologicalframeworkthatimplicitlyredeems thedeathas martyrdom
("the stations ofthe breath").23 GeoffreyHill's bitterlymelancholic "Sep-
temberSong" offers amoreconvincing refusal to mournachildwithina
poemofmourning.ThiselegyandHill'sotherHolocaustpoemsmarkan
extremeintheeconomicmisgivingsofthemodernelegy. Memorializinga
victimofaNaziconcentrationcamp,Hillisvigilantinpreventinghisrhet-
orie from drifting toward the redemptive. Where another elegist might
have identified with the sufferings ofthe dead child, Hill mistrusts any
self-serving effacement ofdifferences between the child and himself-a
poetsafelymeditatingbesidethe "smoke/ ofharmless fires."24 Freighting
everyphrasewithgrimironiesordoublemeanings("Undesirableyoumay
have been, untouchable / youwere not"), Hill tweaks himselfwith con-
stantverbal reminders ofthechild's inaccessibility. Thatpoetandvictim
werebornonedayapartisonlyasickeningreminderoftheirdissimilarity.
Hillridiculeshis fatuous poeticexercise:
(1 havemade
anelegyfor myselfit
is true)
Toelegize,Hillwrylysuggests,is toenjoyone'sgrief,toindulgetheonanis-
ticworkofmourning. "Septemberfattens onthevines," butHill refuses
tointegrate thechild's unnaturalSeptemberdeathintothenaturaldeath
thatpromisescyclical renewal. Instead,hetllrnsindisgustonthe"plenty"
ofaKeatsian autumnandthe "plenty" ofhis own arto Similarly, he is re-
pulsedbythespectacleofthe"thickeningbodies" ofbathersin"Two For-
7
, Introduction
malElegies" for Europe'sJews andrepulsedagain in"OfCommerceand
Society" by the "fattedmarble" thatwouldcommemorate Holocaustvic-
tims.
25
Even as heelegizes thevictims ofNazi genocide, Hill worries that
hiselegiacpoetry,likeotherartistic,commercial,andhistoricalmemorials,
helps to make"theirlongdeathI Documentedandsafe"; thatis, itmight
distancetheatrocitiesbytryingto makethemaestheticallyandhistorically
accessible, might perversely rationalize the evenrs by transmuting their
"harshness" inro "sweetness." A sober new study ofHolocaust survivors
shows that their testimonies repeatedly disrupt any narrative movemenr .
"towarda consolingfuture," refusing "pieties like 'redeeming' and 'salva-
tion."'26 Hill's Holocaust poems similarly refuse the closure, rebirth, and
substitutiontraditionalintheelegiacgenre,lesttheyseemto imposesense
andpurposeonmass murder. Unril recently, comparativelyfew elegies in
Englishwerewrittenfor thevictims ofthe Holocaust; butin their revul-
sionagainstapoeticsofhealing,evenprivateelegiesobliquelyattesttothe
unimaginablehorrorsthatmarkthemodernhistoryofdeathY
Ratherthanremedydeathbywritingpoemsaboutit, poetslikeHill
question theethical groundsofrecuperativeart, addingtothemanybur-
densofmodernpoeticmourning.ForHillasalreadyforHardy,everyelegy
is an elegy for elegy-apoem that mourns the diminished efficacy and
legitimacyofpoetic mourning. But modern elegists, for all theirworries
aboutmakinggainsoutoflosses,collectivelyredeemtheirmounringlosses
as aestheticgainsfor thegenreofelegy (anadmittedlyrecuperativelineof
argument,which shiftstherheroricofredemptionfrom particularelegies
ro ahistoricalnarrativeaboutelegies).As poetsmournnotonlydeadindi-
viduals but mourning itself, elegize not only the dead but elegy itself,
the genre develops by feeding offa multitude of new deaths, includ-
ingthebodyofitsowntraditions. Inrrudinginro modernlamentsforwar
victims, public figures, relatives, and friends are many extraneous
deaths-thedeathofmourningritual, ofGod,oftraditionalconsolation,
ofrecuperative elegy, ofthe sanctity ofthe dead, of"healthy" mourn-
ing, andeven perhaps-intheage ofthevisual mediaandpsychology-
the death ofthe poet. Once a more quiet tomb, the elegy becomes a
noisy columbarium, crammed with corpses onrological, aesthetic, and
physical.
8
INTRODUCTlON
't
This critical narrative ofpsychohistorical change needs, however, to be
qualified at the outset, since, like all such evolutionaryschemas, it relies
on binaryoppositions (modern/traditional, normative/melancholic) that
risk flattening outthe complexities ofthe literary origin-thehistorical
"other"overagainstwhichthemodernis defined.Inrejectingthepremod-
ernelegy, the modern elegy mayreallyelaborateonesetoftranshistorical
tendencieslongembeddedintheform, assorneofourexampleshaveindi-
cated.Twentieth-centurypoetsself-consciouslydepartfromgenericnorms
bywritingnonconsolatoryelegies;butsotoodidJonsonbysuggestingthat
hemayhavekilledhissonwith"toomuch"love,ShelleybyendingAdonais
with an eroticizedvisionofself-annihilation, Elizabeth Barrett Browning
by cutting short any political redemption at the close of"Mother and
Poet," and Swinburne by admitting that "no help," not even "all our
songs," can "mend"thedeathofBaudelaire, andbydoubting"ifanything
endure" ofLandor's spirit after death.
28
Moreover, even elegies that end
triumphantly, such as Spenser's "Astrophel" andMilton's "Lycidas," mute
theirresolurionsthroughdeliberatelyartificial reversalsandthroughvacil-
lations between "normal" and melancholic mourning. Tennyson may
achieve ahopeful, religious resolution, buthe is also temptedby the ulti-
mate despair-"Todrop head-foremost in the jaws I Ofvacant darkness
andtocease."29 Freshdoubtscontinuallydisturbhisprotractedstruggleto
overridedesolation.Alreadywith"Astrophel,"thegenre'sperennialdialec-
tic between "successful" and melancholic mourningis in full swing, as a
compressedclosereadingmayindicate.Althoughthisearlymasterpieceof
theEnglish elegy closes with a joyous vision ofthe dead man reborn in
paradise, its course is tornbetween consolatoryandanri-consolatorylan-
guage.
30
Onthe side ofconsolation are its manyfigures ofreproduction
and imitation, figures that, multiplying and reinforcing one another,
wouldoverridetheseveranceof death.Notonlymothers"breed"sons,for
example, buralso poets "breed" feelings (16, 3).Similarly, thelivingpoet
reproduces thedead poet's pastoral mode, replicatesAstrophel and Stella
in aflower image "Resembling" them, andpromises to "rehearse" the la-
menr ofAstrophel's sister, Clorinda (189, 215). Butworkingagainst this
abundanrandconsolatoryproliferationofcopiesare thepoern's figures of
9
l
r
Introduction
disfiguration. Astrophel is "deformed" by his wounds, Stella "Iikewise did
deforme" herself, and Clorinda deconstructs the flower image that earlier
seemed to substitute for the dead man: "Scarse like the shadow of that
which he was, I Nought like" (152, 156, 59-60). Harshly parodying its
own reproductive rhetoric, the poem continually echoes terms only to
thwart them immediately.31 So pronounced are its defacements and self-
corrections that they threaten to impede progress toward recovery.
Spenser's reminds us that even the most canonical elegies
deviate from the abstract norm of the "traditional elegy." While this book's
period emphasis may obscure sorne of the subtleties of the "background"
to its modern "foreground," I try to check this risk by continually invoking
strong precedents for the "modern" characteristics of the elegy, such as
masochism, irresolution, irredemption, aggression, and self-criticism. Fur-
ther, modern poets often smuggle into their elegies a surprising array of
ancient elegiac tropes, structures, and even consolations, so I supplement
my narrative of generic dislocation with a subplot of generic perpetuation.
But for all these qualifications, the changes in the elegiac genre are suscep-
tible to literary historical narration. Granted the figurative complexity of
the redemptive momentum of its generic logic is unmistak-
able, while the reverse is tme of Williams's "Death." Spenser could not
have written of Sidney "he's dead I the old bastard," any more than Wil- i
liams could have metamorphosed the "old bastard" into a flower, a star, or
a heavenly spirit. In tracking the elegy's melancholic turn, this book tells
the story of how the part became the whole, the thread the weave in the
transformation of a major lyric genre.
SOCIAL MOURNING AND POETIC MOURNING
Although the psycho-poetic history of the modern elegy is my primary
focus, the genre responds not only to poetic but also to social codes of
mourning, so I turn initially to an overview of the sociohistorical contexts
that have shaped its development. Williams's "Tract" suggests the close in-
terrelation between the social practices of mourning and their aesthetic
correlates in the elegy, since many of the frills, accoutrements, and clichs
the poet inveighs against bear on both burial and elegy. When Williams
wrote his wartime ode to minimalist mourning, mourning rites had al-
ready shed much of their Victorian extravagance, beginning in the last
10
INTRODUCTlON
quarter of the nineteenth century. Even though the "funeral director" was
making the American funeral more expensive and showy during this pe-
riod, he also cut its duration, reduced the numbers in the procession, and
consolidated the roles once performed by minister and carpenter, family
and friends. In simplifYing, streamlining, and compartmentalizing the so-
cial work of mourning, he created the "thoroughly departmental" practice
ofburial ridiculed by Frost: "No one stands round to stare," the poet wryly
observes, "It is nobody else's affair."32 Between 1880 and 1920, the period
of mourning was shortened more and more in both America and Britain,
until it extended little beyond a few days after the funeral.
33
At the same
time, crepe, bombazine, and other mourning clothes were worn less and
less; attention to mourning accoutrements was diminishing in etiquette
books, trade catalogs, and periodicals; flowers were supplanting black
drapery in the parlor and somber badges on the front door, until these
social symbols of grief virtually disappeared.
34
While mourners were dis-
carding many ofthe "trappings and the suits ofwoe," poets were trimming
their elegies of flower catalogs, mourning processions, and conventional
reversals. Yet their production ofnumerous elegies indicates that they were
not merely mimicking the decline in mourning ritual but also struggling
against ir. Indeed, they reclaimed, redefined, and reinvigorated poetic
mourning at the historical moment when social mourning was dwindling.
Their elegies belong to a vast literature ofdeath and mourning resur-
gent around the turn of the century. Throughout Europe death triumphed
even in the titles of novels, poems, plays, and stories, from Tolstoy's Death
oflvanIlych (1886), Loti's BookofPityandDeath (1891), and d'Annunzio's
The Triumph of Death (1894), to Strindberg's Dance of Death (1901),
Manos Death in Venice (1912), and Maeterlinck's Death (1912). Death
was reviving in literature and the arts at the same time that death was dying
in other social practices. Summarizing attitudes toward death before the
First World War, Freud remarked, "We showed an unmistakable tendency
to put death on one side, to eliminate it from life. We tried to hush it
Up. "35 He was not alone in his impression that death was, as it were, being
disappeared. Near the close of the nineteenth century, Joseph Jacobs, writ-
ing in a journal published in Britain and America, described what he called
"The Dying of Death" (1899): "Perhaps the most distinctive note of the
rnodern spirit is the practical disappearance of the thought of death as an
11
l
lntroduction
influencedirectlybearinguponpracticallife....Thefearofdeathis being
replaced by the oyoflife.... Deathis disappearing fromour thoughtS. "36
Howcanwe resolve theapparentcontradictionbetweenthe death-denial
in "practicallife"andthedeath-obsessioninliterature?Ir wouldseem that
creativewriters perceived the dying ofdeath-consciousness around them
andsoughtroembalmitin theirwork. "Thehurry-scurryofmodernlife
leaves no one time to meditate among the tombs," according toJacobs
(265). No one, we might add, except for artists, clergymen, and others
marginalized by the "hurry-scurry" ofthe second industrial revolution,
manyofwhom annexedthe "tombs" as theirimaginative preserve.
37
The
socialpracticeofmourning,Jacobsimplies,wasincompatiblewiththefre-
neticpaceofthenewurban,industrial, capitalistorder: "Weare cast back
for themomenton to ournatural feeling self, whenwe hearofafriend's
death; butalmostimmediatelytheclaimsofmodernlife areuponuso Let-
ters haveto bewritten,business, oreven pleasurehastobeattendedto;we
sendawreath,andourfrienddropsoutofourlife" (265-66).Inthisearly
complaint,Jacobspoignantlydepictsthedifficultyofretainingasufficient
spacefor thepsychological necessities ofmourning. A momentofreflec-
tion,aperfunctorygesture-thatis aH theattentionbestowedonthedead
bymany,savethoseforwhommeditativemourningisaprofessionalraison
d'erre.Frost,thoughlessof aprofessionalmournerthanmanyofhispoetic
contemporaries, humorouslyindicates thatJacobs's observations also held
trueinArnerica:
Antsareacurious race;
Onecrossingwithhurriedtread
Thebodyof oneoftheirdead
Isn'tgiven amoment'sarrest-
Seems noteven impressed.
3B
Protestinglike FrostandJacobstheantlike"hurry-scurryofmodern
life," Hardy,Yeats, andotherelegists"meditateamongthetombs,"consti-
tuting in their poetry what Frost might have called a momentary stay
againstamnesia. Sometimes theyarticulatetheadverse social contextthat
delimits theirpoeticmourning.Writinginthelate 1890s, Hardyindulges
his "bereavement-pain" and contrasts it with the modern hurry-scurry:
"Breezilygo they, breezily come." Hesuggests thatmodernsociety, bent
INTRODUCTlON
on regimentedadvancement, tries to repress andsilencethe regressive an-
archyof grief: "Gethimup andbe goneas oneshapedawry," societysays
of the mourner; "he disturbs the order here" ("In Tenebris," I-II,
1:206-8).Themodernelegistresists asocial"arder"thatwouldpatholog-
izeandexpelthebereaved. In boththeprovisionalandmefinal endingof
his elegiac sequencefor hisfirst wife, Poems of1912-13, Hardyimplicitly
describes the social workofpoetic mourningas oppositional. While his
mindalonedweHs onthepastandthedeadwoman,
to-dayis beneapedandstale,
Andits urgentdack
Butavapidtale. (2:65)
Andwhilehestaysbehindinapastoralworldthatpermitsmournfulmedi-
tation, others have vanished into the "urban roar" thatdrowns outgrief
(2:70). Although Hardy's mourning for Emmaseems to have been pro-
tracted primarily by the ambivalent psychologyofmeir relationship, his
steadfastbereavementcouldalsobeseenasaprotestagainstasocialworld,
preoccupiedwith the "urgent" present, intolerantofmourners for whom
thepasthas"apresence more thantheactual brings" (2:65).
Like Hardy, Yeats contrasts the vigor andvitality ofthe dead with
the pallid reality ofthe living. As he puts it in "The New Faces," "The
living seem more shadowythan" the"shadows" ofthe dead.
39
Indeed, he
even asserts that "only two topics can be oftheleast interestto aserious
andstudiousmind-sexandthedead."40 Reactingagainsttheeffacement
ofthe dead by modern economic life, Yeats attacks in his elegies the
middle-class imperatives to "add the halfpence ro the pence" but forget
those "dead and gone" (l08)."Wehave given the world ourpassion," he
writes regretfully, "Wehavenaughtfor deathbuttoys" (158).While both
HardyandYeats repudiate the compulsive "gettingandspending" ofthe
middleclass, Hardyassociateshis mourningworkwithathreatenedrural
outlook, whereas Yeats links his to a disappearing aristocratic visiono In
"UponaDyingLady," "September 1913," "BeautifulLoftyThings,"and
otherelegies, Yeats identifieswiththearisrocraticvirtuesandvalues ofthe
deadanddying. Hisnonconformistgriefdefineshimagainsttheanonym-
ity and amnesia he attributes to the rising Catholic bourgeoisie. Though
"time maybring/Approvedpatterns ofwomenorofmen," onlytheele-
13
12
r Introduction
giac poet, in revolt against the contemporary democratic world, can restore
the "selfsame excellence" possessed by the dead (320). Yeats tries to entomb
in his poetry sorne of "the old kindness, the old distinguished grace" he
remembers in the dying and dead, virtues that modern life has otherwise,
in his view, supplanted (157).
The elegies of Hardy and Yeats, like modern art in general according
to Adorno, may be seen as the "social antithesis of society," negative re-
sponses to dominant public norms, in the sense that they resist the obliter-
ation of the dead by the socioeconomic laws of exchange, equivalence, and
progress. Yet "to avoid being sold as mere comfort," as Adorno says ofmod-
ern works ofart, "they have to assimilate themselves to that reality."41 Mod-
ern elegies betray in their difficult, melancholic mourning the impossibility
of preserving a pristine space apart, ofgrieving fo cthe dead amid the speed
and pressure of modern life. Unlike elegies of nostalgic "comfort," the em-
bittered elegies of Hardy, Stevens, Owen, Plath, and others both react
against and incorporate the suppression of mourning; they provide a spe-
cial space for mourning yet mock and ironize it. In this regard, they diverge
from the merely reactionary elegies of poets like Wlliam Watson and Ru-
pert Brooke, who pretend that the experience of death is unchanged in the
modern period, that neither modern capitalism nor mechanized warfare,
neither religious decline nor scientific advance have altered the customary
forms of mourning. In his elegies for Wordsworth and Tennyson, the once
famous Watson blandly repeats stock elegiac consolations, dawdling in
mortuary formulas and ritual pieties. Published in the 1890s, collections of
American and British mortuary verse were filled with titles like "Comfort,"
"Consolation," "The Mourner Comforted," and "There Is No Death."
The editors of Immortal Hopes (1892) and Not Changed But Glorified
(1896) hit their keynote in the opening pages, one volume beginning with
the biblical quotation "Blessed are they that mourn, Jor they sha!! be com-
Jorted!" and the other with the promise that the "soothing solace" of verse
"may comfort and cheer" the bereaved.
42
While both the poetry of solace
and the poetry of melancholic mourning clear a cultural space for grief,
the modern elegy at its best is not a timeless sanctuary, immune to histori-
cal change; rather, its rough and ravaged contours indicate the social reali-
ties it must withstand.
43
Already discerning the dying of death in late nineteenth-century so-
14
INTRODUCTION
ciety, Jacobs cites as contributory factors not only the frenzied pace of
modern life, but also the increase in the life span, which lessened anxieties
about the early arrival of death, and the decline in religious belief, which
eased terrors about the possibility of hell and damnation (264-65).44 Ar-
guing that social codes of mourning eroded rapidly in the modern period,
writers have more recently added to this list urbanization, medica1ization,
bureaucracy, and technological warfare. The Great War, as Freud observed,
temporarily heightened the awareness of death, but its long-term effect
was, paradoxically, to hasten the prewar "dying of death," to vitiate further
the traditional customs and rites for remembering the personal dead.
45
By
mid-century, the increasing neglect of the dead and mourning seemed
more and more like active denial, and not only in Britain. In "industrial-
ized, urbanized, and technologica1ly advanced areas ofthe Western world,"
claims the historian Philippe Aries, "except for the death ofstatesmen, soci-
ety has banished death. "46 Writing in the fifties and sixties, the social an-
thropologist Geoffrey Gorer argued that the "denial of mourning" had be-
come prevalent in Britain and other "English-speaking countries with a
Protestant tradition," that death had been suppressed except in the kind
of pornograph.ic indulgence that for all purposes affirmed the taboo:
Today it would seem to be believed, quite sincerely, that sens-
ible, rational men and women can keep their mourning under
complete control by strength ofwill or character so that it need
be given no public expression, and indulged, ifat all, in private,
as furtively as if it were an analogue of masturbation....
. . . Giving way to grief is stigmatized as morbid, unhealthy,
demoralizing-very much the same terms are used to repro-
bate mourning as were used to reprobate sexo ... Mourning is
treated as if it were a weakness, a self-indulgence, a reprehensi-
ble bad habit instead of as a psychological necessity.
Many people, of course, can adjust to this public attitude by
treating it as if it were an extension of modesty; one mourns in
private as one undresses or relieves oneself in private, so as not
to offend others....47
The modern elegy is a compromise-formation in its response to the priva-
tization of grief. Often representing itself as private utterance, it offers ref-
uge from the social denial of grief; yet as published discourse, it carries out
15
lntroduction
in the public realm its struggle against the denial of grief. Moreover, the
modern elegy enables the work of mourning in the face of social suppres-
sion, but it also instances that suppression, often displacing and mocking
grief. The melancholic turn in the modern elegy may itself instance the
breakdown in social customs that, according to Gorer, can best facilitate
the "complicated psychological and social adjustments" of mourning. "If
these adjustments are not made," he asserts, mourners are often left with
"the permanent despair of depression or melancholia."48 Even so, the mod-
ern elegy's complicity in the denial of death and mourning should not be.
exaggerated, since its persistent and sensitive attention to loss makes a
strong cultural counterstatement to the pornographic display, the pervasive
stifling, and the disciplinary ordering of death and grief. Like many mod-
ern elegists, Williams in "Tract" denounces the occlusion of bereavement,
demanding that mourners "sit openly- / to the weather as to grief," ask-
ing sarcastically, "Or do you think you can shut grief in?"
Throughout the twentieth century, changes in mortuary practices
have instanced the disappearance of death and the dead. In England, the
growing popularity of cremation reflected an ever more scientific, secular,
and privatistic attitude toward the dead, although it was also a response to
real problems of space, cost, and sanitation. From the first English crema-
tion in 1882, the numbers rose to ten thousand in 1936, and to more
than half the dead by 1968. Gorer contends that, at least in sorne cases,
"cremation is chosen because it is felt to get rid of the dead more com-
pletely and finally than does burial."49 In America, the more popular new
way to dispose ofthe dead was not to obliterate but to preserve them chem-
ically. The practice of embalming, still regarded in 1880 as a bizarre rite of
ancient Egypt or a wartime necessity, was transformed by 1920 into stan-
dard treatment for corpses.
50
In accordance with the ideology of scientific
advance and progress, embalming permitted the finality of death to be de-
nied, much as cremation permitted the inconvenience of the corpse to be
effaced. Putrescence might contradict the illusion that technology could
fix any problem and accumulated capital defeat any obstacle. Claiming
the ability to embalm as an exclusive and scientific practice, the American
"funeral director" enjoyed a rapid ascent toward professional status be-
tween the 1880s and the First World War,51 The National Funeral Direc-
tors' Association was founded in 1882, and it quickly took over the idio-
16
INTRODUCTION
syncratic ceremonies that families, neighbors, and clergymen had once
arrangedY
The rise of the "funeral director" coincides historically with the
emergence of the modern American elegist, both appropriating the rites of
mourning once managed and organized by religion and both threatened
by an insecure and marginal relation to the developing economic order. In
poems like Williams's "Tract" and Stevens's "Emperor of Ice-Cream," the
poet becomes a kind of "funeral director," instructing and admonishing
auditors on how to mourn the dead. But he also competes with his more
powerful rival: in the parodically honatory tone of these poems, one can
discern an uneasy mediation and conflict between the voices of poet and
undertaker.
53
Likewise, in poems such as Hughes's "Night Funeral in Har-
!em" and Brooks's "OfDe Witt Williams on his way to Lincoln Cemetery,"
African-American poets conduct funerals in a style of spare simplicity, re-
pudiating the hollow opulence of the burial business. While these funeral
re-directors overtly challenge the authority of funeral directors, modern
poets also pursue this competition more obliquely in their elegies, denying
undertakers exclusive proprietorship of the dead. They differ from their
rivals in a number ofways. Whereas modern undertakers conceal the dead
with makeup, euphemism, and posh coffins, modern elegists often strip
the dead and themselves of physical and psychological masks. The rhetoric
of funeral directing combines sentimental evasion, pseudo-science, and
psycho-babblej the language of the modern elegy is ironic and self-
mocking, anti-sentimental, anti-scientific, and anti-therapeutic. The fu-
neral director turns grief into a pathology, a temporary illness that needs
to be isolated and cured; the modern elegist reacts against the American
pathology of compulsory cheerfulness, clutching grief as a necessary and
humanizing affect. In defiance of the modern undertaker's organized sup-
pression and objectification of mourning, the modern elegist reveals grief
in ever more detail and complexity. For the modern poet, death and
mourning help to deepen, enlarge, and intensify subjectivity in the face
of an increasingly bureaucratic and dehumanizing economic life. For the
modern funeral business, death and mourning are occasions for extending
the reach of impersonal and objectifying institutions into the most inti-
mate recesses of human consciousness.
Other indices of the ever more impersonal disposal of the dead in-
17
L
r
Introduction
elude rhe "memorial park" and rhe hospiral. Popularized in rhe 1920s, rhe
memorial park, while serving as an alrernarive ro overelaborare morruary
pomp, went so far as ro wipe our sculpture, epiraphs, headsrones, and orher
graveside efforrs ar expression and individuarion. Over rhe course of rhe
cenrury, rhe hospiral supplanted rhe home as rhe primary space of dying.
In urban, multierhnic America, rhe "funeral home," rhe memorial park,
and rhe hospiral function as compararively neurral social spaces, freer rhan
rheir predecessors fram religious, emotional, and kinship ties.
54
They cut
rhraugh local chains of affiliarion, impose bureaucratic arder on rhe dis-
ruptive chaos of dearh and dying, and discipline unpredicrable eruptions
of mourning. In rhe modern elegy, rhe often idiosyncraric and intimare
represenrarions of mourning and rhe dead could be seen as resisring rhe
increasingly impersonal, bureaucraric prapensiries of modern morruary in-
srirutions. Befare rhe rise of rhese instirurions, rhe elegy was irself marked
by rhe regularizing force of lirerary and religious codeso As a gente, ir had
typically shaped and ordered grief, had absrracred and objecrified rhe dead.
Though intermirrently impeded, elegiac mourners usually followed an
affecrive course rhar led fram anger and despair ro consolation. Furrher,
elegiac porrrairs of rhe dead concealed mosr blemishes. From Asrraphel
and Lycidas ro Adonais, rhe dead were visible only rhraugh rhe rhick
shraud of pasroral codes and abstracr ideals, much as mourners were aud-
ible only rhrough conventional personae and formal lamento Hence,
Auden complains rhar in Adonais "borh Shelley and Kears disappear as
people."55 But as rhe more sysrematic disciplinarity of modern insrirurions
exrended ro rhe dead and rheir mourners, poers became ever more arricu-
lare abour rheir intimare and contradicrory feelings roward rhe dead, who
became in turn ever more distinctive because of rheir complex porrrayals.
The inverse relarionship between insriturional defacement and po- i
etic individuation can also be seen if rhe modern elegy is compared wirh
rhe modern obiruary. For rhe dead have been rarionalized, depersonalized,
and objectified nor only in such rhree-dimensional spaces as rhe funeral
parlor, rhe cemerery, rhe hospiral, rhe war monument, and rhe columbar-
ium, but also in such two-dimensional spaces as rhe newspaper, relevision,
and film. Fram rhe mid-ninereenth century ro rhe present, rhe elegy's rep-
resentarions of rhe dead and mourners have rended ro move away fram rhe
caregorical and universal ro rhe intimare and parricular. Knowing norhing
18
INTRODUCTION
abour Lincoln or Arrhur Hallam, we could glean few derails fram Whir-
man's and Tennyson's elegies for rhem, bur we could learn much abour
Years and Freud from Auden's elegies, and perhaps more rhan we want ro
know abour Ginsberg's morher fram her son's elegy. This trend in rhe elegy
reverses a contemporaneous trend in rhe newspaper obituary, ar leasr
through rhe early seventies. In a sociological study of rhe American obiru-
ary gente fram 1856 ro 1972, Gary L. Long arrives ar a conelusion rhar
also bears on rhe Irish and English obiruary: "personal amibures virtually
disappear and organizarional attribures remain rhe only ones men-
rioned.... A loss of derail and people fram obiruaries is accompanied by
an encompassing trend roward universalisric, caregorical characreriza-
rions."56 The encompassing rrend in rhe elegy is, in my view, rhe oppo-
sire-away fram whar Long calls "impersonal, universalisric depictions of
persons" roward "parriciparory, particularistic porrrayals of individuals"
(992). The earliesr obiruary cired by Long is, fram a contemporary per-
spective, asronishingly intimare: "[Comsrock] ... was a good workman,
and very much of a gentleman in his manners and deporrment befare rum
worked his ruin. He had a wife and one daughrer, whom he has entirely
deserred for several years pasr. During rhe lasr fifteen or twenty years,
he has given himself up ro drink, and led a mosr miserable life" (972, 976).
Such parricularisric narrarives of deeline are exeluded fram rhe elegy befare
Years recalls his Onele Pollexfen's failures and Lowell rerells his farher's de-
generarion. Years's elegies, such as "Easrer, 1916," are pivoral in rhis devel-
opment, balancing absrracr celebration wirh intimare arrention-ro a
woman's horse riding and "shrill" voice, a man's "drunken" and "vainglori-
ous" appearance. While rhe obiruary is turning ever more "formal, sran-
dardized," rhe elegy is assuming ever more of"rhe rich, parricularizing de-
rails rhar flesh out people and events" (992). And while obiruaries become
"the person empty cenoraphs of a rationalizing society," elegies become a
person-filled counterforce againsr ir (994). Sorne elegies parady rhis im-
perus roward objecrification by incorporating and exaggerating ir. In rhe
"person empty" elegies rhar Hardy wrires for Queen Vicroria and rhe Vic-
rorian soldier, rhar Srevens wrires for Rosenbloom and Auden for rhe "On-
known Citizen," depersonalizarion is comica1ly accelerared, until individu-
als are wiped our by hisrorical, economic, and bureaucraric forces.
The "person empty" obiruary effaces nor only rhe mourned persan
19
Introduction
but also the mourners. Earlierobituaries, as Long demonstrates, granted
family members and friends their own personalities and histories. But
friends disappearand family members become "coordinates thar formally
locare people" (976, 983-84). Here again rhe elegy reverses the master-
trend in the obituary, increasingly definingthe dead through the intimare
responses of the living. Whereas the newspaper obituary rypically sup-
presses the responses ofboth thewriterand the bereaved behind awall of
apparenrly self-generated data, the modern elegy oEren foregrounds the
poet-mourner's emotions and ruminations. Breaking thraugh standard-
izacion, elegists insist on the vigor oftheirsometimes hostile, sometimes
affectionate, oEren tumultuousaffects.
In responding to thesocial codification ofmourning, modernpoets
havealso hadtodefinetheirgriefin relationtothegenderingofmourning.
The twentieth century, though discarding many specific customs, largely
inheritedthenineteenth-centuryfeminizationof grief.As onewomanpro-
tested at thefin de siecLe, men "positively manage to mourn by proxy."57
The elegy thus afforded male poets the exploration offeelings publicly
markedas unavailableandalien, permittingthesocial maskofthegriefless
male to slip alitrle. Workingin thehighliterary traditionofMiltan,Shel-
ley, andTennyson,mencouldenactapsychologicalworkthatin extraliter-
ary practices might have been more dangerausly feminizing. Like tradi-
tional male elegists, who guardedlyassociated their laments with nymphs
and muses, modernpoetssomerimesovenly linkfemininirywirh mourn-
ing in rheir elegies. Many ofthe mosr despondent mourners in Hardy,
Frast,andStevensare women.
5S
InYeats's "Easter, 1916,"themalespeaker
even undergoes a momentarydisturbanceofgender, switchingfram male
to female: his panis to murmuroverand over rhe names ofrhe dead,
As a mothernames herchild
Whensleep atlasr has come
Onlimbs thathadrunwild.
Whatis it butnightfall?
No, no, notnightbutdeath. ... (181)
Havingsurrendered himselfto rhe fantasy ofbeinga mother, the speaker
abruprly pulls back fram this fiction and asserts rhe (masculine) realiry
principIe. In the figure ofTiresias,whosevision is "rhe substance of" The
20
INTRODUCTlON
Wzste Land, Eliot also blurs rhe gender ofhis universalisr lament. Just as
Years becomes a motherwhen he begins to "murmurname upon name,"
so Elior represents rhe "sound high in theair" rhat attends the rueful col-
lapse ofEuropeas the"Murmurof maternallamentation."59 Modernmale
poers ofren berraydiscomfonwith crassingintoaspheresocially codedas
feminine. In making theelegy more harshlysatiric, iranic, and combative
than ever before, Yeats, Lowell, Berryman, and orhers not only rebel
againstliteraryandsocialcustomburalsocontainrhegenre'scontradictory
sexual politics, reasserting the masculiniry ofrhe formo Faced wirh the
"feminizationof culture," modernpoets try todislocareelegiesandindeed
poetry at large fram irs nineteenth-century association with mournful
emorion, even as they write poems imbued with grief
60
Yeats, Elior,
Pound, and T. E. Hulme insistenrly describe modern poetry as "hard,"
"cold," "dry," "austere," and "impersonal," sharply distinguishing it from
the poetryof"sentimentandsentimentalsadness," of"moaningorwhin-
ing," of"effeminacy" and"emotionalslither."61
Elegiesalso posedrisks tomodernwomenpoets. Forthem,thegenre
was doublyproblematic in gender terms- "masculine" as an lite literary
form yet "feminine" as apopularcultural form and simularion ofmourn-
ing. A female poetwho wrote elegies risked being tainted by the rype of
rhe "poeress" or"nighringale," at a rimewhen securingliterary credentials
required rhat she shun ir. But the alternative to the tradition ofFelicia
HemansandLydia Sigourneywas rhe maleelegiaccanon,repletewithim-
ages ofmenbondingandwomenfailing toprotectthem. Neithermodeof
elegywas satisfactoryamid heightened feminist resistance to apatriarchal
dominationthatincludedliteraryrradirionsand monuarycodes; afrerall,
conventions ofmourning dress and behavior were far more burdensome
ro womenrhan to men.
62
Litrlewondernoneofthepreeminentmodernist
women poets made a major bid for literary ascendancy in the genre of
elegy. Gertrude Srein, H. D., and Marianne Moore preferred poems of
self-reflexive wit, ofclassical detachment, or ofmeticulous scrutiny to
poems ofelegiac lamentation. This is not to say that women writers ofa
more "traditional" bent, like SaraTeasdale, Edna Sto Vincent Millay, and
AnnaWickham,eschewed theelegy, buttheycomposedpoemsofmourn-
ingonlyat theCOSt ofreinforcingtheir marginal relation to the more"ad-
vanced" poerryofrheirtime.
63
Whiletheearlyfemale modernists,writing
21
Introduction
INTRODUCTlON
during the first women's movement, tended to avoid the elegiac genre, po-
ets of a later generation, just ahead of the second women's movement, were
as willing as their male counterparts to produce elegies. Plath, Sexton, and
Rid transvalued the grief that had earlier been used to subordinate
women, championing it as a complex affective resource in poems of angry
insubordination. .fu we shall see, it was particularly in the subgenre of the
family elegy that they broke through the sexual politics that had con-
strained both the literary canon of elegy and the social customs of mourn-
ing. Because the elegy in its domestic form mapped the family romance, it
proved valuable to poets in revolt against the institutionalized andro-
centrism of the family. Defying social taboos on public mourning and on
female anger, they used the parental elegy to vent continuing rage, '
to reinspect childhood wounds, and to scrutinize paternal power in its
absence.
Modern poets, both male and female, have reacted to changes in
American, English, and Irish mourning customs that are in sorne ways
nation-specific and in other ways pervasive throughout the West. America's
elaborate and expensive funerals, for example, are exceptional; to sorne ex-
tent they more closely resemble the funeral s ofVictorian England man the
spare disposals of the dead in modern England. And the wake, once a cus-
tom widespread in Western Europe, persists almost exclusively in Ireland.
Moreover, ethnic, racial, religious, and sexual minorities in England and ,
America, including sorne Jews, Muslims, African Americans, Irish Ameri-
cans, and gays, have preserved or reinvented rituals long abandoned by
most white middle-class mourners in these countries; sometimes they have
even harnessed mourning and its rituals as oppositional practices.
64
Never-
theless, elegists as diverse as the Anglo-Irish Yeats and the UIster-Catholic
Heaney, the African-American Hughes and the gay-Jewish Ginsberg and
Rich, have all wirnessed and responded to changes in mourning customs,
ji
wrought by modernization. Despite the differences between American andj
British burials, Gorer argues that "in both countries private mourning is ,
generally denied" and "the majority ofboth countries tend to treat mourn- .
ing as morbid self-indulgence, and to give social admiration to the be-
reaved who hide their grief so fully that no one would guess anything had '
happened. "65 Even Ireland, where mourning practices have eroded to a
lesser extent and at a slower rate than in the rest of Europe, has lost many
of the traditional mourning rituals that once surrounded the burial of the
dead. Between 1880 and the first part ofthe twentieth century, many tradi-
tional wake customs died out, such as singing, game playing, drinking,
dancing, storytelling, and remunerated keening. For hundreds of years at
synod after synod, bishops enacted decrees condemning these traditional
practices, but it was not until the modern era that they succeeded in re-
straining and disciplining the carnival energies of the Irish wake-energies
mat Joyce spectacularly recuperates in Finnegans \.%ke. "Wakes, as social
institutions," as Sen O Silleabhin writes, "survive in an attenuated form
only here in Ireland, and, possibly, a few other scattered areas of Western
Europe."66 Ireland, thus, is Western Europe's last national enclave for tradi-
tional mourning ritual, and Irish poets from Yeats to Patrick Kavanagh and
Heaney mirror this social conservatism in their elegies, which are often
more ritualistic than those of their English and American contemporaries.
Yet even as they reflect the persistence of mourning ritual, contemporary
Irish poets like Heaney continue to lament its "attenuation." Heaney
writes, "we pine for ceremony, / customary rhythms," although he comes
from an island where more of the traditional funeral rites and mourning
practices have survived than they have elsewhere in the dominant cultures
of the West.
67
GENRE, HIGH MODERNISM, PSYCHOANALYSIS
While drawing on various critical approaches, the readings in this book are
grounded primarily in the generic history of elegy and the psychoanalysis
of mourning. For interpreting the modern elegy, the combination of ge-
neric and psychoanalytic paradigms holds a number of advantages. Ideally,
these paradigms should not only complement but also correet each other,
genre criticism restraining the psychoanalytic tendeney to reduce all elegiac
artifice to emotion, pathology, or biography, and psychoanalysis re-
straining the generic tendeney to reduce all elegiac feeling to trope, code,
or convention. Put more positively, genre criticism honors the aesthetic
specificity of the elegy, while psychoanalysis recognizes its bearing on life.
But why use genre as a paradigm for interpreting modern poems?
Isn't it an irrelevant category for the reading of twentieth-century litera-
ture? After all, a popular myth of the modern posits that in 1900 or 1910
or 1916 literature broke free from the past and, as a corollary, from the
22
23
l
r
Introduction
chains of generic affiliation.
68
Fredric Jameson locates the provenance of
this myth, asserting that the "reaction against gente theory in recent times
is a strategic feature of what must be called the ideology01modernismo"69
Indeed, the history of this reaction goes back much further, since the ideol-
ogy of modernism recapitulated, in turn, a myth of "radical generic break-
down" during the Romantic period-a breakdown that, as Stuart Curran
has shown, "in fact never happened."70 Between Romanticism and mod-
ernism, the reaction was expressed in vehement terms by Benedetto Croce,
who repudiated the notion of gente altogether, relying heavily on
tic concepts like "intuition," "expression," and "artistic genius" to prove
that each work of art was beyond classification.
71
Croce's views were
quickly absorbed into "The New Criticism," as the critic J. E. Spingarn
entitled an influential essay of 1911, in which he said: "There are not,
therefore, only three, or ten, or one hundred literary kinds; there are as
many kinds as there are individual poets. "72 Each work of art is organic
and self-identical; it is not mediated by a generic or rhetorical paradigm
but is an unfettered expression ofthe author's uniqueness. In disseminating
this anti-generic theory of literature, the New Critics and others have ap-
plied it most insistently to the modern periodo Ren Wellek, for example,
holds that modern writers have "called in doubt" the "very concept" of
gente.
73
Other recent critical movements share this assumption. Maurice
Blanchot claims that modern literature "no longer recognizes the distinc-
tion between gentes and seeks to destroy their limits" and "that literary
forms, that gentes, no longer have any genuine significance."74 Similarly,
the "consequences" of modernism are for Irving Howe "a break-up of the
traditional unity and continuity ofWestern culture" and its "decorums,"
and according to Perry Anderson, drawing on Marx and Marshall Berman,
modernity "tears down every ... claustral tradition" to emancipate the
possibilities of the "individual self."75
To be sure, these statements capture the negative impulses of modern
literature, impulses prominent in the elegy among other forms, as we have
seen: the gente changes at an accelerated pace, challenges traditional
norms, shatters old decorums, and combines with other forms. But like
other gentes, it has always been evolving, hybridizing, self-subverting, so
that its modern mutations constitute something less than a total departure
from the generic past. Because the relation of the modern elegy to literary
24
INTRODUCTlON
tradition is one neither of seamless continuity nor of complete rupture,
genre analysis helps to focus both departures and inheritances. Modern
poets, though questioning elegiac conventions more fierce1y than their pre-
decessors, do not thereby disprove the existence of the conventions or the
genre; "the transgression requires a law," as Todorov writes, and the norm
becomes visible in being transgressed. According to the semiotician Maria
Corti, a modern or postmodern writer who "violates" and "deforms" ge-
neric codification nevertheless offers "negative proof" of its importance.
76
Even Blanchot admits that "form perhaps lives only through its alter-
ations," and Jacques Derrida, though more irreverent of generic "laws"
than any other gente theorist, writes that a text "cannot be without or
less a gente. Every text participates in one or several gentes, there is no
genreless texto"77
't
High modernism might seem ro contradict this view. Ir and the New Criti-
cism reinforced each other-an apparently postgeneric practice and a
sometimes anti-generic method. Uncertainty over what kindof work The
WasteLandor HughSelwynMauberleywas he1ped to assure that each poem
would be canonized. But just as high modernism's metrical break with the
past is now recognized to be less extreme than it once appeared, so too we
are coming to understand that Eliot and Pound, while seeming to spring
free from gentes, often repress, engraft, or disguise them. They may seem
to reject the elegy aboye all, since they ostensibly favor impersonality over
emotion, "masculine" irony over "effeminate" sorrow; but elegy is one of
the most important gentes embedded in their poetry. Because these two
preeminent high modernists have overshadowed the
of their contemporaries and have discouraged gente analysis of modern
poetry, we should pause to consider the generic, and especially the e1egiac,
determinants of their apparently metageneric work.
In poem after poem, Eliot's "thought clings round dead limbs," be-
traying a strong affinity for the elegy.78 Although he later conceals elegiac
pathos behind masks of satire and irony, his early verse is freighted with
the rhetoric of transience and death; he writes of growing "Gray-haired
and old" (593), of "Life, a litde bald and gray" (603), of the "fragrance of
decay" (597), and of "the limbs of the dead" (598). Amid the manuscripts

25 /0-
,
,. BALAI
'?Q
l
Introduction
of The Waste Land are poems that perpetuate this melancholy mode,
poems with the revealing titles "Exequy," "Dirge," and "Elegy," the latter
allowing itself the rueful moan, "How steadfastly I should have mourned /
The sinking of so dear a head."79 Admittedly, Eliot works hard to subdue
and check his elegiac proclivities, distancing himself from the age-obsessed
Prufrock and other personae and even parodying the genre of elegy. The
anti-elegy "Aunt Helen," for example, ridiculously yokes together incon-
gruities like the "silence in heaven" and in "the street," me death of the '
aunt and of a parrot (29). Similarly, "The Hippopotamus" satirizes elegiac
apotheosis, levitating the corpulent beast amid a heavenly crew of angels,
saints, and martyrs (50).
Eliot's twin modes of dirge and parody, lamentation and satire, vio-
lently converge in The Waste Land, in which ventriloquism and irony pro- .
tect the poet from too close an identification with his mournful personae.
While the poem owes much to quest romance, epic, and other genres, it :
can be read as a covert elegy, whemer for Eliot's friendJean Verdenal "mort
aux Dardanelles," for Eliot's father who died in 1919, for the recent carnage
of the Great War, for Western civilization, or for all of these losses. In any
case, it borrows substantially from the repertoire of elegy.80 Despite Eliot's
stated distaste for Milton and Whitman, his poem has many specific reso- I
nances with Whitman's elegy for Lincoln, including the lilacs, the mourn-
fuI observers, the tolling bells, the singing thrush, me mysterious "third,"
and with Milton's elegy for King, including words like "forc'd" and"
"pluck," not to mention the young man dead by water. More generally, the;i
poem's elegiac cues include the poetic burial of the dead, the pathetic fal-"
lacy of the seasons, the fertility gods, the trope of the river, me recog
n
itionl
i
of the corpse, the mourner's chaste withdrawal from desire, the dismissal
of female figures, the multiple dramatic voices, and the elegiac coda in"
which the poet reviews the work of mourning he has just completed. The'j
object of such a reading is not to trap this multi-generic poem in its final:
i
pigeonhole but to highlight one ofits primary codeso In Four Quartets Eliot
again abstracts grief from personal occasion and context, but here too, eH
egy is a strong generic substrate. Amid echoes of elegies by Whitman, n ~
nyson, Yeats, and others, Eliot mourns the death of human continuity,
through time, the death of the revelatory moment upon its occurrence, the'l
deaths of generalized poets and war victims, and the failure of words to:
INTRODUCTlON
stem this endless stream of losses. To be sure, Eliot represents neither Four
Quartets nor The Waste Land as elegy, and perhaps we should be grateful
for this generic displacement, given the meager results when he writes overt
elegies. "Where a man dies bravely / At one with his destiny, that soil is
his," Eliot officiously procIaims in "To the Indians who Died in Africa"
(203). In conrrast to Hardy, Yeats, and Owen, Eliot most succeeds as ele-
gist when he claims to be writing something else.
Although Pound's famous affirmations of"direct treatment" and "ob-
jectivity" might seem to contravene elegiac pathos, his poetry too, espe-
cially Hugh Selwyn Mauberley and later parts of the Cantos, can be read as
deeply elegiaco His grief for Gaudier-Brzeska, though less submerged than
Eliot's for Verdenal, was probably at least as determinative in his career.
81
After setting forth his axioms for modern aesthetics in a memoir for the
dead sculptor, Pound further attests to the loss in Hugh Selwyn Mauberley.
Elegy obviously prevails in this poem's famous sections on the war dead,
but it also informs earlier parts of this multilayered lamento Having an-
nounced the death of his aestheticist self (" E. P. Orle pour L'Election de son
Sepulchre') and having mourned the "dead art / Ofpoetry," Pound catalogs
a multitude of other losses: gone are cIassicism, introspection, heroism,
autocratic government, religious ritual, all of them replaced by the "tawdry
cheapness" of a degraded, commercial culture. Responsible for these
deams, modernization is Pound's version of elegy's corrupted clergy or ven-
omous reviewers. But his response to it is complex, even contradictory:
he lamems the golden age yet laments it in the discourse his "'age de-
manded,'" mocks modernity yet uses modernity to mock it. His rhetoric
is less a classicist language of "grace" and "sculpture" than a rhetoric of
"plaster" and "grimace": over and over, it quotes, echoes, ironizes, and re-
produces itself, as well as other texts. Implicated in the cultural death he
abhors, the poet eye-deep in the hell of modernity cannot save the war
dead, any more than a degenerate Britannia, with her "broken statues" and
"battered books," can immortalize them. In Pound's later work, eulogy and
vengeful satire continue to interlock. Notably the Pisan Cantos return to
elegy as a dominant modal strand: Pound unleashes a turbulent dirge for
Mussolini, whom he assimilates to Manes and Dionysos, while also
allowing himself brief laments for literary companions like Yeats, Joyce,
and Ford, as well as himself.
27
26
l
r
Introduction
A full interpretation ofPound and Eliot as elegists would have to
extend beyondclearlyelegiacelementsoftheirworktosubtlermatters of
style. Thefragmentarydiscourseemployed by bothpoetsimplicitlyfunc-
tionsas amodeofinscription-anepitaphforavanishedorderandcoher-
ence. Quotationalso becomesanelegiacdevicewhenPound,for example,
plays on Pindar's encomiastic use ofthe Greek exclamation tn (what!)
and its English homonym, and when Eliot repeats Spenser's line "Sweet
Thames, runsoftlytill I endmysong." Theyturn each textintoaverbal
symbol oflost potential, a corpselike marker ofa dead meaning.
82
Au-
thoringcloset elegies, Eliotand Poundhave deflected attention from the
elegiac coding oftwentieth-century poetry. They have convinced sorne
critics that poetry must be postelegiac-indeed postgeneric-to be au-
thenticallymoderno Butas theelegiacdimensionofevenhighmodernism
becomeseverclearer, letalonethepoetryof othermoderns,itis becoming
increasingly difficult ro believe that Eliot and Pound made "it" so "new"
thattheyrenderedelegy, genre, andgenrecriticismobsolete.
't
Genretheoryhelpsinanalysisof theelegyas aliteraryconstruct, butinso-
far as the elegy is a mimesis ofmourning, psychoanalysis offers a more
useful framework, having amalgamated and modernized othervocabula-
ries for mourning. Freud's essay "MourningandMelancholia" is the basis
of mostsubsequentclinicalandtheoreticalapproachestogrief:psychoana-
lysts as variedas KarlAbraham, Melanie KIein,John Bowlby,Jacques La-
can,andJuliaKristevahavereinterpretedandreinventedits ideas, andlit-
erary critics and theorists have extended its terms into discussions of
everythingfrom the literatureofthe HolocaustandAIDS to suchgenres
as tragedy,elegy, andthenovel. 83 Thisbookperpetuatesthedissemination
of"Mourningand Melancholia," butwe should pause here over Freud's
disciplinary ideal of "normal mourning" and his binary distinction
between mourning and melancholia. Most clinical psychoanalysis has
adopted "normal," "healthy," or "successful" mourning as a therapeutic
ideal, often hypostatizing mourningas a rigid step-by-step program that
leadsfrom shocktorecovery, andsorne literaryapplications ofFreud'ses-
say have transferred his abstract norm to texts, siftingthemthrough pre-
dictable narratives inwhich artistic compensation redeems personal loss.
28
INTRODUCTION
Yet Freud admitted in letters and otherwritings that mourners typically
remain inconsolable, neverfillingthegap of10ss.84 As RobertFrostwrote
in anuncollectedpoem:
Nostatehas foundaperfectCute for grief
Inlaworgospel orinrootorherb.
85
To counterFreud's disciplinarynormwhileborrowinghis insights, Icon-
trastFreud's"normal"mourningwiththemelancholicmourningofmany
modernelegists, poets who refuse the psychoanalyticideal oftherapeutic
art, andI dilute Freud's overly rigid distinction between "mourning" and
"melancholia" to a matter ofemphases within mourning-while still
allowingfor the kindof"melancholia" or"depression" notoccasioned by
deathandhencelargelybeyondthescopeofthisbook.
Despiteitsdeficiencies, Freud'sessayisahelpfulrouchsrone.Ir gath-
ersmuchcollectivewisdom, restatinginsynopticformviewsheldbysages
from Ccero to Shakespeare, Locke, and Burton-forexample, that the
causes ofmelancholia are often inscrutable, and that mourners review
memories ofthedeceased in aprocess ofrelinquishment.
86
Ir illuminates
thesevere self-criticism inmelancholia, attributingittoaninnerdivision
betweentwopansoftheego (or, inthelatertopography,"ego"and"super-
ego")-one part narcissistically identified with the lost object and the
otherpartattackingthisencryptedobject. Buthavingtriedtodisentangle
melancholiafrom mourningonthis basis, Freudadmitsthatthe"ambiva-
lence"and"self-reproaches"of melancholiacanalso befoundinmourning
(251,258). In both conditions, the ego avoids outwardly venting its sa-
dismandhatebyturningits rageontheinnersubstituteforthelostobject.
Mourning and melancholia share many other featutes, including "pro-
foundlypainfuldejection,cessationof interestintheoutsideworld,lossof
thecapacitytolove, inhibitianof allactivity" (244). Giventhissubstantial
overlap between mourning and melancholia, "melancholic mourning" is
conceivableas atermforthekindofambivalentandprotractedgriefoften
encountered in the modern elegy. Later psychoanalysts provide further
suppOrt for this modification ofFreud. Karl Abraham uncovers within
mourningthefeelings ofambivalenceandthemechanismofintrojection,
which Freud sought to attribute to melancholia alone.
87
Describing the
melancholiaordepression inherentwithin mourning, Melanie KIein also
29
lntroduction
shows that "normal" mourning involves regressive feelings ofanger and
aggression. In "Mourningand Its Relation to Manic-Depressive States,"
perhaps thestrongestamongmanyrevisionaryaccounts ofFreud, she ar-
ticulates the continuous struggle within mourning between thedrive to-
ward restoration and the destructive, aggressive, and paranoid impulses
thatthreatenthisworkofrebuildingtheinnerself, betweenpiningfor the
lost object and the sadomasochistic rage that complicates this affection.
She argues that, like melancholia, mourningmoves in waves, alternating
betweenmaniaanddepression, betweenfantasies ofomnipotenceandan-
nihilation.
88
Inmoreempiricallybasedstudiesofmourningbehavior,John
Bowlbyargues thatambivalence, anger, andhatredtowardthelostobject
should be discarded as criteria for "pathological" mourning, and Linde-
mannmakesasimilarpointaboutanger andguilt; theseanalysts observe
such affects even within what they dassify as "healthy" or "normal"
mourning.
89
Although psychoanalytic accounts ofmourninghelp us to abstract
and recognize the psychic tendencies ofthe modern elegy, I subordinate
themtodetailedreadingsofthepoetrybecausetheirtheoreticalvocabulary
isinevitably reductive-not only ofthemany verbaland literary complexi-
ties ofthegenrebutalso ofthemultiplekindsofgrieftobefoundwithin
it.MelancholicmourningisapersonalaffectinHardy'selegiesforhiswife,
acollective response inOwen's warelegies; itis visiblyinflected byracial
historyinHughes'sbluespoems,bygenderinPlatnselegiesforherfather,
and by sexual orientation and ethnicity in Ginsberg's Kaddish for his
mother. Thedeaths mournedbymodernpoets rangefrom thefamilial or
private tothepublic, political, professional, orepochal. Often the deaths
mourned are the deaths ofthe poets themselves, as in the self-elegies of "
Stevens, Hughes, Auden, and Plath-works that extend the tradition of
poeticself-mourninginherited from suchpoets as Keats, Dickinson, and
Yeats.
90
Inthetwentiethcentury, self-elegiesareoftenmorecompensatory
thanelegies proper,scemmingnodoubcfrom asalutaryresidueofnarcis-
sism yec also suggesting an important exception co che melancholic ten-
dencyIhave beenpositing. Otherexceptionsindudeelegiesfor poetsand
African-Americanelegies forpublicfigures. Indeed, we shallfind thac the
modern elegy is far from uniformly melancholic, since elegists from Ste- ,
vens andAuden co Clampitt and Heaneyhave redaimed compensatory'
30
INTRODUCTlON
mourningbysubduingitspromise. Despiteits melancholicprodivity,che
modern elegy continues the ancient interplay between melancholic and
consolatorymourning,sornepoemscendingmoreinonedirection,others
movingdialecticallybetweenche two.
Psychoanalysis is immediately pertinent to che bereavement repre-
senced in sorne poems, such as Hardy's spousal elegies orPlach's paternal
elegies, butelsewhereitis relevantonlybyexcension, as inAuden'selegies
for Yeats and Freud, which, he scaced, were "noc poems ofgrief."91 The
commemorativeelegiesofAuden,Hardy,Stevens,andochersarepoemsof
mourningin thesense chac theirfictionalized affeccivestructureis deriva-
tive ofgrief,juscas "love"poemsinduderepresencationsof emotionsrang-
ingfromardentdesiretodecachedbemusement.Inextendingthemeaning
of"poetryofmourning" to indudepoems ofmournful tribute, we need
noC efface thedifferencebetweentheirformal sorrowandtheintenseper-
sonal mourningdepicced inelegies for parents, children, orsiblings. Still,
whecher public or familial, professional or personal, all elegies stylize
mourningco sornedegree, permittingsomethingless chan "cheeffusionof
real passion" Dr.Johnsonmistakenlysoughtin"Lycidas": "Wherethereis
leisurefor fiction," henocoriouslycomplained, "thereis littlegrief."92 But
the"ficcion" and"grief" hetriedco distinguishareas intertwinedinelegy
as are"ritual"and"mourning"incradicionallamentation-ritualthatnot
onlycontainsbutproducesfeeling, feelingthatnoconlyproducesbutem-
ulaces ritual. In che belief thac where there is grief, ic is well if there
be leisure for poecry, chis bookfocuses onsorneofmodernculture's most
subtleandself-conscious explorationsofmourning, from Hardyto poecs
oftoday.
31
... ,
NE
Thomas Hardy
Hardy once recalled that in childhood he was horrified by the sight
ofcut tree limbs and ofa dead bird, and years later in "The Roman
Gravemounds" he mournedthelossofhis favorite cato Sensitive as aboy
ro death in the animal kingdom and mutilation in the vegetable world,
Hardywentontowritehundredsofelegies, mostofthemforhumanbe-
ings, sorne ofthem amongthe great elegies ofhis time. His elegies have
seldombeeninterpretedas agroup, despiteassertions thathewrotesorne
of"the most unconventional andimpressive elegies inEnglish" and that
the"elegiactoneis Hardy'snaturaltoneofvoice."Elegymayevenbepara-
digmatic ofa1l Hardy's work, at least ifJ. Hillis Miller is right to define
thispoet'sartas a"safeguardingofthedead."1 Nevertheless,Hardy'selegies
coulda1so beseenas anobstacleinthewayofanoverallinterpretationof
his oeuvre; they might seem irreconcilable with manyofhis best-known
poems-worksofloftydetachmentlike"TheConvergenceof theTwain."
ThecoldeyeofsuchpoemsbecameexemplaryformodernistslikeAuden,
whosaidofhis"poeticalfather" thathevaluedmosthis "hawk'svision, his
wayoflookingatlifefromaverygreatheight."2Thedispassionatestareof
the ImmanentWill would seem to be anathema to elegy: the gente had
a1ways depended on involvement, its pathos being born ofresistance to
death. To look on loss from a great height and see it as part ofa fated
patternis toreducemournfulfeelings toironictwinges. Howcouldapoet
whose "natural tone ofvoice" is "elegiac" have written poems that scorn
andbelittleloss?
In"TheConvergenceoftheTwain," Hardyfinds agrim humorin
thesinkingofthe Ttanc. Neitherthe"smartship" norher"sinistermate"
foresees theirmarriageas theymove towardoneanother,
TilltheSpinneroftheYears
Said'Now!'Andeachonehears,
Andconsummationcomes, andjars two hemispheres.
3
Ratherthanlamentthecatastrophe, Hardycomicallytransforms itintoa
sexual union. Despitethe deaths of1,513 passengers, two acquaintances
33
r Chapter One
among them, he risks characterizing the ship in terms of "human vanity,"
"the Pride ofLife," and "vaingloriousness." With remarkable effrontery, he
wrote the unpitying work for the program of the "Dramatic and Operatic
Matine in Aid of the 'Titanic' Disaster Fund." The poet looks at death
from a very great height, not from the closer range of someone who
suffered because a tree limb was lopped off, because a bird or a cat perished.
Dry-eyed, he fashions an austere anti-elegy. His eye gets still drier in the
poem "Transformations," where he surveys with blank indifference the re-
eycling of the dead: one man turos into a "Portion of this yew," his wife
into a "green shoot," others into grasses and a rose (2:211-12). Death
doesn't move him; it is a mere redistribution ofliving matter. Later, in "He '"
Never Expected Much," Hardy explains why he sought this passionless
stance. He made himself expect from life "Just neutral-tinted haps and
such"-a self-steeling that permitted him to "stem such strain and ache /
As each year might assign" (3:225). On Hardy's own suggestion, then, his
Olympian poems are attempts to override "strain and ache," and his so-
called pessimism (a term he disputed) is a defensive response to disappoint- .'
mento Sorne have emphasized Hardy's "refusal of involvement," others Ji
have claimed he "does not draw apart from the suffering of others and .
himself"; sorne have seen him as "absolutist" and "totalitarian," others as
"liberal" and "democratic."4 Both sides are right, as Hardy's elegies make
clear: his vulnerability to loss gives rise to his invulnerable detachment, his
"democratic" empathy spurs into being his "absolutist" emphasis on pat-
tero, or to switch to literary historical terms, his late Romantic pathos
stimulates his modero irony. His elegies anticipate the further implosion e'
of these antinomies in the totalizing nominalism and cold, dry grief of
Yeats, Eliot, and Pound. As a key transitional figure, Hardy presages the
tension in much twentieth-century poetry between the elegiac and the
anti-elegiac, his best work springing from the convergence of the twain.
But Hardy's heirs lay claim to different sides ofhis aesthetic. IfHardy
bequeaths ro Auden and other moderoists his "hawk's vision," he leaves to
anti-moderoist poets like Larkin the unelevated vision of the provincial
poet, a vision attached to the particulars of place and memory. At the op-
posite pole from Hardy's ascetic, god's-eye poems are such indulgendy
despondent elegies as "Bereft," "She Hears the Storm," and "Bereft, She
Thinks She Dreams." All three are the dramatic monologues of widows,
34
THOMAS HARDY
Hardy feminizing many of his bleakest laments. Whereas "The Conver-
gence ofthe Twain" never pictures the mourners or the dead, "Bereft" takes
us into the prisonhouse of a mourner's grief; and whereas the speaker of
roe anti-elegy blocks any sympathy for the dead, the speaker of me elegy
identifies so strongly with her dead husband that she wills her own destruc-
tion. Recalling the vanished rhythms of their daily life, she now can only
wait
In a silence as of the dead.
Leave the door unbarred,
The clock unwound,
Make my lone bed hard-
Would 'twere underground! (1:263)
Hardy follows a long tradition of male elegists who represent irresolvable
and self-immolating grief as female, the inverse of the "masculine" detach-
ment pursued in his god's-eye poems.
5
Many of his widows are encom-
passed by the unbreachable walls of their grief. Numbed by her pain, the
speaker of "She Hears the Storm" no longer fears the sounds of rain
and wind against her "roof-tree"; enwombed, enclosed, insulated, she re-
sembles her husband, who "has won that storm-tight roof ofhers / Which
Earth grants all her kind" (1 :263-64). Similarly, the speaker of "Bereft,
She Thinks She Dreams" can escape the entrapping "web" ofbereavement
only by imitating her husband's ultimate entrapment (2:98). Hardy does
not always displace his blackest sentiments onto "overgloomed" female
keeners, and he is particularly willing to grieve in propria persona when
the occasion of the gloom is undefined. The speaker of "In Tenebris,"
much like the speakers of "Exeunt Omnes," "During Wind and Rain,"
and "Just the Same," is chained to his "bereavement-pain," unable to find
any interest in the "world wheeling on," hoping only for "the ending"
0:206,209,210).
Between this extreme of pathetic dejection and the opposite extreme
of anti-elegiac detachment are Hardy's best elegies-ironic poems that
nevertheless grieve amidst their irony, and sorrowful poems that neverthe-
less suspect their sorrow. The first group of elegies that 1 examine tend
toward the more detached pole of his aesthetic-generalized elegies such
as "The Darkling Thrush" and "God's Funeral." Like "The Convergence
35
"
ChapterOne
ofthe Twain," these poems assume a rotalizing perspective on loss, but
theycannotdeadenpainentirely.Thesecondgroupof elegiestendtoward
the more rueful pole-Poems of 1912-13and other elegies for Hardy's
wife. Like "Bereft" and "In Tenebris," these poems flirt with the self-
destructiveness ofmelancholia, but they also question their motives for
findinggriefso appealing. Theelegies inbothgroupsandhundredsmore
confirm that Hardy's poetry is aboye all an "art oflosing." Whether la-
mentingthedeathsoffamilymemberslikehis motherandsister, ofpoets
likeSwinburneandMeredith,ofruralhabitsandbeliefs, or(inthepoems
on which 1focus) the deaths ofthe nineteenth centuryand ofhis wife,
Hardyis supremelyan elegist, thoughanelegistoften impatientwiththe
toolsofhistrade.Weare usedro thinkingofHardyas apoetbothconser-
vativeandradical in manersofform, thelastVictorianandthefirst mod-
ern: he writes in traditional stanzaic panerns but invents many ofhis
own; headheres ro the metered tine butroughs up prosodic andsyntac-
tic polish; he appropriates Romantic diction but fashions many jarring
locutions. His similar accomplishment in working within the gente of
elegy while dislocating many ofits conventions deserves more analysis,
especially since elegy is the poetic gente to which he made his finest
contributions. His elegies for the passing ofthe nineteenth century are
particularlyilluminating, since they are self-conscious abouttheir medial
position, about being poised between different eras and different kinds
ofelegy.
ELEGIES FOR AN ERA: "BY THE CENTURY'S OEATHBED"
Inhis elegies for the nineteenthcentury, for thequeenwhogave thecen-
turyitsname,fortheunknownsoldierofitsimperialistwars,andforGod,
whohadbeendyingthroughmuchof thecentury,Hardymournsthepass-
ing ofone era and anxiously anticipates the arrival ofanother. He both
depicts thishistorical shiftinhis elegies andembodiesit, representingthe
change from the nineteenth to the twentieth centuryand reproducing it
inhis transitionalaesthetic. Broadlyconceived,hispoemshelpusherinto
the modern period the Vicrorian gente ofelegies for a historical epoch,
such as Arnold's "Dover Beach" and "Stanzas from the Grande Char-
treuse"-agenre thatwill persistwithworks like Hugh Selwyn Mauberley
and The Waste Land; viewedmorenarrowly, theyperpetuatethesubgenres
36
TROMAS HARDY
ofelegies for publicfigures, forwarvictims, andfor religious beliefs. But
theyalso announcesorne ofthe elegy's difficulties as itstumbles into the
newcentury,includingGod'sdeath,thewithdrawalofnature'sconsolarory
powers,theapparent absurdity ofelegiac expectation, and the disappear-
anceoftheindividualfromthemysticpadofhisrory.Inotherwords,these
elegies lament not only their proclaimed loss butalso the decline ofthe
very form throughwhich theylamento Thegenre's conventions-inher-
ited from ''Astrophel'' and "Lycidas" and still codifying poems from the
"Intimations Ode" to Adonais and In Memoriam-seemed at last ro be
dying, even its primary consolations and substitutions. Linle wonder
Hardytypically"Waitsinunhope" (1:207),despiteourreceivedpictureof
him as apoetwho "resurrects," "safeguards," "remembers," and "revives"
medead. Yet his ironicuse oftheelegyparadoxicallyhelpsto save itfrom
metomb, renewingitin theskepticismsofmodernity.
Raisingadeathlamentfor the "Century'scorpse" in"TheDarkling
Thrush," Hardy writes an elegy for an era and for the era's elegiac art
(1:187-88).Originallypublishedunderthetitle"BytheCentury'sDeath-
bed," thepoemrepresents thenineteenthcenturyasadeadlandscapeand
adead aesthetic. Ir inters theaesthetic inallusions ro poems like "Odeto
theWestWind,""OdetoaNightingale,"and"DoverBeach,"incorporat-
ingwordsfrom these representativepoemsso thattheverylanguageofthe
elegybecomesacryptforRomanticism.Peeringintothe"growinggloom,"
thepoetalso triestodiscerntheaestheticofthenextcentury. His resump-
tionandrevision ofelegy signal one aspectofthenewaesthetic-anele-
giacpracticethatsets inmotion the familiar dynamicsofthegenrewhile
abortingits traditionalconsolatorypromise.
The many elegiac motifs ofthe poem help ro confirm its generic
affiliation:
1leantuponacoppicegate
WhenFrostwas spectre-gray,
AndWinter'sdregs madedesolate
Theweakeningeye ofday.
Thetangledbine-stemsscoredthesky
Likestringsofbrokenlyres,
Andall mankindthathauntednigh
Hadsoughttheirhouseholdfires.
37
Chapter One
Theland'ssharpfeatures seemedto be
TheCentury'scorpseoudeant,
Hiscryptthecloudycanopy,
Thewindhis death-lament. (l: 187)
Like"Lycidas"andmanyotherelegies, thepoemacknowledgesthecorpse
earlyonandtropesthesunasan"eye"; like "NovemberEclogue" andstill
other elegies, it situates its sorrow in winter. Much as Milton's persona Ji
shatters the leaves that represent poetic power, and much as Spenser's
breakshis pipe, Hardyintrudesintohis poemanimageofelegiacascesis:
he compares the vines against the sky to "strings ofbroken lyres." The
metaphorofscoringanticipatesthemusicalsimile, makes atombstoneof
thesky, andsuggests thattowrite is to eutorinscribe-anassociation of
artwithviolence developed bytheimage oftornandtwistedlyre strings.
Althoughsuchinitialresistance to artis commonintheelegy (frequendy
taking the form ofself-castigation, as inpoems 1-6and21 ofIn Memo-
riam), Hardygoesfurthertowardapunishingidentificationbetweenhim-
selfandthecorpse.Traditionally, theelegiacspeakerhadbrieflyidentified
withthedeadpersonbutthenassertedatriumphantindependence,which
wasprovedpardybythemakingofthepoem.Thefirst twowordsofHar-
dy's elegy, "1 leant," initiallyseem a reassuring trope ofRomantic medi-
tation, the persona setding into a contemplative pose; but the word "1"
sonicallyanticipatestheday's"weakeningeye,"andtheword"leant"meta-
morphoses intothe "Century's corpse oudeant," bothechoes linkingthe
mourningpoetwiththedeathhe mourns. Thisidentificationbecomesso
strongthat,bythemiddleof thepoem,thepoet'sinnerdeathmomentarily
seems the tenor, the world's death the mere vehicle: landscape, century,
seeds-these and "every spirit upon earth I Seemed fervourless as l."
Mourningthe death ofthenineteenth century, the speakeralso instances
thatdeathinthelossofastrongpersona;hiscontinuedvitalitycouldonce
have guaranteed victory over loss, but here he cannot extricate himself
fromthedeathhemourns. Blurringthedistinctionbetweenmournerand
corpse, elegistandelegized, thepoetcannottranscendtheoccasion ofhis
sorrow, sincethatoccasionis partIyhisowndissolution.
Hardyelegizes thedeathofaRomanticandVictorianaestheticand
predicts the troubied emergence ofits successor. The Romantic lyric, he
38
THOMAS HARDY
intimates, is "broken," its restorative persona debilitated. In the word
"darkling" herecalls boththethirdinvocationofParadise Lost (worried as
he is aboutsustaininghis poeticlife intheface ofadead nature, century,
and aesthetic) and the Romantic appropriation ofMilton via Keats and
Arnold-aRomanticism thepoemsuggests has nowitselfbecome"dark-
ling."6Alludingthroughoutthepoemtotheswollen propheeyof"deto
the WestWind" and the sympathetic ecstasy of"Odeto a Nightingale,"
thepoetrepresentshimself neitheraslyretoaninspiring windnoras vessel
toarapturous birdsongbutas the bewildered reader ofadeadlandscape
and the confused auditor ofa crazed thrush. Winter is here, butspring
seems far behind. Spring's prophetis notthe rhapsodicspeakerwho hails
rebirthattheendofmostelegies andmanyRomanticpoemsbutathrush
set apartfrom the speaker, its gaietyinaccessible. While Keats's birdsang
with "full-throated ease," Hardy's sings with difficulty his "full-hearted
evensong": heis
Anagedthrush,frail, gaunt, andsmall,
Inblast-beruffiedplumeo ...
This harbingerofpostmortemtriumphis amuchdiminishedthing. The
"ecstasy" ofKeats's bird seemed self-justifying, butHardycannotread in
thelandscapethereasonforthe"ecstaticsound"ofhisthrush:"linlecause"
for such joyful song "Was written on terrestrial things." Birds had often
sung in elegiesandinRomanticpoemsofloss,foretellingtherebirthofthe
dead. Buttosingjoyfullyintheface of thisdeadlandscapeis tocommitan
absurdistactwithnometaphysicalbasis: thebeleagueredthrush
Hadchosenthus toflinghis soul
Uponthegrowinggloom.
Unlikethiswillfulandirrationaljoyintheface ofdeath, thejoyofearlier
elegiesandmanynineteenth-centurylyricshadbeengroundedinthewell-
founded expectationofrenewal. TowardtheendofIn Memoriam Tenny-
sonhearsandsees Hallam's"diffusivepower"inair,water,sun,andflower.
But the poetofthe new centurycan no longer find supportfor faith in
nature'ssigns;unabletointerpretwithcertaintyeitherthebirdortheland-
scape (theword"seemed" twicequalifies his reading),hefinallyspeculates
thatthere "could" tremblethroughthe birdsong
39
Chapter One
THOMAS HARDY
Sorneblessed Hope,whereofheknew
And1was unaware.
Yet the poet knows neither ifthe song is truly one ofhope, nor ifit is
divinelyinspired.Thenewpoeticis characterizednotbyaspeakerknowl-
edgeable andconfident butby one who is nearlylifeless, skeptical ofhis
surrogate, ofthe future, andofelegiac convention; notbya landscape of
vibrant growth but by a world of"hard and dry" things (exactiy T. E.
Hulme's termsfor the newaesthetic); not bya pathos thatendsin a rea-
sonedecstasybutbyadespairthatmayoccasionanabsurdjoybeforeend-
ingin ironicirresolution.
7
Suchpoetrycan offer littie hope for the reani-
mationof thecorpseortheaestheticitmourns;butinlamentingtheelegy,
itprovesthegenredurable, howeverweakeneditsconsolatoryclaims.
Thoughhewroteandevenpublisheditearlier,Hardyfastenedasuit-
able date to his elegy for the century: 31 December 1900.A monthafter
thecenturydied, thequeenwholenttheeraitsnamealso died,andHardy
wroteherelegyafewdays latero "Y.R. 1819-1901"also invokesbutironi-
cally r w r t ~ ~ number ofelegiac conventions. While elegies had often
consoled by tracing the lost life back to its divine origins and predicting
itsreturotothoseorigins,Hardysoextendsthehorizonsof pastandfuture
that Victorias life dwindles to the scope ofthe momentary. The elegy
opens uponavast timespan, extendingfrom the"backwardTime"when
theAbsolute uttered its plans for "alllife," to the"ripeningyears" ofthe
distantfuture (1:115). Dwarfedbythegrandscheme, the elegized queen
seemsless apowerfulrulerthanapuppet. Hardycommemoratesherwith
theelegiacmetaphorofradiantlight(she"outshone")andpraisesherwith
theconventionaltropeoftheflower (in oldage she "bloomedwithdeeds
welldone").Butthepoem'spanoramicsweepalsoexcuseshimfromhaving
tospecifYanyof hergooddeeds.Nowondertheelegy beginswitha claim
of ignorance: "The mightiest moments pass uncalendared," so one
shouldn'texpectthispoemtospecifYVictoriasfinest acts. Thepoemmay
seem to endwithconventionaloptimism, butlike the"blessed Hope" of
"TheDarklingThrush,"Victoria'sfinal apotheosis is amerepossibility:
Yet maythedeedofhers mostbrightin eyes to be
Lie hidfrom ours-asin theAlI-One's thoughtlayshe-
Tillripeningyears have runo
DeferringtotheAlI-Oneandtofuturegenerations, HardyhintsthatVic-
toria'sdeedsstillseemrelativelyunimpressive.Indeed,hewouldlaterwrite
tO Lytton Strachey thatthequeen "was a most uninterestingwoman"; he
wished the biographer "could have had a more adequate & complicated
woman to handle."8 In the elegy he represents her less as a determining
force than as a manifestation. Much as the self-possessed elegiac speaker
seemedcrippledin "TheDarklingThrush,"so nowthemouroedindivid-
ual seems lost in thecogs andwheels ofhistorical pattero. The insistent
repetition oftwo rhymes in each stanza heightens the deterministic em-
phasis ofthe elegy. Rather than seem to articulate the griefofan entire
people, Hardyhedges andhesitates, withdrawingfrom the confidentdis-
courseof publiceulogy,as exemplifiedbyapoemlikeTennyson's"Odeon
the DeathoftheDukeofWellington."Oncemorehisironicdetachment
subvertsthecompensatorypromiseof elegy, signalingboththeannounced
deathandtheapparentdeath oftheform bywhich itmouros. Neverthe-
less, the form Hardyburies keeps rising from the tomb. His ambivalent
pictureofthequeenhelpspreparethewayfor poetsfrom Yeats toAuden,
Larkin,andHeaney,poetswhowill keep thepublicelegyalivebyinfusing
itwith theirprivateuncertainties.
During this transition between epochs, Hardyelegized the deaths
notonlyofthecenturyandofoneofthecentury'simperialmonarchsbut
also of a representative soldierof the century's imperialist wars, "Drummer
Hodge" (1899). The name ofthe dead man is somewhere between a
proper name, capitalized in the poem, and a generic nickname-a dis-
dainfultermfor acountrylaborer.Theuncannypowerofthisblandelegy
lies in its appropriation andironic conversion oftwo generic motifs: the
restoration ofthe dead to their home and their translation to the stars.
Elegies from "Lycidas" to In Memoram had commemorated people who
had died far from home, but whereas Milton reimagines Lycidas in the
landscapeof hisyouthandTennysonrecountsthedeadHallam'sreturoby
ship, Hardymakes no attempt to heal thegap separatingHodgefrom his
"Wessex home" (1:122). Hebuilds the elegyaround the estrangement of
theEnglishHodgefromthealienlandintowhichthegravediggers"throw"
him. Hodge "never knew .../ The meaning" ofthis landscape. Rather
than tryto make upfor his bewilderment, Hardyrepeats in his ownlan-
guage theveryalienation hedescribes: he forces strange Dutchterms into
40 41
Chapter One
the poem's English, terms whose "meaning" may be unknown to the
reader. Hodge's "landmark is a kopje-crest / That breaks the veldt around."
Described in the potentially unreadable word "kopje-crest," this landmark,
like the poem, does not restore Hodge to his home; instead, Hardy lets
him continue towander among foreign words, the inscrutable verballand-
scape an "unknown plain" in which Hodge is forever interred. Much as his
"homely Northern breast and brain / Grow to sorne Southern tree," so too
the homely English words that describe him grow to mysterious Dutch.
An imperialist war forced Hodge into an alien world, death incorporated
him into a still more alien world, and now the poet lodges him in the
verbal estrangement of a bilingual tomb.
The poem's second major revision of elegy is of the elegiac topos of
ste11ification. From the elegies of antiquity to She11ey's Adonais, the dead
had been ensphered among the stars. Hardy teasingly reca11s these trans-
figurations but denies such an apotheosis to his dead soldier. Poor Hodge
is stuck in a little "mound," the vast conste11ations oblivious to his fate.
Hardy describes the stars at the end of each stanza, where formal closute
might seem to dictate an apotheosis. Indeed, their exact placement in the
elegy turns the poem itself into a constellation: in the penultimate line of
the first and last stanzas, the word "constellations" is in precisely the same
prosodic position, as is the word "stars" in the ultimate line of the middle
and last stanzas. Hodge has nothing to do with the conste11ations, verbal
or real: theyare "foreign," "Strange," and "strange-eyed." This last epithet:
personifies the stars without making them familiar, unlike the comforting ..
"pure eyes" ofMilton's "all-judgingJove."9 Hardyyokes together the butied
Hodge and the westering stars to reveal their irreparable disjunction, just
as he forces together other binary opposites-the landmark and the sur-
rounding pasture, the litrle mound and the huge conste11ations, Wessex
and the uncultivated plain, Northern and Southern, English and Dutch.
After these characteristic dichotomies, the possessive adjective in the last
line-"His stars eternally"-carries more figutative violence than consola-
tory promise: these stars are not his though he has been thrown into their
hemisphere. The rift separating Hodge from the stars of both Africa and .
of elegiac tradition cannot be easily bridged. In "Drummer Hodge," Hardy ..
brings together the strange, defamiliarizing eye of the stars and the proxi-
42
THOMAS HARDY
mate, familiarizing eye of a local habitation. Once again, Hardy the heav-
enbound hawk meets Hardy the earthbound robin. While elegy had always
tempered the pain of immediate loss by aspiring to a universalist vision,
the two modes clash so loudly in this elegy that their discord seems to
sound a death kne11 for the form itself.
However deafening this kne11 may seem, Hardy persists, adding to
his elegies for the dead century, its dead queen, and its dead soldier yet
another lament, or perhaps mock-lament, this time for its personal God.
"God's Funeral" (1912)was not the first poem in which a god had had his
funeral (2:34-37). Elegists like Spenser, Milton, Shelley, and Tennyson
had imported into their work laments for Adonis, Orpheus, and a deity
related to these vegetation gods-Christ. But they had buried such gods
to ensure resurrection, while the death of Hardy's God seems more final-
the death ofbelief in him and in the compensatory genre that he had guar-
anteed. During this period, Yeats, Pound, Eliot, and Stevens all sound the
theme of Giitterdiimmerung, but Hardy stages for God a more elaborate
and explicit 7OdesfUge. His poem fo11ows the usual tripartite structure of
the elegy and of the Greater Romantic Lyric (as M. H. Abrams names it),
with five stanzas of the speaker's observations, eight stanzas of the "over-
heard" co11ective lament, and fout more of the speaker's reflections-the
old meditative formula of out-in-out, or present-past-future, or memory-
understanding-wil1.
10
In elegy this structure generally allows a taking stock
of the recent death, a reco11ection of an idealized past, and the creation of
a future substitute. But Hardy's elegy suggests that it may be impossible to
fi11 this particular void. Thus, it instances a breakdown of the compensa-
tory structure at the heart of the elegiac genre, its irony a tonal epitaph for
the form it both relinquishes and reinvents.
Hardy the detached ironist and Hardy the "overgloomed" keener-
they meet again in this typically anti-elegiac elegy. Watching the procession
of mourners, the poet is both an observer apart from the crowd and a
participant in its grief. "1 saw a slowly-stepping train," he reports, "Lined
on the brows, scoop-eyed and bent and hoar." The procession seems an
alien object in his field ofvision, until verbal contagion links the poet with
the moutners: much as they are "bent" in this first stanza, so too the
speaker soon says "1 bent," and much as they are "scoop-eyed" in their
43
.....
Chapter One
sorrow, so too he describes himselfas having "blurred eyes." Thoughhe
and the mourners are connected, he equivocates over the nature oftheir
relation:
Andbycontagious throbsofthought
Orlatentknowledgethatwithinmelay
Andhadalreadystirredme, 1waswrought
To consciousness ofsorrowevenas they. (2:34)
The speaker internalizes and parodies the theological dispute between
those who thinkaccess to thedivine is socially mediated and those who
thinkitamatterofinnatefaith. Inhis uncertaintiesoverwhetherhisgrief
is outwardly or inwardly derived and whether he is a mourner or a de-
tachedobserver, thespeakerdisplays symptomsofthedisease causingthe
death he mourns. The metamorphoses ofGod-firstlike aman, then a
cloud, thenabird-alsohelp explainwhythespeakerandtheprocession
grieve: their increasingly historical and comparative consciousness has
giventhedeitya"phantasmalvariousness" thathaserodedtheirbeliefina
singleandunchangingGod.
Turning inward and backward, the middle section ofthe poem re-
views God's metamorphoses, once again illustrating the historicizing
thoughtthat "Mangledthemonarch." Inacomicallycompressedversion
ofbiblicalnarrative, Godhimselfis convertedfrom apunishingtyrantto
a merciful friendo Heloses continuityin his rapid mutations, seemingat
lastamere blur. LamentingthedeathoftheirGod, themourners utteran
elegywithintheelegy, buttheygrieveless overGod'sdeaththanovertheir
ownloss:
'o man-projectedFigure, oflate
Imagedas we, thykne11 whoshallsurvive?
Whencecarne itwe were temptedtocreate
Onewhomwe can nolongerkeepalive?' (2:35)
Thestanza shifts from the initial statement ofGod's dependence on his
creators ro theirdependence onhim ("thykne11 who sha11 survive?") and
thenbacktohisdependenceonthem.Invertingthebiblica1toposof man's
creation in God's image, the mourners nevertheless need God almost as
muchas heneedsthem.Themenandtheir"myth"liveoneanother'slives, ,
44
THOMAS HARDY
die one another's deaths. Most concerned about their own survival, the
mournersconfess thatbecauseoftheir"needofsolace,"
we grewself-deceived,
Ourmakingsoonourmakerdidwe deem,
Andwhatwehadimaginedwe believed. (2:35)
Nor are the mourners now free ofself-deception, since they prove that
theirmakingisindeedtheirmaker:theyareutterlylostwithouthim.Belief
hasossifiedandthendisplacedimagination,leavingthemournersnotonly
without God butwithout the solefaculty that might have enabled them
to "fi11 his place" (2:36). God is dead and so is the power to project a
substitute-thepowerthathadbeenthebasisof elegiacconsolation. Nos-
talgica11yrecallingthe"blestassurance" theyfelt before"Uncompromising
rude reality" displaced it, themourners lavish pityon themselves as they
"creep andgrope" withoutany"fixed star" tosustain theirjourney. Sorne
burstoutwithastockelegiac response-thatthecorpseis buta"counter-
feit" ofwhat lasts, a "requiem mockety! Sti11 he lives ro us!" But unlike
She11ey's exclamation about Adonais- "He lives"-thispious hope re-
ceives littlesupportfrom thelastsegmentofthepoem.
"1 couldnotbuoytheirfaith," thespeakersays,aligninghimselfwith
themournerswhohavefaith onlyintheloss theymourn. Heclaimsthat,
withthebelievers andthebereft,"withall 1sympathized,"yetthescopeof
thespeaker's sympathyis limited byhis ultimatedisbelief: thoughhesays
that"whatwas mournedfor, 1, too,longhadprized,"heprizesitnolonger.
The speaker thinks that the "insistent question" is "how to bear such
loss"-aninte11ectualversionofwhatthemournershave beendoingphys-
ica1ly (they"bore" theshape). Suddenlyhesees in thedistance a"paleyet
positivegleam lowdown behind" (2:37). This"sma11light" is akin tothe
newsun atthe end of"Lycidas," thesomewhatdarker sun at the endof
the"IntimationsOde,"andthe"risingsun" inwhichHa11amstandsatthe
endofIn Memoriam; theearlierelegistshadresolvedgriefthroughimages
of continuingenergy. Buthere thelightis diminishedin itspowerandits
promise, much more so thaneven in Wordsworth's ode. Hardyleaves its
significancevague: we cannotknowwhetherit is a newgod (humanity?),
a new savior (the nation-state?), a new faith (the positivist creed?), or
simply a new illusion, forced on the speaker by his urgent need for
45
lMi....
Chapter One
compensation. At this point a third group-"a certain few who srood
aloof"-tryunsuccessfully ro call attention to the light: "'See you upon
thehorizonmatsmalllight- /Swellingsomewhat?'"Themodifierssmall i
andsomewhat, like the earlier termspale and low down behind, lessen the ,
promise ofthe pathetic light. The speaker cannot believe this gleam an
adequatesubstitutefor thelostGod,so hejoinsnotthe"certainfew" but
the melancholic mourners: "dazed and puzzled 'twixt the gleam and
gloom/MechanicallyIfollowedwiththerest."Heislockedinaperpetual
andpoindesslamento Paradigmaticofthe new mournerofthe twentieth
century, thespeaker recognizes thatsorne minorcompensation might be
availablebutrejects it. Hemovesforwardbutis frozen still,continuesina
processionbutis stalledinhisgrief.
AlthoughHardyrejectedthenotionthatthepoemwashopelessand
atheistic,itsendinglacksebullience;indeed, itsdescriptionoftheconsola-
torylightissotentativeandvagueas tojustifYthespeaker'sbleakresponse.
To see thespeakeras benightedfor notrallying behindthecertainfew, as"
sorne critics have, is to impose on the poem a compensatorynarrative it
cannotsustain, for this dim litde gleam lacks the radiant splendor ofits
precursors inelegiac tradition.loy in response to itwouldbe like theab-
surdjoyofHardy's darklingthrush. At the endofboth "God's Funeral"
and "The DarklingThrush," the speakers stand at an unbridgeable dis-
tancefrom theprophetsof"Hope." Similarly, theelegies for Victoriaand
Drummer Hodge, though mourning individuals from the opposite ends
ofthesocial spectrum, have in commonan ironicdistancefrom thesub- 1
jects oftheir lament-adistance that suspends the elegiac tradition ofi
sympatheticidentification.Theelegy foc the queen squeezes herbetween
the bookends ofher origins and her destiny; the elegy for the soldier
crusheshimbeneath theweightofunrecognizablestars. Theseelegiessac-
rifice the individualityoftheirsubjects tovast horizons beyondtheir un-
derstanding. Theelegy had always maintained a balance between imper-
sonality-viewingtheparticulardeathandsorrowas instancesofuniversal
eycles-andpersonal grief-viewingthe particular death and sorrow as
unrepeatable instances ofthemselves alone; but Hardy tips this balance
towardtheimpersonal, mourningthewithdrawalofthedeceasedandthe
elegiac mourner into determining pattern. Even though all four poems
mourn the death ofsuch norms ofelegy as individuation, substitution, "
46
THOMAS HARDY
,an
d
redemptiveidentification,theyprovethecontinuedvigorofthegenre,
since theirsubversion ofits consolatoryconventionshelps fashion for the
new era anew kind ofelegy-moreironic, more despondent, and more
self-critical.
POEMS OF 1912-13AND OTHER ELEGIES FOR EMMA
Inan earlypoementitled"HerImmortality,"Hardyconsiderstheburden
ofthe personal elegist in asecular time. Long before writing "God's Fu-
neral" andbeforeelegizingacenturyof"blessedHope" in"TheDarkling
Thrush,"Hardysuggests thathecannolongercountonGodtohelpbe-
stOWimmortalityonthedead.Adeadwoman,forgottenbyhusband,chil-
dren, and friends, pleads with the poet, her former lover, asking thathe
preserveher:
'A Shadebutinits mindfulones
Has immortality;
'In you resides my single power
Ofsweet continuance here....' (1:73)
Unlike many ofher predecessors in the personal elegy, she can outlast
deathnotinadivineafterlife butonlyinahumanone. Ifthepoetdies or
forgetshisbeloved,hemurdersher; thisdangermaypartlyexplainHardy's
anxiousproliferationofmorethanahundredelegiesforhis estrangedwife
(thoughEmmawouldhave disputedherhusband's irreligious ideaofim-
mortality). Hardytakes a more humorous approach ro the memorial re-
sponsibilitiesofthemodernpoetin''Ah, AreYou DiggingonMyGrave?"
Once more adead woman has been forgotten by all, includingher dogo
Husband, kin, enemy, anddogabandonedthewomanafterherdeath; in
COntrast, Hardyfears heabandonedhis ownwife beforeherdeath,andso
he mourns herprofusely. Inthe mock-elegy, the woman's kin reflect that
there is no utility to mourning: "Whatuse!" they ask, "Whatgoodwill
planting flowers produce?" (2:39). While Hardy implicitly distinguishes
himself fromnegligenturilitarians,weshallseethathealsoberateshimself
fo
r
making poetic use ofhis own wife's death, for profiting aesthetically
fro
m
herloss. Samuel Hynes grants sorne truth to the disturbingsugges-
tion"thatHardyneededadeath inthefamilyforpoeticreasons," anotion
47
11oo...
ChapterOne
we can trace through Hardy's own troubled utterances.
11
Much like his
paternal grandmother, Hardy seems more in danger of forsaking the living
than the dead:
She would dwell on such dead themes, not as one who re-
members,
But rather as one who sees.
Past things retold were to her as things existent,
Things present but as a tale. ("One We Knew," 1:332)
According to Blackmur, Hardy is imaginatively free "most purely when
responding directly and personally to death or the dead," and Perkins sur-
mises from Hardy's poetry "that the only possibility of meaningful social !
intercourse is with the dead."12 These observations take on a darker mean-
ing when applied to Hardy's marriage, a failed union that blossomed into
success only after Emma's death, when it could become the principal muse
of Hardy's elegiac poetry.
Hardy's Poems 011912-13 have been acclaimed not only as sorne ofl
the most "impressive elegies" but also as "sorne of the finest love poetry in
our language" and as one of "the best three series of love poems in Eng-
lish."13 The generic indeterminacy of the sequence suggests the close inter-
relation of love and grief in Hardy's work, as in the "love elegies" of Pat-;
more and Yeats. Hardy becomes most productive of "love poems" once he!
can write them as "elegies," once death has left a "yawning blankness" fot1
his love to fill. Poetic desire in Hardy is aboye all the unrequited desire of
I
melancholia. Though critics have tended to shrink from the disquieting
guilt, aggression, and narcissism in Hardy's love elegies, these poems in..:'
stance the work of melancholia, fraught as they are with recriminationsl
and self-recriminations, their affection intertwined with hostility.14 Angry
at his dead wife and angry with himself for having this anger, Hardy triesj
to flee from the tumult of their recent relationship by regressing to its earli-
est stages. From the poems, Emma seems during the courtship to have ..
been the object of unambiguous love when she was little more than Hardy'sl
narcissistic fantasies about her, and so Hardy tries to sew up the ragged\
sleeve of marriage with the thread ofhis earliest feelings toward her. Many)
critics have schematized the temporal structure of the sequence-ulti-
48
THOMAS HARDY
mately the familiar present-past-present/future pattern of elegy-but they
have stopped short of explaining the psychological work accomplished by
this structure, namely its supplanting of the guilt-ridden present with an
idealized past.
15
This is partly because they want to maintain that the "ulti-
mate quality" of the poems, in the words of Irving Howe, is an "utterly
defenseless sincerity." But the much-praised "honesty" of the poems, in-
cluding their expiatory self-accusations, needs to be seen as part of a psy-
chological dynamic that also includes self-deception, despite the claims of
Howe and others that Hardy is "never deluding himself."16 The poems
oscillate wildly between ironic self-questioning and desperate self-
comforting; indeed, this turbulence may be the key to their aesthetic
power. Like his more playful elegies for the Victorian era, Hardy's deeply
mournful elegies for his wife complicate the standard picture of him as a
poet of recuperative "memory:' since "memory" is often in these poems a
selective and idealizing mechanism of defense.
17
Exploring why Hardy
effaces the recent relationship and regresses to its earliest stages, I also at-
tempt to determine the relation between Hardy's accusations of the dead
woman and his self-accusations, the reasons for his infantilization of her,
for his representation of her as both free and imprisoned, and for his sub-
sequent representation of his own elegiac art as both destroyer and pre-
server. In his elegies of intense inner turmoil, Hardy may well be the first
English poet to display fully the psychological burdens, anxieties, and con-
tradictions that attend secular mourning and the act of writing about it.
'f
The Virgilian epigraph, lIeteris vestigia flammae, alerts us immediately ro
the sequence's backward movement in time, away from the ash heap of the
marriage and back to the passionate flame that had preceded it. The se-
quence will try to rekindle this pure love until it seems to burn away the
ash. Since Dido's latent passion was not for Aeneas but for her dead hus-
band, the epigraph also hints at differences between Hardy's earlier love
and the love he now fans to life, as if the real and the recollected Emma
were distinct people. The first poem, "The Going:' deserves careful atten-
tio
n
since it anticipates the sequence's continuous vacillations between the
bitter present and the idyllic past and between blame and guilt. The poem
49
.....,
Chapter One
THOMAS HARDY
opens with a question akin to the elegiac questions that had often parceled
out blame-Milton asking, for example:
Where were ye, nymphs, when the remorseless deep
Closed o'er the head of your loved Lycidas?lB
Like Milton and other male elegists, Hardy places responsibility on a
female figure, yet he blames neither nymphs nor Nature nor Muses nor
Furies but the dead woman herself:
Why did you give no hint that night
That quickly after the morrow's dawn,
And calmly, as if indifferent quite,
You would close your term here, up and be gone
Where I could not follow
With wing of swallow
To gain one glimpse of you ever anon! (2:47--48)
The pathos of the question should not blind us to its anger. Why didn't
you forewarn me, the poet asks, so wounded by this abrupt departure that
he accuses his wife of a calmness that is nearly indifference. In spite of his "
often deterministic views, Hardy represents his wife not as a passive victim
of circumstance but as an active agent: she has closed her term, up and
left. It is the survivor who is the victim of circumstance. Incorporating the
colloquial "up and be gone," the question has a disturbing resemblance to
household utterance, as if a husband were responding with annoyance to
his wife's sudden and unexplained departures. But Hardy also tempers this
candid tone through the generic placement of his grief, alluding to the
ceremonious tradition of elegy in the lines "Where I could not follow /
With wing of swallow" (Tennyson had called his elegies "Short swallow-
flights of song," and Swinburne had complained that his "wings ofwords"
could not follow Baudelaire).19 The inability to fly to his wife paradoxically
generates Hardy's swallow-flights-flights that join him instead to his ele-
giac forebears. Indeed, by the end of the sequence, Hardy will have dis-
placed his wife with the masculine company of fellow elegists.
In the next stanza Hardy continues to blame his wife, but the blame
loses its edge and then modulates almost imperceptibly into self-blarne.
Hardy bestows sorne tenderness on his wife in terms like "Iip" and "soft-
50
est," even as he faults her for her speechlessness-she did not "utrer a wish
for a word." Unlike his wife's potential softness, the sunlight seems to
"harden" on the wall. This image, inverting the elegiac motif of the sympa-
thetic and rejuvenative sun, is suggestive not only of a remorseless fate but
also of a wife "indifferent" in dying, a wife literally hardening into rigor
mortis. But the line "Unmoved, unknowing" transfers the blame from an
indifferent fate and an indifferent wife to the poet hirnself, who now offers
his profusion of feelings as compensation for his earlier dispassion, his
questioning as compensation for his earlier ignorance. In the next stanza
the poet quickly shifts the balance again from self-blame to blame: "Why
do you make me leave the house / And think for a breath it is you I see,"
till the blankness "sickens me!" Never in the canonical tradition of elegy
had a poet vented such anger at the dead person for betraying him. Ac-
cording ro the speaker, she leads him on, abandons him, and even in this
way sickens him.
Suddenly the elegy leaps from recrimination to intense nostalgia for
the earliest stages ofthe relationship. In Melanie Klein's view, such "pining"
and idealization shield mourners from their own anger and paranoia, in-
cluding fears that they may have destroyed the lost object. The psychoana-
Iyst Vamik Volkan further explains the relation between ambivalence and
the desire for reunion: "This process of searching for the deceased is un-
consciously intensified, and it is habitual and specific enough to be called
a mechanism of defense-defense mainly against the tension of ambiva-
lence and the eruption of derivatives of those aggressive and libidinal drives
originally directed toward the deceased."20 Having groped for his dead wife
across the "yawning blankness," he finds her now, but only as she was more
than forty years earlier during their courtship. Unlike the "indifferent" and
unpredictable wife, the younger beloved fastened her gaze on him. Though
she seems to move free1y, he is the nucleus of her orbit: the poet recalls
that she, "reining nigh me, / Would muse and eye me." Displacing the
"dankness," he animates the past with bodily color and vigor: she lived by
the "red-veined rocks" of the west, riding "swan-necked" along the coast.
Throughout the sequence such regression to their premaritallove enables
Hardy to defend himself against the anger he feels toward both his wife
and himself
Even so, that anger soon erupts again:
51
L
ChapterOne
Why, then,latterlydidwe notspeak,
Oidwe notthinkofthosedayslongdead,
Andereyourvanishingstrive toseek
Thattime's renewal?
Oncemorerepresentingtheirmarriageintermsofspeechlessness, Hardy's
questionskirts andsuppresses thedangerous recognitionthattheirearlier
muteness is the basis ofhis currentvolubility; itis precisely because they
failed to mournandrenewtheirpastthatthepoetdoesso throughoutthe
sequence. "Wemighthave said," thepoetprotests, "'We'llvisittogetherl !
Thoseplaces,'" buttheabsenceofsuchdialoguenowempowershis poetic
monologue as he sets outona quest for their earlier love. The poet can
defendhimselfagainsthis more recentambivalence onlyby restoringthe ,
untaintedromanticlove ofhis youth. Theseare thestarkalternatives that
Hardy presents himself: either he regresses into the enwombing ideal of
their romantic past, or he suffers scorching guilt for having disliked his,
wife-awifewhoterriblyobligedhis dislike bydying. Indeed, havingre-
linquished the narcissistic ideal, the poetpunishes himself with anaston- '
ishingimageofhis owndeath:
Iseembutadeadmanheldonend
To sinkdownsoon....O youcouldnotknow
Thatsuchswiftfleeing
Nosoul foreseeing-
NotevenI-wouldundome so!
Analyzingtheself-reproachesof"melancholic"and"pathological"mourn-
ing,Freudarguesthattheylayblameonthemournerbecausethemourner
has unconsciously willed the death.
21
Such guilt, moreover, can develop
intoafantasy ofself-punishment.Whathadbegunas anelegyfor Hardy's
wife ends as an elegy for Hardy. Butthe aggression that the poet directs .'
inwardsoon turns backoutward,his masochism flippingoveronce more\
into sadism; indeed, the two modes ofaggression modulate into one an-Il
other throughout the sequence. Having glanced at himself as a "dead
man," Hardytries toforgive his wife for destroyinghim; afterall, neither
shenoranyoneelsecouldknowtheeffectofherdeath.Butbythelastline, .'
the supposed absolution hints at accusation: he almost asks, how could
you "undo me so!" She has undonehim, perhaps, butshe has also made
52
THOMAS HARDY
him: her death has set in motion the reconstructive work ofhis elegies.
Throughmuchof thesequence,Hardywillworryabouthismakingpoetic
gain ofpersonal loss-ananxiety that combines with his guilt over the
failure oftheir marriage, oVer his anger toward hiswife, andover his un-
consciousdesireforherdeath.
In''YourLastOrive," Hardyreturns to indirect ruminationsonthe
economic problem ofpoetic mourning-theproductionofpoems from
herloss. Reflectingthathewouldnothavebeenabletoreadhiswife's face
had he been with her toward her end, he nevertheless suggests that his
inabilityro read herface becomes inturntheconditionofhis writing on
her face now, when he retrospectively inscribes itwith his reverie ofher
unutteredwords. Hecouldnot
have read thewritinguponyourface,
'1 gohencesoontomyresting-place;
'Youmaymiss me then. ButIshall notknow
Howmanytimesyouvisit me there,
Orwhatyourthoughtsare, orifyougo
Thereneveratall. AndIshallnotcareo
ShouldyoucensuremeIshall take noheed
Andevenyourpraises nomoreshall need.' (2:48-49)
His former blindness permits his new insight-hisilliteracy, his literacy.
Hardy demolishes the fiction that mourningmightbenefit anyone other
than the mourner; the dead wife is benefitednotatall by his endless la-
ments. But to see mourning as utterly self-centered would be roo much
for him. Thetropeofapostrophetempersthebleakrecognitionthatheis
addressingnoonebuthimself:
True: neveryou'll know. Andyouwill notmind.
Butshall Ithenslightyoubecauseofsuch?
Oearghost, inthepastdidyoueverfind
Thethought'Whatprofit,' movememuch?
Yet abides thefact, indeed, thesame,-
You are pastlove, praise, indifference, blame.
Aftertheharshacknowledgment("neveryou'll know"),hebacktracks, his
questionintimatingthatnottowriteandmournwouldbe to "slight" her,
53
Chapter One THOMAS HARDY
even though he has just admitted she is beyond his praise. Then he re-
pressesthedangerousknowledgethatheis reapingpoetic"profit"fromher .
loss: shehas always known thathisworkwas useless. Havingdenied that
heis makinggainofherdeath,hecanmoveoncemorefrom mystification
to knowledge: he admits she is beyond his multifarious poetic responses
toher.
In both "The Going" and"Your Last Drive," Hardyguiltilyrecalls
thevexationsof hismarriage,implyinginthesecondthatheusedto"cen-
sure" hiswife andthatsheis nowbeyondthe"blame"he onceheapedon
her. Inseveral oftheensuingpoems, he tries toovercomehis hostileand
guiltyfeelings towardEmmabysubstitutingforhertheimageofaninno-
centchild. Heinfantilizes her to evade his anger, an affect thathe seems
unconsciouslytoholdresponsiblefor herdeath.Attheendof"Rainona
Grave," he imagines her literally pushing up daisies; she becomes "the
sweetheart" oftheflowers thatshe
Loved beyondmeasure
Withachild'spleasure
All herlife's round. (2:51)
This temporal regression prepares for the first poem in the sequence to
focus exclusively on Cornwall and their courtship, '''1 Found Her Out
There.'" Thepoetconfessesthatheis responsibleforhaving"broughther"
far from hernative landscape, even buryingherinthealien land. Buthe
ends the poemwitha fiction ofher return to origins, a fiction thatmay
assuagehis guiltbutthatagain dependsonherreversion to childhood:
Yet hershade, maybe,
Will creep underground
Till iteatchthesound
Ofthatwesternsea
As itswells andsobs
Whereshe oncedomiciled,
Andjoyinitsthrobs
Withtheheartofachild. (2:52)
Thepoetconsoleshimselfbyimaginativelyreturninghiswife to asympa-
theticandmaternallandscapewhereshebecomesthejoyouschildhenever
,,-
knew. Hedisplaces theearlierimages ofan"indifferent"wifeanda"ruth-
less" nature. Unconstrainedinitsidealism, hisrepresentationofherchild-
hoodselfisanimageofpreoedipalharmonybetweeninfantandmirrorlike
maternalbody, akintotheearlierdepictionofthewesternlandseapeas an
encompassing, "red-veined" body.
Against thesoothingfantasy of'''1 FoundHer OutThere,'" Hardy
sets the unexpecteddepartures and abruptseparations ofthenext poem,
"Without Ceremony." He again compares his wife's ultimate disappear-
ance with her earlier departures, the comparison helping to soften the
final blow:
Andwhenyou'damindto career
Offanywhere-saytotown-
Youwereall onasuddengone
BeforeIhadthoughtthereon,
Ornoticedyourtrunksweredown. (2:53)
Uncontrollable, Emma annoys Hardy with her independence ofmind.
Earlier, hehadcontainedthefreedom ofhermovementswithinanideal-
izedvision: sherode horses inthewest amidcliffs, stormyseas, andgales.
Nowhe complainsofbeingvulnerable; his mockingwife even repudiates
his poetic attempts at mastering her absence: "Good-bye is not worth
while!" But"Lament" compensates for this threateningindependence by
infantilizing her once more: were she alive today, Emma "would have
sought/Withachild'seagerglance" newflowers. Viewedagainstherpres-
entconstrictioninthegrave, herfreedom nowbecomespreferable: Hardy
imagines her "freely" bestowing "ardours" and "delight" on her guests
(2:53-55).Eachstanzasplitsintotwoparts,ellipsesmarkingtheunbridge-
able gap between herexpansive social selfandher contracted body. Line
lengthcorrespondswiththesestates, diminishingwhenthepoetthinksof
hershut
Inthejailingshell
Ofhertinycell.
Thepoetaverts disaster bynotrecognizing inherpresententrapment-
"Wholly possessed / By an infinite rest"-themirror image ofhis own
desirefor controloverher. Insteadofdirectinghisangerathersocialfree-
~ \ O T l : 54 55
/ <?J <:-
'ti "9
..
, ,
\ "" _ 8"L"WNC" ii
Chapter One
dom and gaiety, he displaces itonto the objectsofher delight-"these stale '
things" that"usedso to joyher, /Andneverto doyher/As us theydoy!"
Hardyiscaughtbetweenhisdesiretocontainhiswifeaestheticallyandthe
elegiacimpulsetorenderherlivingimage,betweenwantingtoremakeher
as achildhe canmanipulateandwantingto acknowledgeheras shewas.
Thenextpoem,"TheHaunter,"accommodatesthesecompetingde- ';
sires in what we might call a compromise-formation. The poet granes .;
Emmaindependenceingivingheravoiceofherown, buthealsoseverely
restrictsthatindependencebymakinghervoiceoneofsubmission.Earlier, .
hererraticandunpredictablemovementshadthreatenedthepoet,whereas
now her "wandering" depends on his imaginative errancy. Dutiful and
obedient, she says, "whitherhis fancy sets himwandering/ 1, too, alerdy
go" (2:55-56). Twice she is said to be "faithfu!." Apparendy death has
changedherintotheidealmiddle-dasshousewife. Shehasalso becomean
idealaudience, "lackingthepower"tospeaktohimor"answer" hiswords,
but"Onlylistenthereto!" Hardychangesanounintoaverb toemphasize
her new role, "yes, I companionhim," andthis verb momentarilyseems
to function as adefiningappositive. Thoughcritics have beencontentto
laudHardy's "honesty" and"defenseless sincerity," his final pictureofher
subordinationis awish-fulfillingfantasy:
WhatagoodhaunterIam, O tellhim!
Quicklymakehimknow
Ifhebutsighsincemyloss befellhim
StraighttohissideIgo.
Tellhimafaithfuloneis doing
All thatlovecando
Still thathis pathmaybeworthpursuing,
Andtobringpeacethereto.
Because Hardy earlier acknowledges that Emma is irrevocably lost, he
wouldhavetoagreethatthisimaginativevisionofherreturnassubservient
wifeis nomorethanadreamyattempttocheerhimself up.Tolether"join
inhisjourneys,"as hedoesnow, helps tocompensateforhisrefusalinlife '
to "say" thewords he wishes he hadsaid. Inadvertendy, the poemshows
upthesimilaritybetweenthepassiveidealof thefeminineandtheultimate
THOMAS HARDY
passivityofdeath. Onlydeaddoesshecoincidecompletelywithchepatri-
archalidealofwomanhood.
"TheVoice" continues to elaborate this stunninglyopen fantasy of
wish-fulfillment. Responding to "her" appeals-appealshe has justven-
triloquizedchroughherdeadvoice-thepoetsays,
Womanmuchmissed, howyoucall tome,call tome,
Sayingthatnowyouarenotas youwere
Whenyouhadchangedfrom theonewhowas all tome,
Butas atfirst, whenourdaywas fair. (2:56)
How has this remarkable transformation taken place? Why has she
"changed" from the woman whose indifference and sudden movements
che poethas beenrememberingwithconsiderablepain? Indeathshe can
bechanged,troped, turnedjindeathherobjectionableself can beeffaced;
in death she can be remade as thepoet preferred her, as she was in the
earlieststagesofcourtship,whenshecouldbelittlemorechanhisimagina-
tive projections. But with unforgiving self-analysis Hardypattlyexposes
chefantasy. Tryingtosee heras sheoncewas, whenshewouldobediently
"waitfor me,"hedresses herinan"air-bluegown," adescriptionthatan-
ticipates whatwill happen in the nextstanza, in which the blue "gown"
dissolves into thin "air." His doubts send himintoa vertiginous fal!. Yet
che next major segment ofthe sequence, from "A Dream or No" to
"Places," attemptstostrengthentheelusiveimageof Emmaas shewas "at
first, when our day was fair." This attempt falters at first, the poet cor-
roding his recollections with doubts as to whether "a place like Saint-
]uliot" could even "exist" (''A Dream or No," 2:59). But as he grounds
his "dream" more andmore firmly in a specific landscape, his eroticized
recollectionsdisplace theuglyrealityoftherecentpasto Wehaveseen the
poetexpress intermittendytheneedto reconstitute thepriorvisionofan
idyUic past,partlyasa wayofescaping fromthe guilt and angerofthe more
recentrelationship, butnowherecapturesthenarcissisticidentificationhe
haddevelopedinthewest.
In 'Mera]ourney," Hardy continues to fuse the two competing
representationshehas developedofEmma: sheis free, butherfreedomis
comainedby its placementwithin aglowing reverie. As in "TheGoing"
56
57
THOMAS HARDY
Chapter One
and "Without Ceremony," her movements are abrupt and unpredictable,
but they are no longer threatening. Hardy had complained of Emmas pro-
pensity "to career / Off anywhere," ro be "all on a sudden gone," a habit
that culminates in the indifference she shows in her "great going." Here he
transmutes this jarring tendency into a pleasant spectacle:
Herero I come ro view a voiceless ghost;
Whither, O whither will its whim now draw me?
Up the cliff, down, till I'm lonely, lost,
And the unseen waters' ejaculations awe me.
Where you will next be there's no knowing,
Facing round about me everywhere,
With your nut-coloured hair,
And gray eyes, and rose-flush coming and going. (2:59--60)
Instead of creating a hurtful absence, her movements now seem to make
her omnipresent, charmingly dispersed around him. As a ghostlike mem-
ory, she can no longer wound him by her departures. Aggressively, me poeti
hunts her down:
Yes: I have re-entered your olden haunts at last;
Through the years, through the dead scenes I have
tracked you;
What have you now found to say of our past-
Scanned across the dark space wherein I have lacked you?
Hardy represents his poetic mourning as a kind ofhunt, a following ofhi
prey through close attention to the traces she has leh behind. Indeed, b
fixing her in the landscape and form she once inhabited, Hardy traps he
in an image that he can control. The "dark space" is a curious metaphor/
ambiguously alluding to both the span of time since her death and th
span of time since the death of their love. In either case, Hardy begets h'
poetry in the dark space of his lack. This poem and others in the sequeno
multiply the image: Hardy remembers a "cave" with a "hollow" voice, con
templates the "chasmal beauty" of a cliff and the "chasmal beauty" of I
shore, and ruminates over "the hollow of years ago" (2:60, 62, 63, 64)
Despite his outlandish rejections of the pathetic fallacy in "A Death-Da
Recalled," he returns in "Beeny Cliff" to a representation that sets woma
and world in complete harmony, verbally imitated in alliterations, ana-
pests, and participles:
O the opal and the sapphire of that wandering western sea,
And the woman riding high aboye with bright hair flapping
free-
The woman whom lloved so, and who loyally loved
me. (2:62)
Once more Hardy brings together two earlier depictions of Emma that
had seemed irreconcilable: in recent times she had been annoyingly free in
her "swih style" of action, whereas aher her death she seemed to become
"faithful" in the poet's imagination. Restored to her earlier self, she loves
the poet "loyally," while her hair flaps "free" and the sea is "wandering."
Hardy again uses the word "free" for Emma in "Places": she would
ride her horse "free of fear" (2:65). But twice in the next poem he confesses
me parameters of her freedom: she is "everywhere / In his brain," and "she
still rides gaily / In his rapt thought" ("The Phantom Horsewoman,"
2:66). The poet's mind constitutes the outer boundaries of her freedom.
In both poems Hardy admits with astonishing directness that he has dis-
placed the flatness and dullness of the present with a representation that
gives him more pleasure:
Nay: one there is to whom these things,
That nobody else's mind calls back,
Have a savour that scenes in being lack,
And a presence more than the actual brings;
To whom ro-day is beneaped and stale,
And its urgent clack
But a vapid tale. (2:65)
In this poem and "The Phantom Horsewoman," he comes closer than ever
before in the sequence to admitting that his reanimation of Emmas past is
a narcissistic fantasy. Although "he sees as an instant thing / More clear
than to-day, / A sweet soft scene," the power of the memory cannot prevent
it from being largely the product of fancy, ''A phantom of his own figur-
ing" (2:65--66).
"The Spell of the Rose" is the most allegorical poem in the sequence,
59
58
ChapterOne
andits formal dstanceallowsHardytodepicthismarriageinthebleakest
terms: "misconcetsraisedhorridshows,/Andagonescarnethereof,"says
the female speaker, andher male interlocutorsimilarly tells of"divisions
direandwry, /Andlong-drawndaysofblight"(2:67).Havingreanimated
thedistantpasttoevadesuchpainfulfeelings,thepoetnowseemsstronger,
able again to berate himselfopenlyfor nothaving tried earlier to restore
theirlove. Hisblame-talcingis inseparable fromhisgUlt overwritingthis
sequence ofelegies: "Hesees me as I was," says the wife, "thoughsees /
Toolatetotell meso!" (2:68). Becausehehas reanimatedhis love for her
in writing the poems, his remorse intensifies-remorse over having de-
layed until his love has become experientially useless, though poetcally
profitable.TheuselessnessofhispoeticresurrectionspainsHardyagainin
"St.Launce'sRevisted,"wheretoreanimatethedeadis to"wastethought"
(2:69). In this poemandthe final elegy, "Wherethe PicnicWas," Hardy
withdrawsfromhisexclusivefocusonEmma,groupngherwithagroom,
atavern-holder,apoet,andotherswhohave"vanished,"thuscontextualiz-
ingherlossto makeitmorebearable.
Though thelast few poems sharpen the sequence's self-upbraiding,
theyalso help lighten the burden ofthe loss andits attendantguilt. The
last poem, for example, seems to end in a mood oftotal despondency:
Emma,accordingtoHardy,"hasshuthereyes / Forevermore" (2:70). But
hehas not; hecan "scan andtrace" thespotwherehs deadwife andrwo
writersoncejoinedhimonapicnic. Even thoughtheskeinofherlifehas
snapped,hiss unbroken.Againstherself-division,hesetshsself-identity:
Ves, Iamhere
Justas lastyear,
Andtheseabreathesbrine
Fromitsstrangestraightline
Uphither, thesame
As whenwefourcarne. (2:69)
Though the pathetic fallacy seemed to suffer irreparable damage in the
courseofthesequence,itreturnsheretoreassurethepoetofhisuniformity
in time: the seas breath is thesame, like his poetic breath. Thereturn to
an unchanged place allows the poet to measure notonly breaks in time,
theothermembersofthebandhavingdeparted, butalso continuities:
60
THOMAS HARDY
Ves, Iamhere
Justas lastyear....
Similarly,theimageof the"burntcircle"with"stick-ends,charred" returns
us to the beginning ofthe sequence, the echo ofthe Virgilian epigraph
betokeninga continuityacross the timeofthesequence. Negation seems
tocastits pallovertheending: "rwo" havevanishedintothe"urbanroar,"
and"one" has died. Butthe identityofthe "rwo" andtheoccasionofthe
picnicleadtoadifferentconclusion: "OnJune 1atMaxGate,"according
to Hardy's Lije, Hardy and Emma "had a pleasant week-end visit from
HenryNewboltandW. B.Yeats, whohadbeendeputedbytheRoyalSoci-
ety ofLiterature to present Hardy with the Society's gold medal on his
seventy-second birthday."22Thesequence thatseemstoendindespairre-
allyends in acomfortingallusion to Hardy's poeticpowers-powersthat
theseelegies havedemonstratedoncemore. Thepoetcrownedwithlaurel
ayearago nowcrownshimselfthroughtherecollectionofthatevento The
sequenceends, thus,withacoda that resembles the classic, allusive codas
ofelegiac tradition, inwhicha poetlike MiltonorYeats glances over the
poetcandpsychologicalworkhehasjustcarriedout,congratulatinghim-
selfon his masterful accomplishment, and placing himselfin an elegiac
lneage. To shed the loss ofhs wife, Hardy joins himselfto the poetc
brotherhoodofdead precursorsandlivingcontemporaries-amaleband
thatfrees himfromwoundingdependencyandassureshimofhiscontinu-
ing poeticprowess. In this, the genderstructureofthe sequence is com-
parable with that ofmany androcentric elegies-poems that summon
woman, occlude her, and move toward an identification with mirroring
imagesofmasculinepower.
23
't
When Hardyfinished the rwenty-one Poems of1912-13,hehadwritten
onlyaboutafifthofhiselegiesforEmma.Hislaterelegiesareuneven, but
a number ofthem compel our interest because they develop the self-
analysis ofthe earlier elegies. They sometimes allegorize themselves in
termsofavisual representationofEmma. "TheFigure intheScene" and
"'WhyOidISketch'" areaboutHardy'sdrawingsofEmma,anotherpoem
is ameditation"OnaOiscoveredCurlofHair,"anotheranapostropheto
61
....
ChapterOne
''A Forgotten Miniature," and another about "Looking at a Picture on an
Anniversary." Like much ekphrasis from Homer's shield on, these poems
are self-referential, scrutinizing their linguistic artifice in the distorted
looking glass of a visual artifact. Unlike Homer's shield and most other
ekphrastic works, however, they reflect on themselves less with exultation
than with anxiety. Because they hold a mirror up to themselves and to
other elegies for Emma, they clarify the self-understanding implicit in
Poems 011912-13. In particular, they reinspect the complex guilt in Har-
dy's elegies for Emma-guilt over the wrecked marriage and guilt over the
aesthetic mining of that wreckage.
Hardy clearly represents his act of representation in "The Figure in
the Scene" (1917) and '''Why Did I Sketch'" (1917). In these poems we
see him "pencil" and pen Emma during the period of their courtship, pre-
figuring his current elegiac penciling and penning of her after her death.
But a phrase appended to both poems complicates still further this show
of mirrors: "From an old note" (2:216-17). The poem represents itself as a
literary representation of a preliterary representation of a visual representa-
tion. Although it lays great emphasis on its status as signifier, it hardly
flatters itself. In the sketch and in the poem Emma is what she has been
throughout Hardy's elegies: an indistinct "Figure in the Scene," a "Figure"
almost eclipsed by the poet's figures. Looking at a green slope, recalls the
poet, "1 stood back that I might pencil it / With her amid the scene."
Already diminished, she becomes stillless distinct as the poet continues to
portray her: he "kept on" sketching her despite the rain, "leaving for curi-
ous quizzings yet / The blots engrained." Future viewers of the sketch, like
future readers of the poem, may pay more attention to the strange marks
on the page than to the supposed "signified." The woman is nearly
swallowd by the scene with which the poet surrounds her, and his '1
r.
continued attempts at depiction succeed not in revealing but in en-
shrouding her:
And thus I drew her there alone,
Seated amid the gauze
Of moisture, hooded, only her outIine shown,
With rainfall marked across.
-Soon passed our stay. . .. (2:216-17)
62
TROMAS HARDY
The stay that soon passes is not only their visit to this scene of representa-
tion but also their life together, cut off both by the death of the marriage
and again by the woman's literal death. In an eerie premonition of these
deaths, the woman seems bound in a fabric that also figures this elegiac
text-a text that preserves but veils her, that incorporates but encrypts her.
Wrapping her in his text, Hardy grants the woman a traditional apotheo-
sis-like Lycidas, she "is the Genius still of the spot, / Immutable"-but
also seals her into the realm of the unknowable-like poet and reader, "the
place now knows her no more." This is a poem ofburied self-reproach for
seeming ro have murdered with a pencil; the poet has reduced the woman
ro a vague "outIine" in delineating her, has disfigured this "figure" in his
attempt at refiguration. The companion poem "'Why Did I Sketch'" is
similarly self-critical, as the titIe itselfindicates. The melancholic poet tries
to surrender both the feminine and the representational. He now favors
banishing "soft curves" from pictures and replacing them with "escarp-
ments stark and stiff"-pictures that are totemic, invulnerable, masculine.
This surrender of the feminine for the stoic brings the poet close to re-
nouncing artifice: he would not "Limn, laugh, and sing, and rhyme." But
if his earlier poem was right in suggesting that to limn or rhyme the be-
loved is in fact to banish and not to re-present her, then the poem preaches
what it may already be practicing.
In another pair of poems, "On a Discovered Curl of Hair" (1922)
and ''A Forgotten Miniature" (1928), Hardy again meditates on visual
symbols ofhis dead wife-visual symbols that resemble the poetic symbols
he is fashioning. Curl and miniature recall Hardy's elegies partIy because
they represent Emma as she was during their courtship. The curl is a met-
onym of Emma, a part of the body that symbolizes the whole, and the
miniature is a metaphor, a figurative substitute that seems identical with
the lost woman. Both poems are apostrophes, speaking pictures that ad-
dress their mute counterparts. The curl and the miniature function as what
Volkan calls "linking objects," "controllable symbolic objects" that "perpet-
Uate the link with the dead individual." Melancholic mourners use linking
objects to externalize two opposing impulses-the impulses to preserve
and to destroy the lost person.
24
We have traced through many ofHardy's
elegies the conflict between a desire to efface the beloved and a desire to
keep her alive. But the curl and the miniature at first seem, in contrast to
63
....
Chapter One
thepoems,onlyrecuperative: theoriginalpurposeof thecurlwas"toabate
the misery / Ofabsentness" duringthe courtship, and nowit abates the
misery ofa more permanent absentness (2:449). Ir seems so "untouched
oftime" thatthe poeteventhinks he "couldnow/ Restore ittotheliving
brow." Similarly, theminiaturehas"notbeenworsed/ ...ByTime," but
seemsnowto"Glowas atfirst" (3:240). Bothobjectsappeartostandout-
sidetime, transmittersofEmma'sradiantpresence.
Butlike the prototypicallinkingobject, thecurl and the miniature
are also "investedwiththeaggressive drive."25 Theyelide thediffieult pe-
riodfromthecourtshiptoEmma'sdeath.Thecurl"Beamswithlivebrown
as inits prime," thewordprime indicatingthatthis period was followed
by a decline-the dark forty-year autumn that both eurl and poem oc-
clude. Theelegies ofPoems 0/1912-13 had similarlyrecalled the painful
marriageonlytodisplaceitwiththeuncomplicatedmemoryofthecourt-
ship. Thecurl, the miniature, andthepoemsaboutthem convert thebi-
nary opposition between life and death into an opposition between the
period of"soft welcomings" and death, suppressing the long years that
separatedthese moments. Like Hardy's elegies, thelinkingobjects fix the
memoryofEmmaas shehadbeeninher"prime" when herhair"sported
inthesunandwind,"thuscontainingherwithinanidealimagethatpro-
teetshimfrom his ambivalencetowardherlaterself(2:449). Like Hardy's
elegies, theminiaturefreezes Emmainheryouthfulstate:
Thereyouare inthedark,
Deepinabox
Nobodyeverunlocks,
Oreven turnsto mark;
-Outofmindstark. (3:240)
Entombedwithintheminiatureas she is withintheelegies, Emmais per-
fectly preserved in her romantic aspect, but this preservation annihilates
herlaterself. Theminiatureis anothercompromise-formation:itsignifies
thepoet'sattemptstokeep Emmaalive, herbeauty"undispersed," herim-
agevibrantwithinhislinguisticartifacts;yetitalsosignifieshisencrypting
her, his locking herup inher ideal image thatshe maylive on. Thepoet
both indulges the pleasure of miniaturizing Emma and implicitly re-
THOMAS HARDY
proacheshimselfforwantingthusto"Shut"herinlO suchnarcissisticem-
blems.
Thisdoubleconsciousness is similarlyevidentin "Lookingata Pic-
tureonanAnniversary" (1917), apoemthatseems naivelyto mistakethe
picture it addresses for the livingwoman, butone that also implants the
opposite, demystified reading within itself. In such elegies as "The
Haunter," as we have seen, Emma became the obedient housewife who
reflected herhusband's everydesire; so tooherpicture nowseems lO echo
the poet'sthoughts. Oncemorethepoetregresses tothebeginningofthe
relationship, askingifthedepictedwoman recalls theirfirst meeting.The
poet betrays the knowledge that he is forcing onto the picture a wish-
fulfillment:
Thoughatthisquery, mydear,
Thereinyourframe
Unmovedyoustillappear,
You mustbethinkingthesame,
Butkeep thatlookdemure
Justtoallure. (2:283)
Like the woman "Shut" in her "case" in "A Forgotten Miniature," this
womanis trappedwithinanartist'sframe, "Unmoved" and"still," butthe
poetwouldreadherfixityas analluringcoyness.Theword"must"suggests
his awareness thathe is imposinghis ownthoughtsontheinanimatepic-
ture; he would lend it vitality, butonly the inertvitality ofa reflection:
"Youmustbethinkingthesame."ThepoemuncomfortablysustainsHar-
dy's pervasiveconflictbetweenmystifyinganddemystifyinghiselegiacart:
Andnowatlengthatrace
Isurelyvision
Uponthatwistful face
Ofold-timerecognition,
Smilingforth, 'Yes, as yousay,
Ir is theday.'
Theawkwardphrase"surelyvision/ Upon"isasself-mockingas "must"in
the previous stanza, implyingthe poetknows he is once more projecting
65
64
Chapter One
his narcissistic fantasies onto a passive image, but that he cannot restrain I
the urgency of his desire. It is he who inscribes the picture with a "trace,"
and so the picture offers him re-cognition, a knowing again or mirroring
back of himself in words that are his own. Obsessively remembered as she
was in "this one phase," Emma can be exactly as Hardy wants her. Yet the
poem ends on a darker note of self-castigation:
But if this face I con
Does not declare
Consciousness living on
Still in it, little I care
To live myself, my dear,
Lone-labouring here! (2:284)
Once more Hardy closes an elegy with a gesture of self-destruction. More-
over, the condition on which his self-destruction depends is more than a 1]
vague possibility, since the protasis enfolds within itself a disquieting state-
ment that confirms what it seems to suggest hypothetically: "this face I ..
con." While the verb in this context means to peruse, scan, or examine, it .
also suggests that the poet's supposed examination of the picture has been ;.
an act of self-cajolery; he has deceived himself into thinking that the pic-
ture can both embody a living mind and reflect his desires.
26
Employing
but deconstructing elegiac prosopopoiea, Hardy plOjects "Consciousness"
onto the dead picture, yet suggests that to conjure such "Consciousness"
is to play his own confidence mano Rather than "living on," Emma's con-
sciousness is "still," frozen in part by his longing to make her a dead reflec-
tor of his needs. In the end, the poet gazing at his reflection is himself
imagined as a dead man-truly the kin of Narcissus.
l
Hardy is not the first elegist lO criticize himself and the elegiac genre. Mil-
ton had also wondered whether to write an elegy was to be a con artist:
"For so to interpose a little ease, / Let our frail thoughts dally with false
surmise." Tennyson had introduced his elegies as self-serving sobs-"wild
and wandering cries, / Confusions ofa wasted youth." And Swinburne had
conceded the inefficacy of his narcissistic fantasies: "Our dreams pursue
our dead and do not find."27 But these earlier elegists had subordinated
66
TROMAS HARDY
such questions to a poetics of trust, whereas Hardy develops for the mod-
ern elegy a poetics of melancholic mourning. In his ironic elegies for the
nineteenth century, its queen, its soldier, and its God, Hardy reinspects the
pious "Hope" that had traditionally concluded elegies, as well as the fiction
of individuality that had constituted the elegiac mourner and mourned
one. In his spousal elegies, Hardy tears down comforting illusions at the
same time that he builds them up. Though he often tries lO console himself
by retreating into idyllic memories of the courtship, Hardy also exposes
this evasion, guiltily acknowledges his ambivalence toward his wife, and
berates himself for making so much poetic gain out of his personal loss.
After Poems 0/1912-13, many of Hardy's elegies for Emma are even more
sharply self-critical. In "The Clock of the Years," Hardy reflects on his
imaginative retreat to "the year / I first had known / Her woman-grown,"
but his effort to make her "stay thus always" proves disastrous: the clock
keeps turning back until Emma is "nought at all." Hardy suggests that,
eager to revise his "memory of her," he has ended up obliterating Emma
(2:278-79). Caught between another pair of conflicting impulses in "The
Shadow on the Stone," Hardy represents himself as wanting to preserve
her living presence yet wanting to acknowledge her irrevocable death.
Imagining that a shadow cast was Emma's, the poet, "to keep down grief,"
refuses to "turn my head lO discover / That there was nothing in my belief"
(2:280). He declines to "unvision" the dead woman, fearing that to dispel
the illusion that she lives would be to will her death all over again. Trapped
between the guilty need for illusion and the guilty knowledge of loss,
Hardy punishes himself for comforting himself and punishes himself for
making ever more poems out of his self-punishment. Ventriloquized in
"An Upbraiding," his self-castigation reaches a new pitch: "Now I am dead
you sing to me" and offer "tenderness," remarks the embittered speaker
(2:282). Hardy suggests that his obsessive mourning for Emma is a mani-
festation less of pure love than of guilt-a guilt that protracts the course
of his grief.
Formerly an undersong of the elegy, melancholic self-accusation ech-
oes loudly through the genre in the twentieth century. Yeats, Owen, Plath,
Heaney, and other elegists fiercely interrogate themselves. Much as Hardy
vacillates between blame and self-blame, Owen scourges benighted civil-
ians one moment only to impugn himself the next. Self-incrimination in-
67
I
'i
Chapter One
trudes still more forcefully into Plath's elegies for her father. As elegist,
Hardy is indeed "transitional"-a poet of unembarrassed pathos but also
of unforgiving irony, of personal remembrance but also of bitter self-
suspicion, of consoling idealism but also of energetic disruption. Of course;
all elegists have partIy incorporated these opposites within their art, but
to see Hardy as standing somewhere between the great Victorian elegist
Tennyson and the contemporary anti-elegist Geoffrey Hill is to see these
opposites collide with a special force in his work. By the end of In Memo-,:
riam Tennyson has. overridden that. his 1
has been worthwhde and that hlS fnend hves In God ; the elegles of
Geoffrey Hill are made up of doubts, ironies, and self-castigations, Hill.
seeing elegiac consolation as the ''Arrogant acceptance" of death.
28
Tenny-
son can still conclude his grand elegy with "blessed Hope," but Hardy is
unsure about the promise glimpsed by his thrush, and Hill denounces such
hope for making genocide acceptable. Although Victoria conveyed to her
poet laureate that In Memon'am was the only nonreligious book to give heq
"comfort," she would have found littIe reason for consolation had she read
i
her own elegy, "Y.R. 1819-1901."29 Hardy prepares the way for even more
discomforting and even more anti-elegiac elegies, from Owen's concern
that he has helped to dispense "war and madness" to Plath's fear that she
has "killed" her father to Heaney's worry that elegiac "beauty" may help to
conceal "atrocity." Already discernible in Hardy's elegies for the century
and his wife, melancholic mourning will come to inform many of the best:
modern laments for the dead.
68
TWO
Wilfred Owen
Much as Hardy instilled his personal and public elegies with the intensified
skepticisms of modernity, Wilfred Owen forged a new kind of elegy upon
the anvil of modern industrialized warfare. One of Hardy's most capable
admirers, Owen considered entitIing a projected collection of his war
poems English Elegies or, in a phrase from Shelley's elegy for Keats, With
Lightning and with Music. But critics have not pursued the implication
that Owen's poems should be read generically as elegies. This reluctance is
understandable, since Owen's poems challenge received notions of elegiac
convention, structure, and psychology. In poems such as ''Anthem for
Doomed Youth," "Furility," "Mental Cases," and "Miners," Owen exem-
plifies the paradox of many modern elegies: that the best are frequentIy the
most anti-elegiac. In his draft Preface, Owen states, "these elegies are to
this generation in no sense consolatory."l Owen's melancholic elegies, like
Hardy's, make it harder to interpret the elegy solely under the aegis of the
pleasure principIe, harder to maintain normative explanations of the genre
as psychic remedy. Resisting the traditional drive toward solace, his elegies
magnifY the masochism latent in the genre. Critics have noted the "sado-
masochism" of Owen's prewar poems; this quality may suggest that we
should think of Owen's poetic sensibility not only as a by-product of the
painful facts of war but as a sensibility in search of such facts. If even Ow-
en's apparentIy realistic work is symbolically implicated in the production
of the horrible pain and death it laments, then another key assumption
about the elegy as a genre and the war elegy as a subgenre becomes prob-
lematic: that they are irreducibly "occasional" forms of poetry. Owen's
work helps us to rethink the elegiac triad of mourning poet, mourning
reader, and mourned victim, eerily suggesting that, even in war elegies,
both poet and reader may partIy create the victimization they mourn.
Although Owen claims to write nonconsolatory elegies, his best-
kno
wn
poem has been attacked precisely for being consolatory. Following
Geoffrey Hill and Peter Dale, Jon Silkin accuses Owen of "consolatory
mourning" in ''Anthem for Doomed Youth." According to this critique,
Owen participates in the religious and nationalist ideology of compensa-
69
S 1 X
American Family Elegy 1
The popularity and abundance of the elegy in America has left it vull
able to frequent ridicule. By the time that Benjamin Franklin castiga'
American elegies as "wretchedly Dull and Ridiculous," the genre alreal
seemed threatened with rigor mortis by formula. In his humorous red!':
for a New England funeral elegy, Franklin codifies generic clichs in
guise of recommendations for improvement. Essential ingredients are
inelude the dead person's "Virtues, Excellencies, &c.," with additional
ties borrowed as needed, along with "his last Words, dying Expressions,
The poet-chef should mix these items together with "a HandjUl or two
Melancholly Expressions," put "all these Ingredients ... into the empty S,
ofsome young Harvard," let them "Ferment" there, mold them into
hackneyed double rhymes, and garnish the whole with a Latin tag. Therfi
"you will have an Excellent Elegy."l When Franklin devised his recipe,
funeral baked-meats had long since furnished forth the table of
poetry, for the Puritan middle-classes had relished the funeral elegy as one,J:
of their primary poetic forms. They also replenished elegiac
as the self-elegy, composed by the devout supposedly Just before

and the elegiac broadside, defended repeatedly by Cotton Mather amongl
others. Holding an obvious appeal for the introspective, death-obsessedil
Puritan, the genre continued to enjoy popularity long afterwards, making.'1,
it the butt not only of Franklin's enlightened ridicule but of many
quent instances uf anri-elegiac satre.
2
In Huckleberry Finn, Emmeline
Grangerford notoriously personifies the nineteenth-century obsession with ,
consolation !iterature: "Every time aman died, or a woman died, or a child ,i;
died, she would be on hand with her 'tribute' before he was cold."3 She
1
continues to toss off elegies until the name Whisder thwans her facility ,(
with rhyme. Recendy, the elegy-by-recipe method satirized by Franklini\
and Twain seems to have returned, despite the apparendy individualisticl,
and unconventional language of the contemporary American elegy: take ,;\
sorne personal reminiscences of the dead person, squeeze from these spe-1:
cific moments sorne indications of virtue or excellence, stir in sorne literal I
216
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
descriptions of flowers, birds, leaves, webs, wind, rain, snow, or sun, and
shape the whole into a shapeless poem. 5hielded from adverse criticism by
its sensitive subject matter, the contemporary elegy is, at its worst, over-
whelmed by the iconography and psychology of elegiac tradition, despite
me spontaneity pledged by tides like "Journal Entry:" and "The 51ide."4
While such poems lazily absorb elegiac codes, more successful post-
war elegies engage, revise, and interrogate them. 50metimes they parody
me genre's traditions, as when Richard Wilbur wittily asks if lawn sprin-
!ders will weep for a poet just dead,
For you will the deep-freeze units melt and mourn?
For you will Studebakers shred their gears
And sound from each garage a muted horn?
"They won't," of course, except in the amusing conceit of this mock-elegy.5
But the rise of suburban America need not disable the pathetic fallacy.
Even this apparendy exhausted trope, tediously rehearsed in sorne contem-
porary elegies, springs back ro life in vigorous reimaginings. It is brilliandy
recovered but chastened by Elizabeth Bishop. In "First Death in Nova 5co-
tia," she places her dead cousin beside a "stuffed loon" that, while far more
cold and dumb than Whitman's voluble bird, is strangely vital, alluring,
even "caressable."6 When she returns to the avian figure of sympathy in
"North Haven," Bishop once again exploits but checks it. 5he humanizes
birdsong as the writer's imperative to "repeat, repeat, repeat; revise, revise,
revise," yet admits the irreconcilable difference between the dead Lowell
and the birds who can "repeat" and "derange, or re-arrange" their song, as
also between the dead man and the surviving poet who repeats and revises
his words and the words of elegiac tradition.7 Pastoral conjunctions of the
human and the natural vary widely, from James Wright's mild metonymy
of his brother the harvester being harvested himself, borne "sideways in a
bale I Of darkness" with the "Corn-yellow tassels of his hair," to 5tanley
Kunitz's violent conceit, "The night nailed like an orange to my brow,"
suggestive of permanent grief for a father who committed suicide before
the poet was born.
8
Though not always so starding, dynamic revisions have remade other
elements of the elegy's standard repertoire. In "The Hospital Window,"
217
ChapterSix
James Dickeyallows his father to "ascend," buthe preserves this vertical
paradigm by relocating it from the celestial to the contemporarysite of
dying:
Ihavejustcomedownfrom myfather.
Higherandhigherhelies
Above me inabluelight
Shedbyatintedwindow.
Idropthroughsixwhitefloors
Andthenstepoutontopavement.
9
Hayden Carruthalso refurbishes this convention bydeconventionalizing
it, describinghimselfas shovelingsnowintohis srove andwatching
theplumeofsteamrise
frommysrovepipestraightly
andvanish intothemist.
lo
For Louise Glck, a dyingsister is like a spinning top orgyroscope that
suddenly flies apart into "a cloud ofatoms, ofparticles."1l In "Fission,",
Jorie Graham resituates elegiac apotheosis in the movie house, usingthe
"whiting...out"ofafilmscreenro figureJohnKennedy'sdeath:thepoet
iswatchingamoviewhenthePresident'sdeathissuddenlyannouncedand
lightfloods thetheater,turningtheimagesonthescreento"bitsof moving'i
zeros // inthe infinitevirtualityoflight."12 Similarly,JamesTateandTess!.
Gallagherreclaimwhatmightseemanimpossiblycontrivedtrope,stellify;./i
lfl
ing the deceased as a pilotlocked in"compulsive" and"crazy/ orbiting
andasa"hammerf amongtheorbitingdead."13AllenGrossmanandAlanl
Dugan return the elegiac metaphor ofreproduction ro its source in t ~
physical act ofsexual propagation.
14
And Robert Hayden demoeratizes,
urbanizes,andpersonalizestheubi sunttradition, broadeningtheonceelit"
istelegiacquestionro includefellow inhabitantsofaDetroitslum:
Where's madMiss Alice, whoatefromgarbagecans?
Where'ssnuffdippingLucy, whoplayedus 'chunes'
onherguitar?Where's Hattie?Where'sMelissabelle?
Letvanishedrooms, let deadstreets tell.
1S
218
AMERICAN FAM1LY ELEGY 1
Inmanypostwarelegies,Americanpoetssuccessfullyremakeanum-
ber ofelegiac conventionsall atonce. MonaVan Duyn's "TheCreation"
is exemplaryinthis respecto Van Duynresumes anassociationofthedead
person with avisual artifact that goes back ro Hardy, Wordsworth, even
the GreekAnthology, butshe represents her elegiac work not as the re-
creationofthepicturebutits "linebyline" erasure.
16
Whereas apoetlike
Surrey enumerated partsof thedeadperson'sbody andidentified each with
anexemplaryvirtue,VanDuyncouplespartsofherfriend'sfacewithmore
specific memories andattributes, notall ofthem flattering: she linksher
friend's hairto"vainf coquettishness"beforemakingher"bald,"thenuses
her eraser to rub out the eyes that recall various kinds of"intervention,"
theears thatsuggest the"jerkyconversation" theysharedoverthephone,
thenose thatreddenedwithallergies andwrink1edather husband'spuns,
andthemouththathidfeelings whileshethoughtof"somethingcleveror
mean" to sayo Toward theendofthe elegy, Van Duynseems ro make the
prototypicalelegiacleapfrom particulars ro redemptiveabstractions, call-
ingthedeadwoman
ourWlSe,
dear, vulnerable, human
friend, as trueandfalse as life
wouldletyoube....
But she immediately criticizes this turn as yet another form oferasure,
because it can only"move" the dead person from her "selfro generaliza-
tion," leaving a "blur." Whereas poets from Milton to Yeats happily see
theirreconstitutedselves reflectedintheirpomaitsofthedead,VanDuyn
is horrified thatthe image ofherownface has displaced her dead friend
fromthevisualandliterarypage (monster punningonMona and mon):
anotherface is onit-mine,
Sneak, Poet, Mon-
ster, tryingro robyouwithwords.
Your deathwasyourown.
Toelegize thedeadperson is nottoredeemorrefigureher buttoplunder
theprivacyofherdeathforaestheticgain. OutofVan Duyn'scontinuous
andintensedialogue'withelegiacconventionemerges nota reminiscence
219
r
ChapterSix
loosely packaged in naturalized tropes but a poem both highly wrought
andemotionallycredible,aworkthatdeftlycriticizesevenasirextendsthe
e1egiacgenre.
From Hardyto PlathandVan Duyn, modern poets have indicated
that, contrary to the traditional generic wisdom, elegies may deface the
dead more than they recuperate them. Sorne poets regret this elegiac
effacement of the dead, one contemporary poet worrying, "Even in
remembering,/1changeyou, /ForeverywordwrittenItheoppositeseems
true"; butothersharnessmegenre'scapacityfornegationtoridthemselves
ofthedead, respondingtomeirclamorouswhispersanddemands, "Ietme
be."!?Whenbesiegedbythememoryofparents orgrandparents, separa-
tionfrom thedeadoftenseems as urgentas reconnection, ifnotmoreso.
This mightbeexpectedin asocietywithouttraditionalrites whose func-
tion, as anthropologistsrepeatedlyremindus, is inpantodividethedead
from the living. Mark Strand represents himself as sustaining the dead
weightofhis father onhisshoulders, buthewouldfree himselffrom this
Anchises-likeburden. Hestates inthedry, clippedlanguageofpartition:
Your shadowis yours. 1tolditso. 1saiditwasyours.
1havecarrieditwithmetoolong. 1give itback!8
In me absence ofshared codes ofmourning, meAmerican e1egist often
representsbereavementassolitaryandobsessive, as abandonmentto mad-
deninglyvivid memories ofthe dead. In the very titIe of"Re-interment:
Recollection ofa Grandfather," Roben Penn Warren suggests he would
not just reclaim butgive back the dead man "locked" in his head-the
man speaking, "fumbling," and "clawing ...inside myskull." Similarly,
heendsapoemaboutadead motherandfatherwithanironicallegoryof
psychicrepression,inwhichhesummonsthepolicetoputthedead"under
sUrYeillance": "Theymustlearntostayintheirgraves. Thatis whatgraves
are for."19 Warren's iranysuggests his misgivings aboutusing the elegy to
silencethedead,andmanyotherantagonistice1egists aresimilarlyequivo-
cal. Sharon Olds, for example, says she has "never written against the
dead," sustainingand nourishingthemwith herpoetry, as ifopeningher
"shirtto them" andofferingher"white/ conesstill makingsugarymilk."
Butevenso, memoriesofhercruel, glass-eyedgrandfatherhave led herto
reverse herself: "No. 1said Let this onebe dead."20Atits mostviolent, as
220
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
in PlathandSexton, theelegybecomes anactofexorcismo Ir is a "curse"
in Sexton's elegyfor hermother, WilIiamHeyen's elegyforhisNazi uncle,
andJames Wright's "Devotions," which ends with the poet biddingthe
deceased, inan anticipationofPlatns"Daddy," "Comeback, be damned
ofme, your aftermath."21 While these curses, condemnations, andexor-
cisms may help ro free theliving from thedead, theymay also help, para-
doxically, ro makethedeadmoreemotionallyaccessiblerotheliving. Acts
ofaggression, as Simmel and Freud recognized, can serve to strengthen
emotionalbonds, andinaculturewherethemonuaryritesfor remember-
ingyeteontainingthedeadare impoverished, poetsoftencrossthedivide
inarhetoricofcandiddenunciationY
Amid themany recent revisions ofelegy, mis transformation ofits
psychological structure to allow for ever more ambivalence may be the
most significant, and it is most visible in the American family elegy-
aboyeall, inelegiesfor parents. Morethanall otherelegiacsubgenres, the
family elegy bestdisplays the postwarAmericanpoet'sespeciallyintimate
andimmediate, impatientandhostileworkinthegenre. Aswehaveseen,
modern English andIrish poets self-consciously disrupt many olddeco-
rums ofthe genre, includingthe rhetoric ofencomium: Hardyterms his
dead wife "indifferent," Yeats brands a dead uncle "A nobodyin a great
throng," andAuden teasesYeats as "silly" andFreudas "at timesabsurd."
Buttheirirreverencegoes onlyso faro Inthefamilye1egy, American poets
due!fiercelywiththedead,refusingtotempertheirbelligerenceandsome-
times deliberately infiaming it. Theirresistance is all the more shocking
because itis directed notataspouse, an uncle, orapoeticparent, butat
mothers and fathers. From Moschus ro Swinburne, e1egies by one poet
for anotherhad incorporated an oedipal narrativeofthesurvivor's initial
submission to but eventual surpassal of the deceased; yet ceremony
diffused struggle, and displacement shielded the real parent.
23
In the
smaller subgenre ofthe parental elegy, poets were even more careful to
avoidovenstrifewiththe dead. Yet iftraditionalandearlymodernpoets
were not as bold in eIegies for parents as in other kinds ofelegies, the
reverse is trueofpostwarpoets: Americanpoets in particularredirect ag-
gressiontowarditsprimaryobjects,whileoftenwritinglessinnovativee1e-
gies for theirersatzparents, such as poets, friends, andpublicfigures.
24
It
is intheirparental"elegies thatLowell, Plath,Sexron, Ginsberg, Rich, and
221
ChapterSix
r
Berrymanmostforcefullyrevisethedisplacedfamilyromanceattheheart
ofthe elegy, denouncing, mocking, ravaging, andexposing their parents
instunningpoeticactsof confrontation.Thisgenerationgives newmean-
ingto thefamiliarideathatelegies areas muchfor thelivingas thedead:
intheparentalelegy, eachwritersummonsandprobeswhat FrankBidart
calls "the CRISES, FURIES, REFUSALS," "theACTIONS, ANGERS,
DECISIONSII that made mewhat Iam."25
Ithadnotalways been so. Threecenturies before the family elegy
was reclaimedasacentralpoeticgenre,AnneBradstreet,themotherofthe
American elegy, fashioned mostofherelegies for members ofherfamily,
includingherfather, mother,andseveral grandchildren-familyelegiesof
averydifferentsort. Bradstreet'selegyforherfather honorshimas oneof
the"Founders"ofNewEngland,a"Truepatriot,""Truth'sfriend"; hewas
"humble,"histhoughtswere"sublime,hisaccionswise," oras theepitaph
sumsitall up, hewas "pious, just,andwise."26 Thecontrastcouldhardly
be more starkbetween this pious elegy and the deliberate desecration of
thefatherintheelegiesofLowell,Plath,Berryman,andSexton.Nomatter
howpowerfulthelens, itwouldbehardtodiscerninthis respectfulhom-
agethe"stress-marksof anger"thatRichasks us tolookfoc inBradstreet's
workYStill,thestress-marksofanxietyarevisiblehere.Whileshelavishes
praiseonherfather, Bradstreetis notentirelycomfortablewiththeenco-
miastic work ofelegy, concerned like Milton and other Puritans not to
overvalue the worldly "honours" and "cides" her father eschewed in life.
Further, she must guard herself against suspicions offamilial partiality,
defendingthefamilyelegyas alegitimategenre:
Noris'trelation nearmyhandshalltie;
Forwhomorecause to boasthisworththanI?
Whoheardorsaw, observedorknewhimbetter?
Orwhoalive thanIagreaterdebror?
Letmalice biteandenvygnawitsfill,
Hewas myfather, andI'llpraisehimstill.
Bradstreet asserts her unique proximity to her father as the authorizing
groundofherfuneralelegy. LaterAmericanelegists relyonsimilarjuscifi-
cations butturn them insideout. Because theytoo have heard, seen, ob-
served, and known the parent better than anyone, they flaunt not the
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
worth but the faults ofthe parent, unveiling private blemishes. Because
theytoohaveincurredagreatdebtfromtheparent,theyvociferouslyrepay
itwithcomparableinjuries. Like Bradstreet, sonsanddaughters continue
to worrywhethertheyhave the right to elegize theirparents, even as the
outsiderro thefamilywill bedoggedbytheconversequestion-Roethke,
forexample,asksinhisfamouselegyforastudentwhether,"Neitherfather
norlover," he has any "rightsin this matter."28 Bradstreet'selegies, for all
theirstrictreligiousassent,subdyforeshadowotherconcernsof herpoetic
heirs. Bradstreet's personal experience ofloss, to theextent thatitpierces
herimpersonal rheroric, seems to competewithhereffort to subordinate
herindividualgrieftothewill ofGod. Herelegyfor herdaughter-in-Iaw,
forexample,consistsinthedespondentrehearsaloflosses,thepoetpermit-
cingherselfro mournwithabandon becauseshe doesso atsornedistance
andonbehalf of herson. "AndliveIstill tosee relacionsgone,"beginsthe
elegist in mid-sentence,as ifher life werebut a cissue ofgrief and "wailing"
(238).Thepoembarelyrelieves thisbleakness, makingonlyminimal use
oftradicional elegiac consolationes to cushion bothherown andherson's
bereavement.
29
Inspiteofherencomiascic andhomiletic rhetoric, then, Bradstreet
puts strains onthe elegy by raising questions about family panegyric, by
appealingtoherimmediateexperience, byallowingglimpsesintoherper-
sonalsuffering,andby holdingoff themoreelaborate devicesof thegenre.
In much later elegies that are increasingly questioning, immediate, and
personal, postwarAmerican elegists rely moreontheirown feelings than
oncommunalcodesandreligiousstructures,evenwhenthosefeelingsvio-
latetaboosagainsttheexposureordegradacionofthedead. Notthatthey
ignorereligious tradition: Lowell's "QuakerGraveyard" turnsro prayerful
meditation, Ginsberg's Kaddish incorporatesJewish mourningritual, and
Sexton'sandClampitt'selegies for theirmothersdefinetheirgriefin rela-
cion to GoodFridayandCandlemas. Nordo theyignore Bricish literary
tradicion: Lowell grounds his violent language in the oedipal strife and
elegiacsatireof"Lycidas,"Ginsbergplaceshiselegyinthemelancholicline
ofAdonais, Plath stands on the stilts ofRenaissance andclassical drama,
and Rich weaves into herelegy for her father allusions ro Shakespearean
daughters andfathers. Butinall these choices ofliteraryandreligious in-
heritance, the poets are more revisionist than deferential, writing outof
222 223
~
ChapterSix
anantagonism toward traditionthatis ofteninseparablefrom theiranger
towardadeadparent.
Shapedbyresistancetotheculturalpast,thepostwarAmericanelegy
isalsoprofoundlymarkedbythecontemporaryworld-byitsinstitutions,
discourses,andsocialimperatives.AtatimewhentheAmericanfamilyhas
been unlockingits secretsintalkshows, autobiographies, andsociological
studies, the dead and dying have paradoxically become unspeakable,
evicted from the home and closeted in the hospital, commemorated in
perfunctory rites and mourned in embarrassed privaey. Under the social
commandmentto repress thedead anddenygrief, manyAmericans have
encryptedtheirresponses to thedead in thesymbolic privaeyofthe lyric
poem; underthecommandmenttobe openandcandid,theyhavearticu-
lated more anger and illicit desire toward the dead than ever before. The
provocativeintimaeyofthefamily elegyhas beeninpartareaction tothe
powerful cultural discourses that depersonalize andregularize the experi-
ence ofloss. Wendell Berry clarifies one ofthe anti-institutional tasks of
thefamilyelegywhenhe requests in"ThreeElegiac Poems,"
Lethimescapehospitalanddoctor,
themannersandodors ofstrangeplaces,
thedispassionateskills ofexperts.
Lethimgo free oftubes andneedles,
publiccorridors, thesurgicalwhite
of life dwindledtopoorpain.
30
Justas Berryandotherpoetssettheimpassionedfamiliariryoftheirelegies
against the impersonal dictates of the medical establishment, Warren
wouldsubstitute his elegiac truth-tellingfor the "undertaker's sick lie"-
the sham offlesh embalmed to disguise the irreversibiliry ofdeath, the
shamoflanguage cleansed to obliterate the ravages andcontradictions of
grief.3! Morerecently, theAmericanfuneral businesshasdevelopedaform
thatopenly displaces mourningwords withvisual images: the "video eu-
logy" splices together photographs of the deceased with stock nature
scenes,viewedinthefuneralparlorto theaccompanimentofcannedmu-
sic. Sometimesthepsychotherapist,alongsidetheundertakerandthemed-
ical doctor, also seeks to disciplineandcontainmourning. Lowell, Ginsb-
erg, Plath, Rich, Sexton, andBidartare all indebtedtopsychoanalysis for
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
insight into mourningand familial conflicto Without it, theywould not
have made theparentalelegysuchavitalgenre, norwouldtheyhave dis-
covered in their ambivalent grieffor parents a royal road into their own
psyches. Butfrequentlytheyhaveprotestedthenormativeconceptsofpsy-
choanalysis, as in Linda Pastan'sexplicit-if unsubtle-description of fol-
lowing"TheFiveStagesofGrief."Havingproceededfrom Denialto Anger
to Bargaining to Depression to "Acceptance, / its name in lights," she dis-
covers upon arrival that "something is wrong. / Griefis a circular stair-
case."32 Howeverfree contemporarybereavementmayseem from institu-
tional constraints, psychotherapy, medicine, and funeral directing are
arguably as invasive and disciplinary as the church once was. As Louise
Glckindicatesoftoday's mourners, rypically"Someoneleansover, / tells
themwhattodonext."33
Postwarelegists have constructedtheirdiscourseagainstmanyother
cultural forms that quietly simplif)r, rationalize, or occlude the intimate
experience ofdeath and mourning. Neither anger nor guilt nor furious
longingmakesitswayintothedryinstitutionalindicesof theobituary,the
prepackaged"sympathy"ofthecondolencecard,orthemaudlinclichsof
commercial music. The nursing home shuts the aged and dying out of
sight. But the corpse-concealedinhospitals and funeral homes-pops
up continually in the mediated, for-profit space ofmass culture. Many
films, televisiondramas, andnewsprogramsmass-marketsensationalgrief
and violent death, pornographically distributing them everywhere while
locatingtheiroccurrence always elsewhere. Radio andTVcompanies sell
anendlessseries ofinstantlyavailablewars, atrocities, murders,griefs, and
naturaldisastersfromaroundtheworld.Withlittleself-consciousness,the
commercial mediacapitalizeonfears ofdeathbynuclearorconventional
warfare,profitfromconvertingintomarketablediscoursetheextinctionof
speciesanddestructionofhabitat.Fortheconsumer,sorneofthesemacro-
cosmicrepresentationsofdeathandloss potentiallyreveal theinextricabil-
iryofeachindividualfate from humanandnaturalsystems; buttheyalso
risk dwarfingthemore personalexperience ofmortaliry. Thecommercial
panoramaofdeath threatens to alienate us still further from an intimate
relation to ourown deaths and the deaths ofloved ones. TheAmerican
familyelegy, broadlyconsidered,holdsopenaspaceformourningtheless
granddeathsandlosses thateachofus mustface, whilealso inscribingthe
224
225
Chapter Six
larger dislocations ofmodern death. They indirectly attest to our con-
sciousnessofgenocideandtechnologicalwar,ecocideandmassstarvation
when they expose the lasting wounds ofprivate grief; for these modern
catastropheshave helpedto makepoeticsalves foreven personallossseem
easy, suspect, sometimes dishonest. Not that such mistrust is unprece-
dented; norwas thereever a golden age without manipulators andprofi-
teers ofloss, death, and grief Indeed, the satire ofFrankIin and Twain
should remind us that theAmerican elegy has always been at risk ofbe-
comingvacuous, ifit retreats into comfons and nostalgias outoftouch
withits momento
Inshort, poetic responses tothecontemporarydiscourses and reali-
tes ofdeathcannotafford to be simply compensatory, lest the elegy be-
comeideologicalpap-arepository ofsentimentalpalliatives.Writing per-
ceptively about the Americanelegy's egalitarianism, isolation, direcrness,
longing for origins, and increasing privaey, Peter Sacks regrets that the
genre is losingits abilityto console. Butconsolation mayno longerbean
imponant"criterionbywhichtojudge"theelegy,sincemanyoftheweak-
est are merely consolatory and manyofthe strongest-in revolt against
consolation in its religious, literary, psychiatric, and poltical forms-are
poems less ofsolace than ofmelancholia, less ofresolution than ofpro-
tractedsrrife.
34
ROBERT LOWELL
It was hardlyself-evident thatthe elegywould be apropervehide for an
Americanpoet'smelancholcangertowardparentsandancestors.Afterall,
Roben Lowell recited an elegy to himselfto control his aggression soon
beforehebeathisfather rothefloor. Enragedbyhis parents' rejectionofa
prospective fiance, Lowell recalls "calmingmyhotnerves and enflaming
my mind's / nomadquicksilverbysaying Lycidas" before"1 knockedhim
down."As heputitinanearliermanuscript:
Ihummedtheadamantine
orerotundoofLycidas tocoollove'squarrels,
anddearmyhonor
from Father's brandingScarletLetter....
226
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
"Yet oncemore, Oyelaurels"-
Iwasnineteen!35
Because ofits highlywroughtform, theelegy calmsandcools theyoung
rebel. Butit is notmerelyabreakonhis oedipalepisode: italso plays the
opposite role, "enflaming" the poet's restless imaginationandclearinghis
"honor." Lowell shoves his real ancestryaside, grabbingthe "laurels" that
redefinehimasapoetinagreatlineo Farfrompaeifyinghim,therecitation
ofthe elegy is anact ofsymbolic rebellion thatprepares for and parallels
the physical act. Lowell may have turned to "Lycidas" in part because it
dramatizes a youthful accession ro power: Milton, like his classical fore-
fathers, uses theelegyroclaimhis rightsofinheritanceandsuccession, in
relationroboththelamentedpoetandliterarytradition.InLowell'sphysi-
cal assault on his father as in his verbal accostingofhim in laterelegies,
the angry son benefits from the oedipal structure ofelegy, but whereas
Miltondisplaces the struggle for power from the domestic realm ro the
literary, Lowell redomesticates andliteralizes it. NotthatLowell forsakes
the agon with literary parents: he too plucks and shatters the inherited
language ofelegy. But Lowell, along with Plath, Berryman, and other
Americanpoets, relocatesthisliterarycombatwithintheoverchargedset-
ting ofprimarycontention, reinterpretingitin terms offamilial ambiva-
lence. HadLowell recitedmore than"thestartofLycidas," hecouldhave
madehiswaytothe locus classicusofelegiacaggression, Peter's satiric re-
bukeofthecorruptedclergyfor lettingtheir faith-starvedflocks "Rotin-
wardly, and foul contagion spread." Butwhereas Milton's "dread voice"
assails the unworthysurvivorsofthedeadLyeidas, Lowellaudaciouslyat-
tacks the dead as unworthy, tauntingand teasing parents, grandparents,
andtheiroverlyesteemedancestors. Heconflates thesatiricinvectiveand
theoedi pal dramaofthe elegy,heightening bothof themand turning therr
36
intothefoundationofhiselegiacart.
Alreadyin Lord Wearys Castle (1946) Lowell is eagerly condemninl
hiscousinWarrenWinslo
w
,hisgrandfatherArthurWinslo
w
,hisagedrela
rs
tiveMaryWinslo ,andhis entirepackofWinslo
w
ancestO .InLowell
w
first majorelegy, "TheQuakerGraveyardinNantucket,""Lyeidas" is th
obvious poetic paradigm. It has been said to provide me model for suc
227
Chapter SU:
larger dislocations ofmodern death. They indirectly attest to our con-
sciousnessofgenocideandtechnologicalwar,ecocideandmassstarvation
when they expose the lasting wounds ofprivate grief; for these modern
catastropheshave helpedtomakepoeticsalvesforevenpersonallossseem
easy, suspect, sometimes dishonest. Not that such mistrust is unprece-
dented; norwas there ever agolden age without manipulatorsandprofi-
teers ofloss, death, and grief. Indeed, the satire ofFranklin and Twain
should remind us that theAmerican elegy has always been at risk ofbe-
comingvacuous, ifit retreats into comforts and nostalgias out oftouch
withits momento
Inshort, poetic responses tothecontemporarydiscourses andreali-
ties ofdeath cannotafford to be simplycompensatory, lest theelegy be-
comeideologicalpap-arepositoryofsentimentalpalliatives.Writingper-
ceptively about theAmerican elegy's egalitarianism, isolation, directness,
longing for origins, and increasing privacy, Peter Sacks regrets that the
genreis losingits abilitytoconsole. Butconsolationmaynolongerbean
important "criterionby which to judge" theelegy, since manyof the weak-
est are merely consolatory and many ofthe strongest-inrevolt against
consolation in its religious, literary, psychiatric, and political forms-are
poems less ofsolace than ofmelancholia, less ofresolution than ofpro-
tractedstrife.
34
ROBERT LOWELL
It was hardlyself-evident thattheelegywould be a propervehicle for an
Americanpoet'smelancholicangertowardparentsandancestors.Afterall,
Robert Lowell recited an elegy to himselfto control his aggression soon
beforehebeathisfather totheRoor. Enragedbyhisparents' rejectionofa
prospectivefiance, Lowell recalls "calmingmyhotnerves andenRaming
mymind's / nomadquicksilver by saying Lycidas" before"1 knockedhim
down."fuheputitinanearliermanuscript:
Ihummedtheadamantine
orerotundoofLycidas tocoollove'squarrels,
andclearmyhonor
from Father'sbrandingScarletLetter....
226
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
"Yet oncemore,O ye laurels"-
Iwas nineteen!35
Because ofits highlywroughtform, theelegy calms andcools theyoung
rebe!. Butit is notmerelyabreakonhis oedipalepisode: italso plays the
opposite role, "enfiaming" thepoet's restless imaginationandclearinghis
"honor." Lowell shoves his real ancestryaside, grabbingthe "laurels" that
redefinehimasapoetinagreatlineo Farfrompacifyinghim,therecitation
oftheelegy is an act ofsymbolic rebellion thatprepares for andparallels
e
the physical acto Lowell may have turned to "Lycidas" in partbecaus it
dramatizes a youthful accession to power: Milton, like his classical fore-
fathers, uses theelegytoclaimhis rightsofinheritanceandsuccession, in
relationtoboththelamentedpoetandliterarytradition.InLowell'sphysi-
cal assault onhis father as in his verbal accostingofhim inlater elegies,
the angry son benefits from the oedipal structure ofelegy, butwhereas
Milton displaces the strugg1e for power from the domestic realm tO the
literary, Lowell redomesticates and literalizes it. NotthatLowell forsakes
the ago with literary parents: he toO plucks and shatters the inherited
n
language ofelegy. But Lowell, along with Plath, Berryman, and other
Americanpoets, relocatesthisliterarycombatwithintheoverchargedset-
tingofprimarycontention, reinterpretingit in terms offamilial ambiva-
lence. HadLowell recited more than"thestartofLycidas," he couldhave
madehiswayto thelocusdassicus ofelegiacaggression, Peter's satiricre-
bukeofthecorrupteddergyfor lettingtheir faith-starvedfiocks "Rotin-
wardly, and foul contagion spread." But whereas Milton's "dread voice"
assails the unworthysurvivorsofthedeadLycidas, Lowell audaciouslyat-
tacks the dead as unworthy, taunting and teasing parents, grandparents,
andtheiroverlyesteemedancestors. Heconfiates thesatiricinvectiveand
theoedipaldramaof theelegy,heighteningbothof themandturningthem
36
intothefoundationofhiselegiacart.
Already in Lord Warys Castle (1946) Lowell is eagerly condemning
hiscousinWarrenWinslow,hisgrandfatherArthurWinslow,hisagedrela-
tive MaryWinslow, andhis entirepackofWinslo
w
ancestors. InLowell's
first majorelegy, "TheQuakerGraveyard inNantucket," "Lycidas" is the
obvious poetic paradigm.It has been said to provide the model for such
227
ChapterSix
formal elements as the loose pentameter varied by occasional trimeter, the
adapted canzone, and the lengeh; for such motifs as the youthful death,
the drowning, the unrecovered body, the classical and biblical imagery, and
the place names; and for such rhetorical strategies as the universalizing con-
templation, the religious consolation, the anonymity, the homage to liter-
ary precursors, me questioning of poetry, and, we might add, the poet's
aggressive bid for literary ascendancy. As important as these features, the
very language of Lowell's poem-violent, contradictory, unstable-both
recalls and remakes the rhetoric of Peter's denunciation. In its famous sa-
tiric section, "Lycidas" linguistically encodes violence, especially in such
catachrestic formulations as "Blind mouths" and such dissonant phonemic
paneros as "Grate on their scrannel pipes of wretehed straw." While adopt-
ing this poetic mode, Lowell dislocates it: Milton's angry discourse is deliv-
ered from behind a dramatic and prophetic mask that legitimizes its ex-
tremity, but here it is Lowell and not a saint who lashes out against the
wicked. Further, because Lowell contends with no third party but with the
dead themselves, because he even confIates the dead with the depraved,
he disrupts the normative hierarchies that had contained the violence of
the British elegy within an orderly narrative of oedipal succession. He so
blurs elegiac boundaries that even the aspiring poet is himself endangered
by the rhetorical vortex he creates. At the same time that the poet expresses
anger toward his God- and nature-killing, his war- and money-making
ancestors, poetic language itself becomes a primary object of his anack.
From the poem's beginning the violence in Lowell's language is con-
spicuous: multiple opposites collide in such phrases as "heel-headed dog-
fish barks," the imagery for the small shark bolting from heel to head, from
dog to fish then back to dog (in a punning word for "scrapes"); similarly,
the corpse is "marble" and "bloodless" yet "a botch of reds and whites"
(6-10). Though based in New Critical principies, the figurative incongru-
ities exceed the decorum of "paradox" and "tension," particularly in me
macabre personification of the sailor's corpse: "the drowned sailor
clutched" and "grappled at me net / With the coiled, hurdling muscles of
his thighs," his eyes "open, staring." Working from within the norms of
New Criticism and traditional elegy, Lowell pushes them to extremes that
unmake them. Whereas the dead Lycidas visited me ocean-bottom or slept
by Land's End, prosopopoeia in Lowell's poem more actively personifies
228
AMERiCAN FAMiLY ELEGY 1
the dead person, weirdly reanimating Winslow's deanimated body. Unlike
the traditional elegiac personification of willows, rocks, sheep, or the ab-
stract soul, this uncanny reinvigoration of the dead man threatens to desta-
bilize the usual division between the living and the dead. With the dead
man clutching, grappling, and staring, his muscles coiled and hurdling, no
discursive space in the poem seems safe from the reach of the lusty dead.
Twinned with prosopopoeia, apostrophe further contributes to the
poem's violent reanimation of the dead man as dead mano After vividly
detailing me features of the corpse, the poet repeatedly addresses the
"Sailor" as "you, my cousin." Whereas apostrophe had traditionally helped
elegists tO conjure a spirit apart from the corpse, the dead body is so vigor-
ously present in this elegy that the poet incongruously seems to address it
rather than an otherworldly formo The poet's persona is also remarkably
unstable, wandering among the positions of "we," "you," and "1," between
the realms of the living and the dead, of objective judge or prophet and
implicated mortal. Resisting the secure locations mapped out by pastoral
ceremony, Lowell blurs not only life and death but also land and ocean
.\
("this field of Quakers in their unstoned graves"), here and there ("There,
in the nowhere"), inside and outside ("the whale's viscera go," "The deam-
lance churns into the sanctuary," "Gobbets ofblubber spill"). The poem's
climactic fifth section is swept up in a vertiginous turning and turning of
opposites, as suggested by such words as roll, churns, coiling, and go round.
Milton could move his poem upward and out of the clerical "rot" and
"contagion" he blasts, but in Lowell's poem the "corruption overruns this
world," making it impossible for the dead ancesrors, the poet, or anyone
else to "Hide" guilt successfully within a sanctified space aparto lnvoking
the "expressionless" statue of Mary, the poet seeks cover in the "castle of
God," but he has aligned his sublime rhetoric so completely with rupture
and barbarity that this desired move beyond "corruption" must inevitably
fail.
37
By poem's end, even God shares in the relish for destruction: his
"blue-Iung'd combers lumbered to the kilL" However hard Lowell srrains
ro do so, he cannot at the end submit his struggl
e
to the elegy's rationaliz-
ing hierarchies, having so disordered them, nor can he distance himself
from the scene he vividly animates as he decries it. Hatred and paranoia
toward the dead, according to KIein, subvert the mourner's attempt ro re-
inrroject them and rebuild a coherent inner world, while idealization en-
229
ChapterSix
ables the mournerto totalize andrelinquish thedead.
38
ThoughLycidas's
bones mighthave roamed the bottom ofthe ocean, theyleapt backinto
place in the poet's final vision. Damned rather than idealized, Warren
WinslowandLowell'sotherdeadrelatives "spill," "cryout,"and"overrun"
thepoet, theirfragments restlesslytwistingandturningthroughhis trou-
bleddiscourse.Anelegythatstrangelyyokestogethertheceremoniouspo-
eticsofpastoralandtheanti-ceremonious,explosiveangerofanAmerican
poet,"TheQuakerGraveyardinNantucket"continuallyrecallselegiactra-
ditionbutdisperses its consolatoryandreassuringmagic.
Thepoet'shatredofhisdeadrelativesandhimselfis transmutedinto
generalizedsatireinthepublicoratoryof"TheQuakerGraveyard," butit
is morenarrowlyfocused in two spitefulelegies ofLord Warys Castle: "In
MemoryofArthurWinslow" and "MaryWinslow." Onceagain, Lowell
absorbs numerous elegiac conventions and motifs (apostrophe, classical
andChristianmyth, thecorpse, theprocessionofmourners,thereviewof
life and ancestry, purification, resurrection, water, tolling bells, fish, and
birds). Buteven moreclearly than in "QuakerGraveyard," he systemati-
callyinvertseachof theseelegiacelements.Apostrophedoes notrecallbut
tauntsthedead; religiousmythdoesnotbless butdamnsthem;theproces-
sion does not revere butneglects the dead. Rather thannoteand surpass
the corpse, Lowell dwells upon it; he purifies himselfinstead ofthe de-
ceased;andheinvokes resurrectionmerelyas ajoke.Further,thereviewof
lifeandancestrydoesnotsummonillustriousdeedsandlineagebutstories
ofgreed anddecay; thewater is notofsalvationbutofHades andpublic
gardens. And finally, the otherworldly bells are obstructed by mundane
noise, while neitherfish norbirds signify rebirth. Lowell revises the elegy
moremethodicallyandstrenuouslythanhadsuchBritishpoets as Hardy,
Yeats, Owen, and Auden. Recalling words and images from the English
elegiac canon ("look," "risen Jesus walks the waves," "she is dead," "is
dead," "thewide waters and their voyager are one," "all the bells," "The
bells ery"), Lowelldesecrates his illustriousancesrors, bothliteraryandfa-
milial. His parody ofelegiac apotheosis betrays contempt both for his
grandfather and for the convention that might once have "run" him be-
yondthe riversofHades.
Sobitteris thetoneof"InMemoryof ArthurWinslow"thatLowell
seems intentonpermanentlydislodging the elegiac genre from its tradi-
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
tionalhomeinepideicticverse.Theemotionalintimaeysuggestedbyapos-
trophemerelyhighlightsthespeaker'sderision.Thattheattackislaunched
bytherebelmemberofahigh-castefamilyfurthercontributestothescan-
dal; Lowell simultaneouslyviolates poetic,familial, andsocial norms. His
grandfatheralmostseems ro deserve his horribledeathfrom cancer:
ThisEaster, ArthurWinslow,lessthandead,
Your peoplesetyouupinPhillips' House
Tosettleoffyourwrestlingwiththecrab-
Theclaws dropfiesh uponyouryachtingblouse
UntillongshoremanCharoncomeandstab
Throughyouradjustedbed
Andcrushthecrab. (11)
Eventhoughthefirstlinesof thissection,as laterofthethird,rhythmically
echo "Lycidas," theimplicitsneer inthephrase"less thandead" fixes the
courseofthispoem-notmerely"stillalive" but,implicitly,atanontolog-
icallevellowerthandeath.
39
As ifamannequinorthevictimofaswindle,
thedyingmanhasbeen"set...up" by"Yourpeople."Theywould"settle"
him "off," anoddcollocation thatsuggests notmerely placinghimcom-
fortably butpayingoffadebtandfinishingoffaproblem. By means ofa
gruesomepunoncancer, Lowellturnsthediseaseintoacrustaceandigging
into his grandfather's body and spattering tissue on his clothes, though
Winslow maybe picturedhere as clumsilyeatingcrab in this institution
for Brahmins.Justas thewordcrab violentlyconfiatestheastrologicaland
thephysical,Lowell's languagealso forces togetherthemythical ("Charon
come and stab I Through") and the mundane ("your adjusted bed"). As
in "Quaker Graveyard," language is both the tool and target ofLowell's
melancholic hostility. Rhetorically jabbing at the memory ofthe dead
man, the poet risks associatinghimselfwith the infernal destroyer ofthe
deceased. Later elaborated in Plath's elegiac "stake" and Berryman's "ax,"
the trope ofphallic impaling recurs in Lowell's elegies, from the "death-
lance"of"QuakerGraveyard" tothetotemiccane"lanced"intothe"fauve
ooze" in"UfeStudies" (9, 73). Lowell proffers cruel delightathis grand-
father's thwartedattemptsto hearthebells rollingthepromiseofresurrec-
tion-apromisewithheldhereandthroughouttheremainderoftheelegy.
Inits last three s ~ t i o n s Lowell contemplates themillennial hopes ofhis
231
230
ChapterSix AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
ancestors, hopes mocked by their "half-forgotten" burial plots and the de-
crepit mourners at his grandfather's funeral; he recalls his grandfather's
devil-driven lust for gold, a lust that could "give back life" neither to him
nor his workersj and, as he prays for his own purification and resurrection,
he envisions his grandfather still yearning for "painted idols to adore."40
The opening of the companion elegy for Lowell's aged relative,
"Mary Winslow," is comparable in its severity: "Her Irish maids could
never spoon out mush / Or orange-juice enough" (12). Imperious though
powerless, she insists on commanding others and governing "her four /
Room kingdom." But the poet responds with defiance, mocking this
"Cleopatra in her housewife's dress" with characteristic misogyny. Here, as
in the Arthur Winslow elegy, he satirically exposes the gap between his
relative's grand self-perception and actual dilapidation. Charon reappears
in this elegy, but instead of stabbing through his victim he stifles her-
"stops her hideous baby-squawks and yells, / Wit's clownish afterthought."
These cries may indeed be "hideous," but it is the poet who interprets
them as a regression to childhood and finds a malicious humor in them.
He repeatedly extracts irony from the disparity between Mary Winslow's
seeming youth and her real degeneration. In a more traditional elegy, the
words "child" and "baby" would have suggested rebirth, and the stock
phrases "she is dead" and "Nothing will go again" would have reverberated
with pathos, but here they in no way qualifY the poet's hopelessness and
disgusto Even the sounding of the belis is sinister, pace Tennyson and
Whitman: the bell-rope "unsnarls / And belis the bestial cow." As in the
other two elegies in Lord Warys Castle, Lowell heaps caustic irony on the
elegiac motif of the rebirth of the dead in heaven. While using an eschato-
logical rhetoric, less Catholic than Puritan, it is the poet, and not God,
who assumes the role of almighty judge in the elegies for Mary and Arthur
Winslow, damning the dead with astonishing confidence. Charon-like, he
ferries them to the hell of his unforgiving poems, where they will forever
remain sealed in representations of themselves as selfish, pretentious, and
domineering. These poems have been faulted for lacking elegiac consola-
tion, but if the poet proves the dead to be unworthy, then who needs to
be consoled over their loss?
Years later, after the death of his parents, Lowell wrote Life Studies
(1959), a book dominated by ambivalent elegies for other poets, for.him-
self, but especially for his father, mother, and grandfather. In Lowell's turn
from a more impersonal to a more personal mode of poetry, the genre of
both mask and feeling, both myth and intimacy plays a pivotal role. Hav-
ing generalized and diffused oedipal violence in "Quaker Graveyard," and
having aimed it more narrowly at close relatives in the Winslow elegies,
Lowell makes his parents themselves the object of sustained attack in Life
Studies. What Lowell calls "my adolescent war on my parents" is the subject
and impetus not only of the elegies in Life Studies but also of "91 Revere
Street," a prose memoir that prepares for the satiric family elegies in the
"Life Studies" sequence.
41
In both "91 Revere Street" and "Life Studies,"
the central narrative is the srory the father's decline, his "downhill progress
as a civilian and Bosronian" (43). Even before resigning from the Navy and
commencing his social tumble, his father betrayed a "morbidly hesitant"
and "Unmasterful" character, which presaged a dismal future and humili-
ated both wife and son (16, 18). Lowell, in turn, uses his memoir and
elegies ro humiliate his father. At the same time, he more subtly prosecutes
his "war" at the discursive level, making his style the "masculine" opposite
of his father's effeminacy. Much as his father's armchair is described as the
antithesis of its owner-"black, cracked, hacked, scratched, splintered,
gouged, initialed, gunpowder-charred and tumbler-ringed"-so too this
vehement, verb-compacted description distinguishes the poet's muscular
rhetoric over against his father's weakness. "1 doubt ifFather, a considerate
man," Lowell facetiously adds, "was responsible for any of the marring"
visible on this "'rhinoceros hide'" (17). Though his father was a naval
officer, it is Lowell who proves himself the man of combat in this memoir
and in the elegies of "Life Studies," contending with the dead man in a
rhetoric that, as he says of the battered chair, leaves the father "disfigured."
Lowell's unresolved oedipal antagonism bears on even the most famous
aspect of his poetic practice in Life Studies: he invents a Iyric mode often
said to be more "personal" than any before ro elegize a father "who trusted
in statistics and was dubious of personal experience." The only artistic acts
of which his father is capable are "Iettering his three new galvanized gar-
bage cans: RT.S. LWELL-US.N." (an image subsequently repeated)
and carving with "formal rightness" the Sunday roast, his brow wet with
perspiration from the strain of reproducing "stroke by stroke his last carv-
ing lesson" at a car-ving school (32, 34). Lowell recalls having been "furi-
232 233
Chapter Six
ous" at the time (35), and he responds even in the prosody of the "Life
Studies" elegies-elegies that, for the first time in his published poetry,
eschew the "formal rightness" of regular rhyme and meter. Although Low-
ell's dissociation from his father tentative1y allies him with his mother, she
too endures harsh treatment for, among other things, her "ruthlessly neat"
aesthetic of house-eleaning and her preference in pottery for "puritanieal,
elean-cut lines" (37,34). In contrast, the lines in which Lowell memorial-
izes his mother are ostentatiously irregular, loose, jagged, unhampered.
Knowing that both of his parents disdained the "effrontery" ofArny Low-
ell's "free verse" and that they re1ished "Robert Frost's remark that 'writing
free verse was like playing tennis without a net,'" the son e1egizes his par-
ents in preeisely the style that would have irked them most (38). In his
prosodic, modal, and stylistic affronts, Lowell tutns inside out the e1egiae
tradition of imitative homage, as practiced by e1egists from Spenser
to Swinburne and Auden: the rhetoric he adopts was not preferred but
despised by the dead.
While male e1egists had long assumed the stanee of sons grappling
with parental figures, they had typically accomplished the transition from
competitor to successor by incorporating the dead into their own language
and identity, recapitulating ego-formation in a story ofprofessional inheri-
tance.
42
But Lowell deforms this psychodynamic paradigm in the elegies
of"Life Studies," regressing ro the unresolved oedipal position of the child,
refusing the complete reincorporation of his parental imagos, and reani-
mating antagonisms without bringing them to elosure. The "Life Studies"
sequence begins with a memory of youthful rebellion: Lowell "threw cold
water" on his parents' "watery martini pipe dreams" because he wanted ro
stay with his grandfather at the summer home; but rather than merely
relate this act of insubordination, Lowell repeats it by mocking his parents
in the jarring conflation of these elichs ("My Last Afternoon with Unele
Devereux Winslow").43 As we have seen, the very style of the sequence is
a rebuke to his father's weakness and mother's propriety; it more nearly
resembles his grandfather's person and dcor-"manly, comfortable, /
overbearing, disproportioned." His grandfather, though hammered in the
earlier elegy, now functions as a bulwark against the greater vexation ofhis
parents. In the bric-a-brac that filled his grandfather's summer place, Low-
ell finds an objective correlative for his discontinuous psychology and po-
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
etry. The imagery of discrete items and the metonymic language could be
seen as part of Lowell's larger refusal to subsume the dead parents and the
dead past within himself.44 He describes objects that, like the poet and his
elegies, only halfincorporate the dead "other," leaving it in partial suspen-
sion: the cuckoo elock is "slung with strangled, wooden game," much as
the couch legs are "shellacked saplings." The summer home abounds in
other elegiac simulacra ofextinct worlds, ineluding "snapshots" that recall
vanished instants and tiles "crummy with ant-stale," Aunt Sarah's "dummy
piano" and Unele Devereux's student posters of prewar "belles" and "bush-
whacked" soldiers. Throughout the sequence, Lowell's ambivalence roward
his father and mother prevents him from reinstating the parental "objects,"
as KIein terms them, within his own identity-an identity that therefore
finds itself strangely externalized, fractured, even in peril.
At the same time that Lowell elegizes dead relatives without assimi-
lating them completely, he also recalls his dead youth without absorbing
it, holding it instead at an ironic distance. In describing moments of
youthful se1f-reflection, Lowell brings to mind the Lacanian "mirror stage"
that Sacks finds recapitulated in the traditional elegy; but whereas this mo-
ment in the elegy and in psychoanalysis normally affords growth and self-
creation, Lowell emphasizes self-division and paralysis.
45
In "My Last Af-
ternoon," he remembers having seen his image mirrored in the water,
where it seemed a "stuffed toucan," and in the next elegy he recalls, "1 saw
myself as a young newt, / neurasthenic" and "numb" (73). These moments
in which the young Lowell saw his dead reflection anticipate these very
e1egies, in which the mature Lowell peers at the dead selves of his youth,
not lovingly embraced but ironized, not incorporated but objectified. The
sequence's tendency toward reflective self-division manifests Lowell's per-
vasive ambivalence toward his paternal imagos, the poet separating himself
into reflector and refleeted, subjeetive mourner and object of mourning.
Instead of re-creating his identity out of a normative process of inheriting
parental imagos and the past, Lowell keeps his dead parents and his dead
selves abjected, discrete, suspended outside himself. Instead of dissolving
his youth with a soft focus, he fixes with precision the date (1922), his age
(five and a halO, and how long he had worn his shorts (three minutes),
much as his grandfather penciled the heights of the doomed Unele Dever-
eux on a "white measuring-door." Presented as a collection of discontinu-
234 235
Chapter Six
ous pictures, poetic memory is epitaphic in the sequence. Elegizing his
dead uncle, Lowell also elegizes moment-to-moment perceptions, each
dead at the instant in which it was lived. The last visual image of Uncle
Devereux "grew sharper and straighter" as the poet distills it to a one-
dimensional picture, "like a ginger snap man in a clothes-press." Painterly
but also photographic, these poems approximate sorne of the harsh instan-
taneity of the "snapshots" they allude to, "every poem an epitaph" or pho-
tograph, a vertical slice of time that mummifies the moment and declares
the loss of contiguous duration.
46
In the ensuing elegy, "Dunbarton," Lowell continues implicidy to
link his elegiac craft to his grandfather while maintaining a distance from
his parents: each autumn his grandfather drove him to the family grave-
yard, where together they "raked leaves from our dead forebears" (72-73).
Indeed, this strategic alliance with his grandfather helps him to keep his
parents at bay: Lowell calls himself his grandfather's "son" and "paramour,"
and his maritally tinged lament in "Grandparents" (74-75) shows up his
different attitude toward his parents: "Grandpa! Have me, hold me, cher-
ish me!" While sorry that his grandfather can "Never again" rejoin him,
Lowell begins to betray impatience even with his grandfather, associat-
ing him with figures of overbearing but impotent authority. "Back in
my throw-away and shaggy span / of adolescence," Lowell remarks
with amusement, "Grandpa still waves his stick / like a policeman." Lowell
freezes his grandfather in a ridiculous pose, granting him only the apotheo-
sis of adolescent caricature. For all Lowell's concessions to his grandfather,
the poet represents his overriding elegiac impulse not as idealization but
disfiguration:
I hold an Illustrated London News-;
disloyal still,
I doodle handlebar
mustaches on the last Russian Czar.
Lowell self-mockingly associates his rebellion with Bolshevism, but he nev-
ertheless subjects his grandfather to a dual defacement, refiguring him as
anachronistic royalty and then disfiguring his refigured face. At the mo-
ment when transcendence might be expected, Lowell eternizes his grand-
father as hapless autocrat and shows him to be forever trapped beneath
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
his pen-faced, defaced, refaced according to the elegist's ambivalent im-
pulses. Once again, self-representation, though long traditional in the el-
egy, evokes not a stabilizing authorial ground but the play of mirror on
mirror, poetic identity floating among contradictory impulses toward ab-
jected imagos and selves.
Meanwhile, Lowell's father has fared far worse than his grandfather:
the son has not only thrown "cold water" on his parent's dreams but con-
spired to supplant him as "Father" with his grandfather (66, 72). He recalls
having persistendy "dug" and "picked with a clean finger nail at the blue
anchor / on my sailor blouse," an image that may seem innocent enough,
except that repetition clearly associates it with a specific naval of!icer (70,
69). When the anchor reappears in "Commander Lowell" (76-78), it has
dropped from the boy's shirt and into the ex-of!icer's ridiculous bath-time
chant:
"Anchors aweigh," Daddy boomed in his bathtub,
''Anchors aweigh,"
when Lever Brothers offered to pay
him double what the Navy paid.
................
He was soon fired. Year after year,
he still hummed ''Anchors aweigh" in the tub-
whenever he left a job,
he bought a smarter caro
Whereas the son picked at the anchor that figured his immovable paternal
burden, the father imagines anchoring himself as he drifts aimlessly from
jobs in the navy to soap-sales to investments. As with the trope of the
anchor, Lowell wages his unresolved "war" on his father in ironic contrasts,
both overt and subde. He had borrowed from his grandfather a thyrsus-
like cane, "more a weapon than a crutch," but this phallic inheritance
dwindles into the father's mere "dress sword with gold braid" and "ivory
Annapolis slide rule"-phony, ineffectual instruments that signify the fa-
ther's impotence and self-delusion (73, 77,80). Much as Lowell implicidy
defines his poetry of self-scrutiny and force over against his father, so too
the noncompensatory logic of his elegiac sequence eschews redemption,
while his father compensates himself for failure by singing songs about
237
236
ChapterSx
anchorsandbuyingfaneycars-tokensofthestability, power, andsuccess
rharhave eludedhim.
Lowellallowsrharhis father "once" hadaheroicmomentar rhe age
ofninereen, buthesaririzes hisfather's morerecentexistenceas ashamin
"Terminal Days ar BeverlyFarms" (79-80). Landlockedfor manyyears,
ex-commanderLowell"swayedas ifondeckduty."Abouttodie, heseems
"virallyrrim," while his head, useless as ever, looks "efficient." Stillsquan-
deringmoney,heconvinceshimselfhehaspulledoffagrearvicroryinrhe
form ofacardeal. fu ifrisking high dangers, he "stole off...I ro loaf in.
theMaritime Museum," thesecondverb ironicallydeflaring thefirsr. Ar
thehourofdeath, heis stillrryingro fake appearances:
Farher's deathwas abruprandunproresring.
Hisvisionwas srilltwenty-twenty.
Afteramorningofanxious, repetirivesmiling,
his lastwordsto Motherwere:
"1 feel awful."
Although"unprotesting"and"smiling,"hedoesnordiethe"happydeath"
oftherraditionalhero.Arrhemomentwhenrragicandelegiacconvention
might lead us ro expecr heighrened utterance, the father's last words are
hardlyrevelarory. Andar the momentwhen penetratingspiritual insighr
mightbeexpected,onlyhisphysical"vision"is keen.Whilerhepoerrecurs
oncemoreinrheensuingelegyrohisfarher'ssingleheroiehour-hisgun-
boatvoyage onrhe Yangrze-rhedouble inseriprion inthe bookdimin-
ishes rhis achievementbyplacingitunderthewingofmaternal guidanee
("Farher's Bedroom,"81). Neardeathas rhroughoutlife, rhefatherseems
rempted by "anxious, repetitive" fraud and self-deceprion, while rhe son
represents his ownart as rheexacropposire-anelegiac sequenee ofau-
rhentic memoryandself-revelarion. Bureven thoughthis ironiccontrast
enhanees thepoet's definitionofhis craftandhimself, itdoes norissuein
rheelegy's typicalreconstitutedandintegralidentity,sincetheson,perper-
uating rather than resolving oedipal strrte, remains haunred by the very
diseontinuityrharheimpugnsin hisfarher.
Lasr ro die, his morheris also lasramongrhe people elegized in rhe
"Life Studies" sequence, unlesswe counrLowell's tense glancearhis own
deathin"SkunkHour."Alrhoughrhepoetportrayshimselfas weepingar
238
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
hismother'sdeath,thebiographicalLowellalso experiencedmanicelarion
at thetime. Evenwithoutthishint,we mightdetectarroubledjoyinthe
violent, even exuberant deseriptions oftheshoreline "breakinginto fiery
flower" andrhegailycolored
sea-sleds
blastinglike jack-hammersacross
the spumante-bubblingwakeofourlinero ...
("SailingHomefrom Rapallo," 83-84)
Vividflowers, wildcolors,andaseabubblinglikechampagne-thescene
seemsmorelikeacelebrationthanamourningprocession.HavingseIected
hercasket,Lowellrelisheshislitdejokeonhercharacterandsocialpreten-
sions:
Morhertraveledfirst-dass inrheholdj
her Risorgimentoblackandgoldcasker
waslikeNapoleon'sattheInvalides....
Even in deathsheseems to demandher prerogatives. Theltalian under-
takerhas unwirringlycontributedafurther jokeonLowell's mother, who
usedtoinsistonhavinghernamespelledaccurately:
InthegrandiloquentletteringonMother'scoffin,
Lowellhadbeen misspelled LOVEL.
Thecorpse
waswrappedlikepanettoneinItaliantinfoil.
Yet onthereal coffin, hernamewas actuallymisspelled LOWEL,47 so itis
once again the poetwho disfigures thedead person, muchas he doodled
mustaches onthedisplaced pictureofhis grandfam
er
andattachedironic
tags like "vitally trirn" to his dying father. Disfiguring her name, he
strangely reveals the reason behind his poetic vandalism, for it was his
morher'sinsufficient LOVEtharheblamedfor turninghislovetoanger.
Indisfiguringhername,healso,ofcourse,disfigureshisownname,much
as throughoutthe entiresequence his abuse ofdeadfamily members has
s
also been self-abuse-batteringme imperfectly internalized imago that
constitutehisownpsyche.Thisincompleteinternalizationisbrieflyhinted
at in the poern's final eomparison ofrhe dead motherwith bread tO be
239
48
Chapter Six
consumed. After a number ofelegies that aggressively ironize and mock
thepoet'sparents, thesequencelogicallyproceedswithpoemsthatexplore
theprecarious structure ofthe poet's own ego. As Rosenthal wrote in an
earlyreviewofLife Studes, "1 wonderifamancan allowhimselfthis kind
ofghoulish operation onhis father [and mother] withoutdoinghis own
spiritincalculabledamage. Butthedamagehas clearlybeenin themaking
alongtime, andLowellknowsverywell thathe is doingviolencetohim-
selfmostofall:
...Ihear
my ill-spiritsob ineach bloodcell,
as if myhandwereatits throat...."49
Rather thanstrengthentheego, as theelegiacquestfor origins hadtradi-
tionallydone, Lowell's troubledquestreveals theoriginsofhis ego's insta-
bility-aninstabilityonly exacerbated by the sustained aggression ofhis
work. The poet's rebellion against his family ends notin the triumph of
the strongpostoedipalselfbutin a mind"notright," fractured by its im-
pulses to reinheritandexpel thedead, to reappropriateanddisinheritthe
past, to elevateanddemolishtheego.
Inlateryears, Lowell wentonto write more affectionate elegies for
hisparents,grandparents,andotherrelatives. HiselegiesforHarrietWins-
low, from "Soft Wood" (I964) and "Fourthoflulyin Maine" (I967) to
thefinal "Endings" (1974) aretender, free oftherancorthatrunsthrough
most of his domestic elegies. In his last volume, Day by Day (1977),Lowell
rewritessorneofhisearlierelegies, producingpoemsthatrecanthisyouth-
fuI combativeness. In"Phillips House Revisited," for example, Lowell re-
visits notonlythehouse butalso hisearliest, harshestelegyfor his grand-
father. Afterfortyyears herecalls the imageryoftheHouse, the crab, and
the gold mine, but nowhe is eager to grant his grandfather's brilliance,
magneticattractiveness,andinexhaustibleenergy. In"ToMother,"hestill
seems to feel reproved by the militaristic neatness ofhis mother's house-
cleaning,buthehasnowbeenable"todiscoveryouareas humanas Iam,"
her humorno longerhis "opposite" bur"mine now," herwhite-pebbled,
white-pottedliliesnow"seductive" inmemory.Andin"RobertT. S. Low-
ell" heevengrantshisfather his ownvoice, the"Son" reproachinghimself
for not having reached out to his father, the "Father" compounding this
240
l.
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
self-reproach with a meditation on "loneliness."5o These retractions are
moving, indicatingason'sheightenedawarenessthatheshares manyofhis
parents'unforrunatequalities.Buttheydefermoretothetraditionalcodes
of elegythandoLowell'searlierpoemsofharassedintensity.Muchpraised,
these final poems had a lesser literary impact than Lowell's elegies from
"QuakerGraveyard"toLife Studes, whichweredecisiveinhelpingSexton,
Plath, Berryman, Bidart, and others articulate an aggression toward the
deadthathadneverbefore beenutteredin thegenreof elegy, especiallyin
its parentalformo
]OHN BERRYMAN
Lowellelegizednumerouspoets, suchasJarrell, Roethke, MacNeice,Wil-
liams, andFrost,buthiselegyforBerrymanportraysthatpoetas hisnear-
estcolleague.HestageshiselegyforBerrymanas arecognitionscenebased
in his readingofthelastDreamSong:
Iusedtowanttolive
toavoidyourelegy.
Yet really we hadthesamelife,
thegenericone
ourgenerationoffered...,51
Ahhough Lowell explains this "generic" life primarily in professional
terms,hehintsin "Unwanted"thatbothpoetsfelt unlovedas children,so
that reading abour Berryman's ambivalentyouth is like "recognizing my
obituary." They share not only the "generlc" male hunger for maternal
love burtheequally"generic" male rivalrywith the father. Yet Lowell and
Berrymanexceedthe"generic" inits pejorativesense, openingup theele-
giacgenretomakeroomforanongoingoedipalviolencepreviouslybarred
from its normativeresolurions. FollowingLowell's example, Berrymanre-
inserts the elegy's displacedconflict into its originarydomesticsite. Both
poets, theirundyingangerilluminatedbythedeathofits primaryobject,
turn to the elegy to articulate oedipal fury. Poetically mourning their
fathers, they rehearse attachments and resistances fundamental to their
identities. The oedipalized elegy, thus, plays a crucial role in their an-
guishedlaborofself-interpretation.Muchas Lowellsaidhisfatherwas the
centralfigureofLife Studes, sotooBerrymansaidthatthefirst384Dream
241
Chapter Six
Songs were about his father's death, with only the last about his daughter's
pregnaney.52 But for aH their resemblances, LoweH and Berryman diverge
as elegists. Whereas Lowell distributes his oedipal antagonism among nu-
merous members of his family, Berryman more narrowly concentrates his
on his father. And whereas Lowell articulates but controls violent grief in
the language of novelistic satire and ironic contrast, Berryman pumps his
up, dramatizing it as wild rage and exaggerated despondeney.
Though Berryman avoided Lowell's elegy, he wrote anxious and
competitive poems for many other elegists in his Dream Songs. In these
works, he reclaims the most agonistic of traditional elegiac subgenres and
boosts its aggressivity. The deaths of poets spurred Berryman to reevaluate
his own status, as when he heard that Frost had died: "it's scary," he is
reported to have said, "Who's number one? Who's number one?"53 Won-
dering whether he or Lowell was now king of the cats, Berryman in an
elegy for Frost tried to ensure that Frost could no longer compete with him
from beyond the grave. Not hiding his lingering rancor for the old man's
"slanders," Berryman represents the poet as literally disfigured by moral
ugliness: "His malice was a pimple down his good / big face, with its sly
eyes."54 In his elegies for other poets, Berryman often contests their literary
standing. Once he has pigeonholed Roethke as the "Garden Master," the
poet who "favoured" "Weeds" can pose little threat to the poet who favored
people, dead or alive (18:20). Stirred by his narcissistic identification with
Delmore Schwartz, Berryman cannot help but recur in his elegiac sequence
to Schwartz's decline from "the more beautiful & fresh poems / of early
manhood" to his "weaker later" work (150:169). OfJarrell he asks, "Does
then our rivalry extend beyond / your death?" (259:278). Although he
would forgive Plath her suicide, Berryman represents her as the bad
mother, careless of "the screams of orphaned children." In contrast with
the "poor exemplum" of her cowardly "resignation," a heroic image of
Henry-Berryman closes her elegy, the poet withstanding the temptations
of suicide: "he / alone breasts the wronging tide" (112:191). Berryman
sharply distinguishes himself from Stevens, parodying his competitor's bird
imagery, poetics of abstraction, and m-alliterations Oove "moved among
us, as a muttering king, / Magnificent").55 While Stevens wrote unmov-
ingly discursive poetry, "Ir is our kind / to wound." Recalling Stevens's
ambitious effort to apprehend the "Nothing that is not there," Berryman
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
turns the negativity of "The Snow Man" into an emblem of what was
"missing" from Stevens's apparently inhuman art, the "something ... not
there." The last line of the elegy tries to balance compliment and detrac-
tion, but the vague concession that Stevens was "better than us" is nearly
undone by the poet's self-commemorative tag: "less wide" (219:238).56 In
the end, Berryman manages ro withstand the competition from fellowele-
gists, not only because he slyly puts them down but also because, in putting
them down, he bequeaths to later poets a newly enlivened mode of profes-
sional elegy. Much as Auden renewed the subgenre by uncovering and in-
tensifYing its latent propensity toward homoerotic union, so Berryman
takes to a new level its opposite tendeney toward hornosocial rivalry and
division.
Looming larger than any of these testy professional poems in the
strucrure and psychology of The Dream Songs, however, are Berryman's ele-
gies for his father-elegies indebted to the aggressive tactics of Lowell's
paternal elegies and, especially in the penultimate Song, of Plath's. Unlike
the deaths of other poets, the death of Berryman's father is a major struc-
rural device in The Dream Songs, giving shape to its emotive sprawl: it is
the subject of the first Song, the penultimate Song of Book 3, rlJ.e second-
to-Iast and last Songs ofBook 5, and the penultimate Song ofBook 7 (the
last book of the collection)Y Casting an elegiac hue over the entire se-
quence, the first Song suggests that the father's death is the founding mo-
ment ofHenry-Berryman's maturity and poetic career; thus, for Berryman,
as for Lowell and Plath, the father's death elicits not ooly lament but also
an equivocal search for origins. Once upon a time, the world seemed a
preoedipal extension of himself, or "a woolen lover," but "Then carne a
deparrure," the father's death occasioning the son's mythic fall into experi-
ence. As a result "1 sang"-song both an effort to reawaken "glad" inno-
cence and ro articulate, as the rest of the Songs establish, loss, deprivation,
injury (1:3). Instead of healing this primordial wound, the poet enters
more deeply into it as the sequence evolves. Felt throughout the Songs, the
terrible "departure" is explained only gradually, as the poet strips layer after
layer from his mysterious injury. Ir is first named as the father's suicide
"long agone" in "Henry's Confession." In this penultimate Song of the
original 11 Dream Songs, Berryman hints amid his "bafHin odd sobriety"
that all the mad antics-the drink, the "girls," the theatrics-have been
243
242
ChapterSix
evasionsofthistraumaticevento Theydiverthimfromhissuicidallonging
to "joinmyfather" in death. HoweverurgentBerryman's questto recover
the origins ofhis despondentpoetry, the pithyandennoblingrhetoricof
thispoemobscuresthecircumstancesofthesuicide:hisfather"dared"kili
himse1fby a "smotheringsouthern sea" (76.'83). Berryman vacil1ates be-
tweenprotective1ycloakingandpainful1yunveilingthisoriginarytrauma.li
Over the course ofthe paternale1egies in The Dream Songs, he confronts
itevermoredirectIyandangrily.
Finallynamingtheenigmaticsea the "Gulf," the e1egies at theend
ofBook 5clarifJ the adjective "smothering"-threetimes Berryman re-
pOrts his father's threat to take him along on a suicidal swim (160-62).
Butthe recoveryofthis disturbingepisodestiH proceeds infits andstarts:
theincreasein detailin Song143is offsetbyanincreaseintheatricalcam-
ouflage. Berrymanrecaststheantiphonalstructureofpastorale1egyasmin-
stre1 show, the unnamedpersonacrooningthestoryofBerryman'sloss:
Honourtheburntcork, be avaudevil1e man,
1'11 singyou nowasong
thelike ofwhich maybringyourheartto break:
he's gone! andwe don'tknowwhere. (J43:160)
Thepoetcan bestexpresshisgriefbyrecastinghimse1fas other, inparticu-
lar as racial other. Masked in blackness, he can indulge the pathos pro-
jectedbyminstre1sy ontoMricanAmericans, particular1yatatimewhen
whiteAmericanswereevermorevigorouslyrepressingfamilialgrief. Divid-
inghimse1finto an oldersinging"1" andthe "Iitde"suffering "you," Ber-
ryman tries to ensure his distance from the traumatized child. But pro-
nominal instability erodes this se1f-partition, as the mourner shifts from
"you" to "we," from "you" to "us," thenfina11y to "My," "me," "my," "1,"
"1," "1," "1," and "I" Itwas "my childhood," the poet admits, that the
suicide"wipedout." In this gesture, Berrymanhe1ps tobringintothepa-
rentale1egy theunmitigatedpainandangerofthewoundedchild. Bye1e-
gy's end,dramatictrappingshavefallen away, thepoetmoaning,"1 repeat:
Ilovehim/ until Ifal1intocoma." Iterationbetrays Henry'sambivalence:
he is trying to convince himse1fthathe loves his father, even though his
father threatened to kiH him and though his father did indeed kiH him
psychological1y ("wipedoutmychildhood"). Further, thepoet'sfigure for
244
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
me intensity ofhis love-the coma-suggests that this love is suicidal,
perhaps a turning inward ofhis desire for revenge against the injurious
famer. To love thefather, to accept himandidentifJwith him, is also to
affirm his violence against both thefather andhis son. Thoughthe poet
cloaks his aggression here as "Iove," he also indicates thathewants to kil1
mepartofhimse1fthatmostclose1yidentifieswithhis father.
InSong145 thepoetpersistsintryingtoassurehimse1fofhislove,
buthisprotestationskeep twistingroundintotheiropposite."1 lovehim,"
herepeats for the third time, buthis father's innocence ("me he's doneno
wrong") is quicklyqualified bythe nextline ("for goingonforty years-
forgiveness time"). Damagedbyhisfatherinyouth, Henrytries toforgive
him by sympathizingwith "his despair," but his pity mere1y succeeds in
entanglinghis fatherwith grosser crimes: "hefe1t as bad as Whitmanon
his tower." Quiedy, Henryretreats from this comparison between his fa-
therandoneofthe mostnotorious mass-murderers ofthesixties. Hehas
to remind himse1fonce more thathis father literallykil1ed himse1falone,
thatHenryhas reason to fee1 gratitudetowardhis father: "buthe did not
swimoutwithmeormybrother/as hethreatened."Sti11, thelineberween
psychological andphysical murderkeeps blurring, so HenrymustspecifJ
yetagainthathisfather-"heonly"-ki11edandwaskil1ed. "I-I'm/ try-
ingto forgive," Henrystutters, stilltryingtoovercomethe implicitanger
thatdisruptshis speech. To absolve his fatherofhis crime, Berryman de-
personalizes the act, saying his father "didwhatwas needed" and "could
notlive/aninstantlonger,"as ifanirresistibleforce compel1edthesuicide.
Similar1y,heclosesthee1egy byinsistingrepeatedlyonthe"1" thatoudasts
its me1ancholicsplittingand byimposingtheorderofrwo rhymesonhis
dislocated utterances. His sanguine conclusion-thatthe suicide "in the
summerdawn /leftHenrytolive on"-reaflirmshisidentityinnameand
associates his survival withdiurnalrebirth.
"1 take it therefore," Berrymanwrote inan unfinished story, "that
my desolation and rage over his death persisted, although for years I
thoughtit pure1ygrief."58 UnderLowel1's influence, Berrymanfingers but
restrains his rage inhis ear1ye1egies, while underPlath's influence,he un-
leashesitinthepenultimateDreamSong: "1 standaboyemyfather'sgrave
with rage." Indeed, there are many paral1els between these manic-
depressive poets, 150th ofthem scarred in childhood by the apparentIy
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ChapterSix
willed deaths oftheir fathers, bothofthem dramatizing their rage in an
actofmurderthatis also seIf-murder. InvertingtheeIegist's usual posture
ofoedipal submission to the dead, Berryman stands above his father,
thoughhe foll
ows
traditionale1egy in settinghis songat thesunsethour
andrepresentinghislamentas arepetition. Lowell, forall his resistance to
thedead,encryptshisviolenceinverbalironyandsatiricportraiturerather
thanvengefulseIf-dramatizations. Berrymantoo,insorneofhiseIegiesfor
friends and rivals, had mixed his admiration with contemptuous barbs.
ButnowhereproducesPlath'sdeveIopmentas hedescribeditinhereIegy:
"Yourforce carneonlikea torrent toward theend/ ofagonyandwrath"
(172:191). ReIeasing his own wrathful torrent toward the end of The
Dream Songs, BerrymanfollowsPlathinreversingtheeIegiacworkofresto-
ration and reintegration, imaginativeIy breaking open his father's coffin,
tearingaparthis dothes, andwieIdingamurderousweapon:
Ispituponthisdreadfulbanker'sgrave
whoshothis heartoutinaFloridadawn
O hoalas alas
Whenwill indifferencecome, Imoan& raye
I'dliketoscrabbletill Igotrightdown
awaydown underthegrass
andax thecasketopenhato see
justhowhe's takingit,which hesoughtsohard
we'll tearapart
themoulderinggravedothesha....
Ravaged by his meIancholichatred, Henry-Berryman longs for "indiffer-
ence"; indeed,heassociateshisviolencetowardhisfatherwithsuicide,for
to kill his father he must buryhimseIf"under thegrass." Onlysuch vio-
lence can bothavenge his father's aggression andjoinhimwith thedead
man, whom hehas soughtas hardas hisfathersoughtdeath. Disrupting
hisdiscoursebyinterjectingthecomicexpletives"Ohoalasalas" and"ha,"
Berrymansplitshislanguagebetweenthefarcical andthebelligerent. Like
Plath's "Daddy," this eIegy is a rhetorical act ofgrotesque exaggeration,
thepoetseIf-consciouslycarryingoutasymbolicmurderwhileparodying
himselfThefirst DreamSonghadsuggestedthatthefather'ssuicideocca-
sioned the birth ofBerryman as suffering artist, thepoetofloss; in this
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
penultimate Dream Song Berryman suggests that to annihilate his self-
murderedfatheronceandforallwouldbeanactofseIf-annihilation:
Henry
willhefttheaxoncemore,his final card,
andfell itonthestart.
To efface thestartofall his troubles would also be to destroy his raison
d'etreas atroubledpoet-andtheoriginatingeventforthisentirevolume
ofpoems. "1 cannotread thatwretched mind," Berrymanhadwrittenin
thepreviouselegyfor his father, andinthiselegyherepresentshis father's
suicideas atextualevent:he"torehispage/out."The"card" (from charta,
orleafofpaper) Henryvows to "fell" onhis start is this poem itseIf-a
rhetorical ax so violent that it might just free him from his fate, might
enablehim to leave this storybehindandstartanew, as suggested byhis
daughter'spregnancyinthelastoftheDreamSongs. Nowondertheper-
sonaofthe mournful "Henry" seems to be superseded in thelast Dream
Songo Berrymanprefaced the Songswitha note thatcondudes,afterde-
scribingHenryandhisfriend,"Requiescantinpace."Berrymancharacter-
izes Henryas having"suffered anirreversible loss"; thus, whenHenryre-
turns to the grave to reverse the irreversible, to rewrite his originating
narrative, hemustalso will his own destruction. Like Lowell and Plath,
whoriskfurtherdamagetothemselvesbyrecoveringparentaloriginsonly
toattackthem,Berrymansuggests thattoheightentheoedipalaggression
oftheelegyis toforsake thegenre's normativemovementtowardpsychic
reintegration, courtinginsteadthedangersofseIf-annihilation.
ALLEN GIN5BERG
Mourningas a return to and separation from parental origins is also the
psychological impetusofGinsberg'selegy for his mother, Kaddish. In the
sixties, bothLowellandBerryman readalongsideGinsberg, whosepoetry
was "raw" bycomparisonwiththeir"cooked"offerings,inLowell'sfamous
distinction.NotthatLowellandBerrymancookedtheireIegies toabodi-
less broth.Berryman'smournfulquestculminatesinthesymbolicdestruc-
tionofhis paternalorigins, thepoetheftinghis phallicax alast time; his
penpiercesthedividethatseparateshimfromhisfather,as thoughmourn-
ing were an actufsexual violence. And we have also seen thattropes of
246
247
ChapterSix
phallic aggression recur in Lowell's family elegies. But Ginsberg more
openly links his writing to bodily metaphors, from the scatological to the
phallic, from defecation to ejaculation. At the outset of his elegy for his
mother, he foregrounds the physicality of mourning, tying his lament to
the bodily performance of the ritual Kaddish, the blues shout, and the
poetry recitation:
Strange now to think of you, gone without corsets & eyes,
while I walk on the sunny pavement of Greenwich Vil-
lage.
downtown Manhattan, clear winter noon, and I've been up all
night, talking, talking, reading the Kaddish aloud, lis-
tening to Ray Charles blues shout blind on the phono-
graph
the rhythm the rhythm-and your memory in my head three
years after-And read Adonais' last triumphant stanzas
aloud-wept, realizing how we suffer-
59
Even at the beginning, Ginsberg recalls his mother not fully clothed but
in her undergarments-the first of many references to her corporeality. In
grouping together the still vital traditions of]ewish lamentation, the blues,
and the elegy, Ginsberg implicitly sets them against the backdrop ofa post-
war white America that would render bereavement invisible. Although the
blues plays a less sustained role in this poem than either the ritual Kaddish
or the elegy, Ginsberg, like Berryman, links the expression of raw grief
with African-American culture, even comparing his poetic overflow to a
"saxophone chorus" (13/212). In Ginsberg's performative lament, the
grief-encoded rhythms of the blues and the Kaddish merge, despite their
different ethnopoetic sources.
60
While critics have often discussed the poem's equivocal relation to
traditional Kaddish, they have said little about its relation ro Shelley's mel-
ancholic elegy, Adonais, but the continuities range from such incidental
details as Ginsberg's allusions to the nightingale and the mourner's ''Ai! ai!"
to the elegy's overall structure (out-in-out or present-past-present/future)
(9/210). More important, Ginsberg like Shelley depicts a narcissistic iden-
tification that, resisting the search for compensarory substitutes, impels the
poet toward self-destruction; hence the Shelleyan epigraph ro Ginsberg's
248
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
volume: "-Die, / If thou wouldst be with that which thou dost seek!" As
this famous injunction suggests, the precursor-elegy chosen by Ginsberg is
a poem that highlights not only the self-desttuctiveness but also the erotics
of mourning. Impatient with the "dome of many-coloured glass," with the
"web," with the "mirrors" of "Life" that separate him from the dead man,
Shelley closes his elegy with a sexually charged vision of mourner and de-
ceased breaking through these barriers: "breath ... / Descends on" the
poet, "driven" forward, as the earth and skies "are riven!" He is "borne
darkly, fearfully, afar: / Whilst burning through the inmost veil of
Heaven," Adonais "Beacons." Whereas most elegists consent ro restrain
mournful eros or at least deflect it onto a new object, Shelley insists on
the urgeney of his self-destructive need. Ginsberg intensifies the erotics of
Shelley's drive roward origins-the origins figured in Adonais as "The fire
for which all thirst." But whereas the heterosexual Shelley envisions a
same-sex interfusion with Keats, the homosexual Ginsberg must undertake
a heterosexuallament for his mother. Even so, the psychosexual nature of
the poem is multilayered. First, Ginsberg forms a poetic alliance with his
male precursor Shelley, as in the exclusively male company of mourners in
the traditional Kaddish. Second, he follows Shelley and other elegists in
conjuring maternal origins only ro relinquish them by the poem's end,
identifying instead with the phallic "Lord Lord great Eye that stares on
All" (36/227). While sustaining these same-sex identifications, Ginsberg
tells a narrative ofhis mother's life that, with its insanity and scandal, mod-
ulates into a psychosexual explanation ofhis homosexuality. After relating
how at twelve he first had to transport his paranoid mother away from
home, he adds, as if incidentally, that this was the year of his "first love," a
starry-eyed "crush" that eventually led ro "whole mountains ofhomosexu-
ality, Matterhorns of cock, Grand Canyons of asshole" (16/214). Further,
Ginsberg's unveiling of his mother's sad condition, often labeled "embar-
rassing" by critics, confirms his repudiation ofembarrassment over his own
sexuality. The gay poet stays out of the "closet" by bringing the mad
mother out of the "attic"; indeed, he mentions both hiding places in his
first description of her madness, as if to link the two kinds of "coming out"
(14/213).
Like Berryman and Lowell, Ginsberg mournfully returns to his pa-
rental origins to ieoriginate himself poetically, but unlike them, he returns
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ChapterSix
to a literalized, maternal source. More than his contemporaries or precur-
sors, he reveals the living body of the deceased-the living body from
which he carne. Traditional elegists had shrouded the dead in allegory and
dressed them up in abstraction, their poems reasserting the inevitable me-
diation separating them from the dead; Ginsberg describes his mother with
her "dress unbuttoned on one side" (18/215), "varicosed, nude, fat" (22/
218), "in corset" (221218), "oft naked in the room" (24/219), "half-naked"
(25/220), or "half undressed" (27/221). In death and earlier in her mad-
ness she withdrew from him, so the writing of this elegy is an act of pene-
tration: "Now I've got to cut through-to talk to you-as I didn't when
you had a mouth" (111211). But though he wants to reencounter his
bodily source, he is often repulsed by what he uncovers; this repulsion
helps him ro suggest, in mrn, the source of his sexual proclivity. Ginsberg
patterns his drive to recover his origins on his mother's deathly return to
hers: she has "escaped back to Oblivion" (7/209), "Pure-Back ro the Babe
dark before your Father" (9/210), "In that Dark," "Void" (10/211),
"Nothingness," "God's perfect Darkness" (12/212). In these descriptions
of death as the womblike dark, Ginsberg conRates generative source with
destructive end, "the Origin" with "Death which is the mother of the uni-
verse!-Now wear your nakedness forever" (29, 30/223). Ginsberg follows
not only Shelley but Whitman, who had hailed death as the "Dark
mother," her "loving Roating ocean" a kind of amniotic Ruid that blessed
the dead.
61
Yet Ginsberg identifies death not with an abstract mother but
with his own mother. Like Whitman's mystical quest for "the sure-
enwinding arms of cool-enfolding death," Ginsberg's more sexualized
quest for his mother is both self-productive and self-destructive. He re-
creates himself in relation to his mother, but this radical stripping down
of the mother and of himself threatens him with extinction. Besieged by
contradictory responses to his mother, the poet recoils from the womb to
which he owes his existence, repeatedly alluding to fearful or repellent ori-
fices: "hideous gape of bad mouth" (10/211), "all those rags between
thighs" (17/215), "lips formed an O, suspicion-thought's old worn va-
gina" (21/218), "farewell / with your old dress and a long black beard
around the vagina" (34/226). Compelling himself to recollect his mother's
body, Ginsberg would force himself to override the disgust that it inspires,
would reaffirm his connection with his maternal source. He hails her as
250
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
the wellspring ofhis speech, art, and propheey, "O glorious muse that bore
me from the womb, gave suck first mystic life & taught me talk and music,
from whose pained head I first took Vision" (29/223). Thus, however re-
pulsed by his mother's body, he strongly identifies it with himself and with
his poetry, thanking it as the source of both.
Ginsberg also identifies his mother's body with the mournful torrent
that he now unleashes. Though he repeatedly refers to her body, he dwells
on it in two key passages of the elegy. In the first, it is represented in terms
of expulsion, foreshadowing the final expulsion of her soul:
One night, sudden attack-her noise in the bath-
room-like croaking up her soul-convulsions and red vomit
coming out ofher mouth-diarrhea water exploding from her
behind-on all fours in front of the toilet-urine running be-
tween her legs-Ieft retching on the tile Roor smeared with her
black feces-unfainted- (22/218)
Breaking ancient taboos on the exposure and degradation of the dead,
Ginsberg Roods the poem with graphic details that mimic the uncon-
trolled discharge he describes. Bursting through the dam of elegiac deco-
rum, he reproduces at a literary level his mother's oral, anal, and urinary
efHux. Critics have often said his poem is "shapeless" and "formless," but
this effect is crucial to Ginsberg's verbal mimesis of his mother, his lan-
guage similarly "coming out," "exploding," and "running." Byexposing
his mother he also exposes himself, as we have seen-the defiant gay writer
who, resolutely "out," reasserts his freedom from inhibition. Ginsberg
proves that his mother is indeed the muse ofhis scatological poetry, includ-
ing this scatological elegy; as Jack Kerouac explained the Beat principIes of
composition, "No pause to think of proper word but the infantile pileup
of scatological buildup words till satisfaction is gained."62 The general
alignment between mother and poet might be expected to reRect positively
on the mother; but to the extent that Ginsberg's linguistic release resembles
her bodily release, he is not only mimicking his mother but getting her
"out of his system," exorcising from his mind an insane, guilt-inducing
specter.
In the second key passage, the poet shifts from the scatological to the
erotic. Ginsberg's l y is in turns expulsive and libidinal, the poet trying
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ChapterSix
both to rid himself of his mother and to recover her, both to degrade her
and to make love with her:
One time I thought she was trying to make me come lay
her-flirting ro herself at sink-Iay back on huge bed that
filled most of the room, dress up round her hips, big slash of
hair, scars of operations, pancreas, belly wounds, abortions, ap-
pendix, stitching of incisions pulling down in the fat like hid-
eous thick zippers-ragged long lips between her legs-What,
even, smell of asshole? I was cold-Iater revolted a little, not
much-seemed perhaps a good idea to try-know the Mon-
ster of the Beginning Womb-Perhaps-that way. Would she
care? She needs a lover. (24/219)
Once again the poet refuses any mediating veil between himself and his
mother, but, once again, he is also repelled by what he uncovers: the origi-
nating womb is a "Monster," and the rest of the body is covered with
threatening incisions and partial openings. Allured but repelled by the un-
concealed body, Ginsberg pulls back after this most intimate scene of the
elegy; he hastily dives under the cover of ritual, interjecting his only He-
brew quotation from the Kaddish. The same ambivalence that he felt as a
teenager wracks his poem: he wants to get closer to his mother than any
elegist had been ro his or hers, wants ro love her more fiercely than any
mourning son had loved his, but he is confronted with her monstrous
body: the hairy "slash" of her "ragged" vagina, the legs and stomach muti-
lated and mended, possibly even a smelly anus. Flouting the elegiac taboo
on disrobing the dead, Ginsberg recapitulates poetically his earlier imagi-
native violation of the incest taboo. Both violations ultimately reinforce
his shattering of the taboo on open homosexuality, despite the apparent
contradiction between his homosexuality and his incestuous temptation.
Later he compares visiting his mother in an asylum to following a "path to
a minute black hole-the door-entrance thru crotch," suggesting that
visiting her, as he does in this elegy, is a matter ofcompelled heterosexualiry
(28/222). In a letter he received two days after his mother had died, she is
still telling him "Get married Allen don't take drugs" (31/224). Ginsberg
hopes to compensate for his rejection of her sexuality and her rejection
of his. To this end, he identifies his marginality as homosexual with her
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
estrangement as madwoman, linking the two positions, for example, in a
line that boldly extends the Kaddish blessing of God in everything:
"Blessed be He in homosexuality! Blessed be He in Paranoia!" (32/225).
In a cryptic sequence of phrases, Ginsberg even links his elegy's uninhib-
ited rush of revelations to her madness: "this is release of particulars-
(mad as you)-(sanity a trick of agreement)" (13/212). Alluding briefly to
his own breakdown, he returns so abrupdy to his mother's insanity that he
momentarily obscures whether it is he or she who "went half mad": "1 was
in bughouse that year 8 months-my own visions unmentioned in this
here Lament- / But then went half mad" (25/220).
In spite of his fervent identification and love, Ginsberg must con-
standy fight the worry that he may in sorne sense have been the fulfillment
ofhis mother's paranoid anxieties. His mother suffered from paranoid fears
of"Hider, Grandma, Hearst, the Capitalists, Franco, Daily News, the '20s,
Mussolini, the living dead" (26/221), of her sister Elanor, her doctors, as-
sassins, spies, poison gas, invisible bugs, Jewish sickness, sticks in her back,
and wires in her brain. Since she was a Russian Jewish emigre with
communist-socialist views, many of her fears were rooted in the historical
realities of her time. Although her son felt he had ro commit her to hospi-
tals and asylums, he reproaches himself for abandoning her. At twelve he
"left Naomi to Parcae in Lakewood's haunted house" (15/214), as if he
wanted her dead; indeed, on the bus ride home he thought to himself,
"Would she were safe in her coffin" (15/214). Left alone, she went "mad,"
barricaded herself under the bed, screaming in terror; the guilt-ridden son
asks, "my fault, delivering her to solitude?" (17/215). On a subsequent
occasion, as he takes her for the last time and "forever" to the hospital, his
mother demands, '''Why did you do this?''' (28/222). When he returns
two years later, he finds his mother skeletal, gaunt, lobotomized, her "hand
dipping downwards to death" (29/223). Her face has turned skull-like, "as
if she were dead thru funeral rot" (30/225). Abandoning his mother ro the
hospital, Ginsberg worries he has abandoned her to the grave. After she
dies, he must assure himself that "she was better- / at last" (31/224). His
rhapsodic celebration of her death as liberation-"you're out, Death let
you out, Death had the Merey" -helps to quiet his guilt over having
wanted her dead (9/210). His retrospective re-identification with his
mother is in parla defensive response ro the worry that he was her killer,
253
252
ChapterSix
that he was the conspirator she took him for on his last visit. Earlier she
had chided her son for not understanding that people "want to see me
dead" (141213), and the greatest worry of the elegy is that Ginsberg him-
self proved her right. In the later dream-poem "Black Shroud," Ginsberg
dramatizes explicitly his guilt toward his mother: he enacts her murder in
a gruesome scene, "beheading her" at a sink with a "knife-like ax" and then
trying to conceal the deed. In the companion poem, "White Shroud," the
poet revisits his mother as contemporary bag-Iady and tries to make
amends for having "abandoned" her.
63
Kaddish already incorporates these
contradictory impulses. Guilty for having wanted his mother to die, angry
at her for making him want her dead, and wounded that she forsook him
in madness, Ginsberg not only berates himselfin Kaddish but takes revenge
on his mother by relentlessly exposing her to public view. However painful,
this exposure avenges him for these injuries, justifies what he fears was his
ultimate betrayal ofher, and reaffirms his identity as a gay poet who refuses
aH elosets.
MICHAEL HARPER
Untesolved guilt and anger also erupt throughout the parental elegies of
Plath, Sexton, and Rich, as we shall see; but we turn first to one more male
elegist, Michael Harper, to study another vertical paradigm-a parent's
elegies for his children. Whereas the mainstream elegies of the English and
American canon enact the child's inheritance from and resistance toward
the parent (whether in the actual or displaced family arena), elegies for
children reverse this familial narrative, the poet assuming the role of a par-
ent responsible for giving the child protection and a bequest. Occasionally
elegies for children combine these two dynamicsj in "Threnody," for ex-
ample, Emerson casts the child as father to the man, elaiming his son
Waldo was "So gentle, wise and grave" that "fairest dames and bearded
men ... / Bended with joy to his behest" and "Gentlest guardians ... /
Took counsel from his guiding eyes."64 But the death of a child is obviously
harder to redeem in a narrative ofgenerational transmission than the death
of a parent. In many traditional elegies for children, such as Bradstreet's
elegies for her grandchildren, Beaumont's elegy for his son, Lamb's "On an
Infant Dying as Soon as Born," and hundreds of elegies by "nightingale"
poets like Lydia Sigourney, the pervasive trope of the crushed bud or with-
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
ered flower figures the child's death as the extinction of futurity. The mag-
nitude of this loss suggests one reason why mourning for a child has often
been represented, from Shakespeare's tragedies to Kathe KoHwitz's prints,
as more intense and painful than mourning for a parent or spouse.
65
Not
that poets always "take" the death of children "inconsolably," as does the
wife in Frost's "Home Burial": elegists like Jonson and Bradstreet rational-
ize the loss as the repayment of a sacred loan, Emerson redeems the death
of his son by contextualizing it within a universe ofdivinely-driven change,
and the "nightingale" poets tirelessly beautify and sanctify children's
deaths. But the burden of parental responsibility often complicates such
consolatory maneuvers. Hardly has Jonson begun his elegy for his first son
before he is convicting himself of "sin." "1 think every parent," Frances
Gunther observes, "must have a sense of failure, even of sin, merely in
remaining alive after the death of a child. "66 In the aftermath of God's
withdrawal, the rise of psychology, the fall in child mortality rates, and the
desentimentalization of children's death, guilt figures even more promi-
nently in elegies for children than it once hado If the heightened guilt in
recent elegies for parents arises in part from the refusal of inheritance and
willing of final separation, it often involves in elegies for children the fail-
ure to transmit an inheritance and prevent a final separation. Even public
elegies on the death of children, such as Thomas's "Refusal to Mourn a
Death by Fire," Hill's "September Song," and Brooks's "The Boy Died in
My Alley," implicate the poets in the deaths they mourn-Brooks con-
eludes, for example, that she "kiHed" the elegized boy "with knowledgeable
unknowing."67 Brooks suggests she has contributed to the boy's violent
death by inuring herself tothe plight of black youths, but the problem of
never having known the child acutely affects another group of elegists-
poets mourning the deaths of infants. Deprived of any verbal access to the
nner life of the deceased, such poets often seem to suffer the inevitable
privaey of grief in an extreme formo In both Glck's elegy "For My Sister,"
dead at seven days, and Jon Silkin's "Death of a Son," who died "in a men-
tal hospital aged one," the poets emphasize their painful distance from the
children by representing the infants as enelosed within a house or behind
bars, forever speechless and inaccessible.
68
With precision and power, Michael Harper scrutinizes the inscruta-
bility of his two infant sons in a series of tormented elegies, most of them
254 255
Chapter Six
containedinhisfirstvolume, DearJohn, Dear Coltrane (1970),andothers
appearinginhis subsequentcollectionsoftheseventies. Notthattheseare
the only losses Harper mourns in his poetry. His first volume alone in-
cludes elegies for John Coltrane, Malcolm X, "Those four black girls
blown up / inthatAlabamachurch,"hundredsofslaves, andmyriad Bia-
frans, among others. Resounding with iterations ofthe word gone, the
bookfinally breaks into a furious blues incantation ofthe phrase another
brother gone, repeatingiteighteentimes.Amidthiscollectivegriefoverthe
untoId deaths ofAfricans andAfrican Americans is the private bereave-
ment ofa father mourning his sons-agriefinevitably inflected by the
sense ofmassive racialloss. For manyAfrican-Americanwriters, even the
most intimate griefhad long seemed inextricable from racial experience.
Alreadyintheessay "OfthePassingoftheFirst-Born," DuBoishadtried
ro reconcilehimselfto his son's deathas anearlyescapefrom "theLandof
theColor-line,"yetbitterlyruedtheloss ofachildwhomighthaveknown
aless racist future.
69
Drawingon the collective rage and griefalso at the
baseofjazzandtheblues, Harper, like LangstonHughes, SterlingBrown,
andGwendolynBrooksbeforehim,appropriatesAfrican-Americanmusic
forpoetry.Hispoetry'scloserelationtojazzinparticularremindsus ofthe
profoundly elegiac dimension ofthis great musical tradition. Especially
during the sixties, African-American improvisers often foregrounded the
melancholicgriefandangeroftheirmusicinsearingjazzelegies likeJohn
Coltrane's "Alabama" and Archie Shepp's "The Funeral" (later recast as
"Malcolm,Malcolm-SemperMalcolm"), notto mentionthelessoverdy
elegiacpieces. Suchmusicfinds astrongliterarycounterpartinthepoetry
ofMichael Harper,7o
Guiltoverone's ownfailure, impotentrageovermortality,anddeso-
lation over lost potential-Harper brilliandy transmutes these melan-
cholicaffects intothestrenuousstyle andreflection ofhis elegies. In"We
Assume: Onthe Death ofOurSon, Reuben Masai Harper," he manages
to disclose the agonizing self-enclosure ofgriefover a lost infant.
71
"We
assume," Harperapostrophizes, that"youlearnedtoacceptpureoxygen /
as the natural sky," buthe suggests thatsuch thoughts are mere assump-
tions, untested fantasies. Thefather can have no authenticknowledge of
his son's perspective, norcan his griefbeassuaged bymemories ofshared
experience. Representingtheimpermeable barrierbetweenfatherandson
256
AMERiCAN FAMiLY ELEGY 1
is the incubator in which Reuben lived his brieflife, surrounded in turn
by"thetwin-thickwindowsof thenursery."Thefamily's dreamsareunable
ro penetrate windows that surround the son, sticking to them "like
crookedpalmprints."Worstofall, thepoetcanneverknowthesatisfaction
ofhavingimpartedlovetohischild.Theelegyreproduceshisepistemolog-
icalandemotionalfrustration in theclinicaldetachmentofitslanguage-
28 hours, collapsible isolette, sterile hands, chemicals, bicarbonate, mucus,
stomach, plastic mask, autopsy. His relation to his son has been mediated
and mutilated by the impersonal, objectifying discourse ofthe hospital.
Neverhavingglimpsed his son's psychic interior, thefather is condemned
to thinkingofhis childas aphysicalcollectionofveins, lungs, mucus.
Feelingthathehas failed hisson,thathehas beenunableto perform
his paternal duty, the father resists surrendering his griefto consolation.
The fact that another parent had also lost her son offers scant comfort.
Noris the poet "consoled" by the thought ofReuben or the otherchild
mounting"intothatsky," since theirascentwas no metaphysicaljourney
but a quest for oxygen, which each ofthem found in abundance as "a
disposablecremation."Thelastpartoftheelegyintersperses therhetorics
of harsh fact and illusory comfort, its verbal patchwork evoking the
mourner's alternationbetween ruefullongingandself-critical realismo On
the one side are soothingphrases like an angel gone ahead, to pray Jor our
family, gone into that sky, afine brown powderedsugar, buttheyare deflated
by brutally impersonal words like oxygen, autopsy, a disposable cremation.
Theelegycloseswithanotherdisquietingstandoffbetweendesire(we loved
you) andskepticism(you did not know), wedgingthemrogetherinitsvexed
last line:
Weassume
youdidnotknowwe lovedyou.
Comparableinitsbleakness,Harper'snextelegy, "Reuben,Reuben,"
is nomorehopefulabouttheaccessibilityofthe deadboy's experience or
ofconsolation.Thegrievingfather, isolatedterriblyin"WeAssume...,"
is still trying to fight his way out ofthe prison ofremorse in "Reuben,
Reuben" (64). Listeningro jazz, he seeks in itthecomfortofan objective
correlative for his anguish, buthehas difllcultyreachingbeyondhis pain
and into another/reality. The cryptic language ofthe poem mirrors this
257
l
ChapterSix
difficulty, suggesting the poet's reluctance to deliverhis feelings notonly
ro music buttowords, to "thebeat" ofpoeticformo Thephrases hefinds
for his son-"lovefruit, apiekle ofhate"-areless catharticthan contra-
dictory. Butinthemomentofdiscoveringatraditional tropeforhisson's
death,hefinallyrelinquisheshisresistancetotheswayofmusic:
abrown berrygone
to rotjusttwo days onthebranch;
we've lostason,
themusic,jazz, comesin.
Functioningas asynecdocheforAfrican-Americanloss, art,andevensen-
suality,thewordjazz gatherstogetherthepoem'smajorthematicstrands-
agriefthatverges on"madness," a"great" creativitythatmightrelieve or
express thatgrief, anda "lovefruit" that rots, betraying theaffection that
generatedit to inspire "hate" and"madness" (jazz was once slang for "ro
copulatewith").Wantingto joinhis personalgrieftojazz, Harpercannot
easilyreturnfromhisemotionalexiletofindsolaceintheaggregateexperi-
ence ofpain, though he points toward the larger cultural context ofhis
griefas anAfricanAmerican.
"Deathwatch," the third poem in this series, engages this cultural
contextmoreexplicidy, clarifyingtheties bindingmourningto race (65-
66). In the hospital, with its microcosm ofinterracial power relations,
deathandmourningareboundto agridofblacknessandwhiteness. The
mother, remarkingtheson'sresemblancetohis father, thinkstheboyis
likeablack-
stemmedEasterrose
in awhitehand.
Building on the ominous racial implications ofthis comparison, Harper
begins to see the black infant as an object ofritual sacrifice: he is "a
collapsed/balloondoll"with"eightvoodoo/adrenalinholes" initschest.
Even theautopsyanddisposal papersreflect racialdivision, written
in blackink
onwhitepaper
likethecountry
youwere bornin....
258
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
Small black marks surrounded by whiteness, a perforated doll, a black-
stemmed rose held ina white hand-thefather cannot help butsee his
loss through thelens ofhis racial experience, visualizing the blackinfant
as a powerless litde object dominated, manipulated, perhaps even sacri-
ficed bywhites. Demonstratingthathis bereavementis inextricablefrom
racial experience, Harper angrily recalls howwhites have suppressed and
denied the griefofAfrican Americans: he alludes to the griefofanother
melancholicfather, DuBois, towhomaCornellstudentwrote,askingon
behalfof theclass:
"Willyoupleasetell us
whetherornotitis true
thatnegroes
are notabletocry?"
Thedenial ofacollective historyofmourningdeprives blacks, like other
racial and ethnic minorities,of their humanity and dignity, and ofa source
ofgroupidentity.ThissuppressionofAfrican-Americangrief inflamesthe
poet'sanger, untiliteruptsintoablind,furiouscry: ''Americaneedsakill-
ing," he repeats, and"Survivors will be human." Jusdyfaultingwhite in-
difference toAfrican-American griefandloss-anindifference thatleads
roevermoredeathandmourningintheblackcommunity-Harperrisks,
when he calls for still more bloodshed, merely reversing the very scape-
goatinghe condemns. Psychologically, his vengeful demand completes a
purgativeturnfromguilttoaggression. Thefatherhadstared, helpless, at
a mirrorlike infant-"the face / ofyour black father, / his fingers, his
toes"-andhadsigned"theautopsy/anddisposalpapers."Tormentedby
his feeling ofresponsibility, heredirects outwardaportionofhis irradica-
ble burden.
Continuingtowrite elegies for his sons in latercollections, Harper
recurs to the "white hand" thatappeared briefly in "Deathwatch," butit
becomes a more central figure ofresentment in "Nightmare Begins Re-
sponsibility" (1975).72Heretheinstitutionof thehospitalisaracialnight-
mare,thefatherhavingtoentrusthisfragile childtothehistoricaloppres-
sors, though "distrusting white-pink / ...end hairs, distrusting tubes,"
"distrusting-white-hands-picking-baboon-light / on this son." Reversing a
commonracistslurbyrepresentingthewhitehandsas baboon-likeintheir
259
ChapterSix
sizeandc1umsiness,thepoetis steeledinhis"infinitedistrust"ofthewhite
meninpower, ofthewhiteinstitution,ofthe"white-doctor-who-breathed-
for-him-all-night." Harper, who had himselfpursued premedical studies
before beingdeterredbyracism, depicts thecollisionbetweenwhitescien-
tificcultureandblack"folk" culture byforcing themtogetherinsuchcol-
locationsas
mamaborn, sweetsonchild
gonedowntowninto researchtestingwarehousebatteryacid
mama-son-done-gone....
Hefeels hehasabandonedhissontoa"tube-kept/prison"andfears "what
theywilldoinexperiment." Hisangerrisingoncemoretoaviolentpitch,
he expresses "panebreaking heartmadness"-anaggression that external-
izes heart-breakinggrief, thatsymbolicallycracks the barriers keepinghim
from his son. Singingthe"boxscarred" blues, heperceives his son's depar-
tureas oneofthe myriadlosses suffered byblackparentshistorically.
Inspite oftheprofoundhistoricalconsciousness encodedinthis el-
egyandothers,Harperdoes notalwaysplacehis bereavementinapolitical
contexto In "Kneading" he focuses on the familial context ofgrief, sug-
gesting theeffectofdeath ontheerotic relationship thatbothoccasioned
andsurvived it.?3 Each stanzaoftheelegy is along, periodicsentence, its
rhythms mirroring the rhythms ofthe kneading he describes. His wife's
kneading, like his poetryand their dailylives, works into one composite
thevarious tenses oftheirexistence. It incorporatestheseeds ofthefuture
("kernels, grains") andtakes up the "dust" ofthe past. It "fuses / mysons
and theworld ofthe house," lost promise and the presento Inkneading,
the mothercontains both presence and absence, her living boys and her
dead: the "sons quiver in the shadows" and "crevices" ofher body, inher
eyes and ears. The mother's body represents the insistence ofthe past in
thepresent, her"scarshapedlikeananchor,"as iftosuggestthatthepres-
ent would be unmoored without the injuries of the past. The poet's
mournful yearning for his dead sons, his need to preserve and protect
them,commingleswithhis needforhis kneadingwife, representedinthis
poemas bothanobjectofdesire andyetasignifieroftheabsentdead. In
consuminghereucharisticbread,thepoetingests"thedeath" kneadedinto
hercreative act, much as his own poeticworkholds the dead fast within
260
"
AMERiCAN FAMiLY ELEGY 1
itsdiscourse. Poetrybothkneadsandneeds thedead, in theelaboratepun
running through the poem: Harper's work, often recalling the historical
and me personal dead, kneads them into its texture, and needs them to
sustainitsworkofelegiackneading.Torecurto}onson'sfamouspun,Har-
per's sons mayhave been his "bestpiece[s] ofpoetry" and may also have
occasionedhissecondbestpiecesof poetry.Whileworkinginthesubgenre
of elegiesforchildren, Harperparadoxicallyaccomplishestheelegiacwork
oftransmission,inheritingthedeadsonswhoshouldhavebeenhis inheri-
tors, incorporating them into the ongoing renewal ofmourning that is
his poetry.
261
Chapter Seven
In this imaginative death, represented as concurrent with the poem,
the poetic ''1'' melts into the great "Eye" of the sublime. Unlike Smith's
self-elegies, Plath's dramatize and even accelerate what Heidegger calls
Sein-zum- Tode, or Being-towards-death. And yet in spite of many differ-
ences, the twO poets share with each other and with other poets the com-
mon project of flouting the modern social taboo on death, defiantiy build-
ing their poetry around death, whether as the tame or the savage godo
292
El GHT
American Family Elegy JI
In committing suicide, Plath occasioned elegies by Sexton, who avows her
envy that Plath killed herself first, Berryman, who vaunts his heroic re-
straint in not killing himself, and Wilbur, who criticizes her poetry for
being "unjust."l But she also occasioned elegies of another sort, written
not for her but for the fathers of other poets. Indeed, her "torrent ... / of
agony and wrath" so impressed Berryman that, as we have seen, he adopted
her violent elegiac mode for the climactic poem of The Dream Songs (191).
Getting back at and back to his father, he wields an ax that functions
enough like Plath's stake to suggest that, in a neat reversal of patriarchal
inheritance, the poetic son is now borrowing "phallic" authority frorn a
literary forernother. Yet Plath broke taboos not only on desecrating and
openly mourning the dead but also on female expressions of rage, thereby
setting a precedent of special importance for wornen poets. Rich, for ex-
ample, who later analyzed her lingering rage toward her father in prose,
began to articulate it in poetry under the sway of Plath's elegies, reversing
the earlier line of influence frorn Rich to Plath. Less than two years after
Plath wrote "Daddy," Rich composed her premortern elegy, ''After Dark."
Despite rnany differences between the poerns, the mourning daughter in
each confesses that she has wanted her father to die, protests that he has
eaten her heart, depicts him as physically impeding her utterances, rernern-
bers trying to join him in the ground, meditates on a photographic image,
and represents him as an insistent, repetitive, autocratic voice. In begin-
ning to sound her anger in this elegy, Rich affirrns as a valid affect what
she had been taught in childhood was a "dark, wicked blotch" to be sup-
pressed.
2
In the later prose-poern Sources, Rich's address to her dead father
still echoes Plath's apostfophic "Daddy": "Por years I struggled with you:
your categories, your theories, your will, rhe cruelty which carne inextrica-
ble frorn your love. Por years all argurnents I carried on in rny head were
with yoU."3 Rich draws strength frorn "Daddy" even though Plath herself
had been wary and cornpetitive toward her conternporary, judging sorne
of her own poems "richer than any" by Rich, yet worrying she rnight "lag
behind" her.
4
293
Chapter Eight
Apparently more exciting to Plath's imagination was the "emotional
and psychological depth" of Sexton's work,5 "Daddy" clearly echoes the
insistent rhymes and obsessive guilt of Sexron's obliquely elegiac poem
"My Friend, My Friend," in which the speaker confesses, "Watching my
mother slowly die, I knew / My first release."6 While this poem and Sex-
tons early parental elegies, like Plath's, emphasize guilt over anger and ex-
press rage as detachment, after Plath's death Sexton was "infiuenced" in
turn by the spectacular wrath of"Daddy" and other poems, impressed that
Plath, in Sextons words, "had dared to write hate poems, the one thing I
had never dared to write. I'd always been afraid, even in my life, to express
anger."7 In her late elegies for '''Daddy!' 'Daddy!'" Sexton even brands the
dead man an incestuous demon:
I am divorcing daddy-Dybbuk! Dybbuk!
I have been doing it daily all my life....8
Plath's elegies anticipate the father poems of many other women poets:
Kumin, for example, represents her dead parent in a dream-vision of enor-
mous, disconnected body parts, and Wakoski (who later elegizes Plath at
length) mythologizes her vanished "Father, / Father, / Father" as absent,
militaristic autocrat.
9
More recently, Plath has continued to reverberate
through elegies by women, Olds, for example, detailing in an entire vol-
ume of poems the death of a father she not only "loved" but also "hated"
and even "killed."IO
Yet the significance of the family elegy for Sexton, Rich, Wakoski,
Kumin, Olds, Kizer, Clampitt, Glck, and other women poets is due not
only to the explosive impact of"Daddy," the wide infiuence of"Life Stud-
ies," or any other single work, but to the collective determination of these
women writers to rethink the daughter's position within the family ro-
mance. Although the so-called "circle of domestic affections" had long
been considered a proper locus for women's poetry, Plath's generation
would, for the first time, make space within that circle for a daughter's rage
and ambivalence toward both her mother and father. Among other forms
of domestic poetry, the parental elegy was especially suited to this task be-
cause it represents the daughter at a moment when generic and gender
codes called for docile mourning, intergenerational continuity, and filial
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 11
self-abnegation-expectations fiouted by the new daughter's work of ago-
nistic mourning.
A backward glance at traditional elegies by women might help to
put this momentous change into perspective. Despite recent claims that
"women in the past have been excluded ... from the writing of elegy,"
American women poets from Anne Bradstreet and Phillis Wheatley to
Lydia Sigourney and Mary Weston Fordham channeled much of their po-
etic output into the elegiac gente. 11 Recurring to Bradstreet's poem for her
father, we find that the announced function of elegy is to "celebrate the
praises of the dead" and present one's "lamentations," Bradstreet twinning
encomium with mourning as do her male contemporaries in the gente
(201-3). She suggests that elegies also ensure the transmission of the dead
person's "legaey," in this case from father to daughter as well as other "after-
comers." The compliant daughter hails the patriarch as "instructor" and
"guide," much as in her brief epitaph for her mother, she acclaims the
matriarch as a "true instructor of her family," evidencing this instruction
in a dutiful poem (204). Like Bradstreet's poems for her parents, her elegies
for poets and grandchildren culminate in a final consolation-a reaffir-
mation of the enduring "Fame" or the "everlasting state" of the dead (194,
235). Respectful homage, submissive lament, grateful inheritance, and po-
etic, natural, or transcendental consolation-though these are often quali-
fied-will remain guiding principIes of daughter's elegies for parents, until
Plath, Sexton, and Rich set a dramatically new course for women's elegies.
In the nineteenth century, the nightingale poets embraced the tradi-
tional elegiac imperative of consolation with unprecedented fervor, at a
time when "women poets," as Cheryl Walker states, "were usually associ-
ated with elegies," and deeply ''Acquainted with Grief," in the words of
Helen Hunt Jackson.
12
Lydia Sigourney, who helped ro inaugurate and
soon personified the consolatory women's verse of the era as "Emmeline
Grangerford," repeatedly traces the soul's "upward path" to its "reward,"
"the fulness of the light of Heaven," whether commemorating friends or
family, poets or distinguished persons. 13 Because the dead "dwell in perfect
rest" (124), consolation should outweigh lament not only in elegies but in
me overall etiquette of grief, as prescribed by Sigourney. She denounces
what she calls "Mistaken Grief" (60), urging her readers to follow the ex-
294
295
Chapter Eight
ample of "The Christian Mourner" whose "hope" is "anchor ro the soul"
(40-41), and warning against the kind of excessive, misguided, "pagan"
grief displayed by an Mrican mother who annually mourns her daughter,
bears oblations to her "hopeless grave," weeps on it, cries out in agony
(111). Here consolation participates not only in generic or gender para-
digms but in the broad cultural logic of missionary imperialism and
racial politics.
Working in a genre that belonged to the domestic, occasional, or
affective modes considered most proper for "ladies," British and American
women poets from the seventeenth through the nineteenth century wrote
elegies for parents, children, siblings, husbands, grandparents, and friends,
as well as community leaders, clergymen, statesmen, soldiers, poets, writ-
ers, pets, and others. Given high mortality rates and maternal responsibili-
ties, the elegy for the child was, as noted earlier, one of the most frequently
practiced, and it exemplifies the strong grip of literary and religious code
on women's elegies, rigidly curbing the expression ofanger and grief. Brad-
street may write elegies for her grandchildren with "trembling hand" (236),
but she soon steadies it with reassuring flower metaphors and providential
hopes, much as another seventeenth-century poet, Elizabeth Brackley,
crushes grief for her infant son with the certitude that he is "happy, Sweet'st
on High."14 During the century-long reign of what Aries has called "the
beautiful death," children die sweet, lovely deaths in an unprecedented
proliferation of women's elegies.
15
Just as Felicia Hemans congratulates an
infant on having fled this world before "guilt had power / To stain" its
"cherub-soul and form," so too the so-called ''American Hemans," Sigour-
ney, recounts the good fortune of numerous children who died before "care
or woe" could corrupt their "infant charms," still "sinless" in ascending to
become "tenants of that cloudless sky."16 In a mid-century anthology, The
Female Poets ofAmerica, elegists find for the angel-winged, light-encircled
children in their poems a "lovely place to die," track their early journey
"unsullied back to Heaven," and rationalize the mourners' "sore loss" as
the children's "eternal gaining."17 Accordingly, Demeter is not, for these
women elegists, an example to emulate but one to avoid, Helen Hunt Jack-
son denouncing the story of the goddess's violent grief as a "Legend of foul
shame to motherhood."IB Mourning is indulged, but moderately, often ex-
pressed by poets as a secret sorrow, not the destructive melancholia of a
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY II
Demeter, Niobe, Antigone-or Plath. To reclaim this ancient paradigm
of irresolvable female bereavement and ro criticize the symbolic order that
justifies loss, Plath, Sexton, Rich, and other recent poets must bypass not
only the elegiac tradition ofMilton and Tennyson but also the female con-
solatory tradition ofBradstreet and Sigourney. True, women elegists before
the twentieth century sometimes repudiated the conventions of consola-
tion. In an elegy for a five-day-old infant, the eighteenth-century poet Eliz-
abeth Boyd, for example, angrily reproaches "the stern-souled sex" for its
indifference to the special "pain" and "agonies" a mother must endure. 19 In
"Mother and Poet," Elizabeth Barrett Browning adopts the voice of a be-
reaved mother for whom the birth of the Italian nation does nothing to
redeem the death of her two sons in batde. Moreover, the continual re-
course to mournful affect on the part of elegists like Hemans and Sigour-
ney qualifies their religious, natural, and poetic resolutions. And early
twentieth-century women poets wrote sorne powerful, anti-consolatory
elegies, including Millay's "Dirge Without Music," Bogan's "To My
Brother," and Mina Loy's "Letters of the Unliving."zo Nevertheless, He-
mans spoke for many women elegists before the 1960s in avowing her
literary effort to "Put on submissive strength to meet, not question
death."ZI To question, not meet death, and to question literary, religious,
and parental authority-these will clearly emerge as the primary impulses
of women's elegies only with Plath, Sexton, and Rich.
In view of this brief foray into a large field, we might ask whether
elegies by women share transhistorical characteristics that differentiate
them from elegies by meno Clearly, women's elegies often diverge in em-
phasis from men's elegies, foregrounding subgenres like the child's elegy
and affective programs like consolatory hopeo But these boundaries are
shifting and permeable: men have also written hundreds of elegies for chil-
dren, from Jonson and Beaumont to Lamb and Emerson, and women have
written hundreds of professional elegies for fellow poets and politicallead-
ers, from Bradstreet and Anne Wharton to Alice Cary, Barrett Browning,
and Henrietta Cordelia Ray, not to mention the substantial overlap be-
tween men and women in their poetics of redemption and solace. When
more recent elegies by women are included, it becomes still more difficult
to define a female continuum of elegiac poetry in contradistinction to a
male continuum, each with its own essential qualities. In recent essays on
296 297
Chapter Eight
the "femaleelegy," CelesteSchenckandCaroleStone disagree. Butwhile
they usefully describe howsorne women elegists have separated their art
from a "resolutely patriarchal genre," they distinguish the "female" from
l
the "masculine" elegy in terms that deserve closer scrutiny.22 "Refusal oE!
consolation,"Schenckargues, "is perhapsthefemaleelegist'smostcharac-1'
teristic subversion ofthe masculine elegiacO' (24). But, as we have seen, ,
manywomenpoetsfromBradstreettoSigourneywriteelegiesthatarejust
as consolatoryas thoseoftheirmalecounterparts, ifnotmoreso. And,as,
we have seen throughoutthis book, refusalofconsolationis characteristic
ofmodern elegies by both men and women, from Hardy and Owen to
LowellandPlath.BecauseSchenckarguesprimarilyfrom recentelegiesby
women, she maymistake ahistorical trendfor agenderdistinction. "Eu-
logy and transcendence are themost salientfeatures ofthe masculine el-
egy," Schenckwrites (20), butlike consolation, these devices often figure
prominent1y in traditional elegies by women, from Aphra Behn to Ina
Coolbrith. Discarding these elegiac norms, poets like Plath, Sexton, and
Rich write elegies that, in beinganti-eulogistic, anti-transcendental, and
anti-consolatory, more nearly resemble the elegies ofLowell, Berryman,
Ginsberg,andHarperthanofBradstreet,ElizabethRowe, andMaryWes-
ton Fordham. Stone grounds her claim for "a specifically female elegiac
political tradition" in the "fusion ofthe political and the personal," "of
public andprivate grief" (86); butever since Yeats's mergingofpersonal
equivocation andnationalgriefin "Easter, 1916," male poetslike Owen,
Auden, Lowell, Hayden, and Heaneyhave also written publicyet private ,
elegies. Further, Stone adduces the "strongbond," "closeness andidenti-
fication," and explicit acknowledgment of "indebtedness" among wo-
menpoetsas characteristics "specific" to the"femaleelegy" (86--87), even
thoughhomage, identification, andbondinghave been basicto the most
canonicalofmen'selegiesfromMoschusandMiltontoShelley,Tennyson,
andSwinburne.
Finally, toimposeontheparentalelegies ofPlath, Rich, andSexton
amodelof"connectedness"risksdistortingtheirhistoricalimpulsetochal-
lenge the patriarchal father and mother-an impulse that enabled their
poetic careers, their renewal oftheAmerican family elegy, and the path-
breakingpublications bymanyotherwomenwritingin thesixties. Com-
posingpoemsofresistance, theyabjurethetypeofthemourningdaughter
298
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY II
as definedbygendercodes,monuarycustom,andelegiactradition. Close
examinationofpairsof elegiesformothersandfathers bySextonandRich
demonstratesthatthese poets refusesubmissiontothemournedparentor
to the authority ofgeneric precedent. Their refusal belongs to the first
phase ofahistorical dialecticofnegationandcaunteridentification, as we
seewhenwe turntoAmyClampitt'slaterelegiesforherparents. Herfam-
ilyelegies,presupposingthedissociativeelegiesofthesixties,workthrough
anti-patriarchalanger to reclaim notonlythemotherandfather butalso
elegiacnormsthathadearlierbeenspurned.
23
ANNE SEXTON
Contendingwith the dead in poems ostensiblyfor them, Sexton spurns
the twinelegiaclabors ofremembranceandinheritance.Althoughelegies
areamongthebestearlypoemsSexton published,sherepresentsherselfas
a reluctant elegist, writing ''A CurseAgainst Elegies" inwhich she avows
toherlover,
Iamtiredofall thedead.
Theyrefuse tolisten,
so leave themalone.
Irefusetorememberthedead.
Andthedeadare boredwiththewholething. (60)
Thesymmetryofthe statements "Theyrefuse to listen" and "1 refuse to
remember" consttuctsthepoet's refusal as aninstanceofthe /ex talionis, a
psychicactofreciprocalviolence,eventhoughthewearytonepreventsthis
reprisal from resembling the kind of murderous retaliation enacted
by Platns "Daddy." Mutual"refusal" also figures prominent1y in Sexton's
anti-elegy "TheTruth the Dead Know," openingandclosing this poem
inscribed"for" bothherparents:
Gone,Isayandwalkfrom church,
refusingthestiffprocessiontothegrave,
lettingthedeadridealoneinthehearse.
Theyrefuse
tobeblessed, throat,/eye andknucklebone. (49)
299
Chapter Eight
Impatient with the imperviousness of the dead, Sexton writes poems less
of connective remembrance than of disjunction, less of reaffirmed bonds"
Jj
than ofsevered ties. She builds this poem, for example, around the contrast
between the intimate "touch" of lovers and the inaccessibility of the dead,
denying the Tennysonian hope that an elegist can reach or be "touched"
by the dead. Rather than claim transparent access to her dead parents- )
their souls like Hallam's "Rashed on" and "wound" in the soul of the
mourner-Sexton, advised by Lowell to silence the dead in this poem,
insists on their stonelike impenetrability: they cannot hear ("be blessed"),
speak ("throat"), see ("eye"), or touch ("knucklebone").24 Sexton skepti-
cally disputes the therapeutic fiction of traditional elegy, suggesting that
survivors have served only themselves, despite their pretense ofhelping the
dead by remembering or blessing them. Her recurrent images of "stone,"
embedded in stiff rhythmic and syntactic patterns, reverse the standard
elegiac rhetoric of translucent light, which once promised spiritual inter-
course between the living and the dead. "[S] treams ofendless light" seemed
to bathe Margaret Davidson's child, and light Roated "transparently se-
rene" about the faces ofHemans's dead.
25
Postmortem expressivity and ca-
maraderie had once served a similar purpose: Hemans felt the voices of the
dead sweIling over her, Elizabeth Rowe listened to a long discourse from
her dead husband, and Sigourney reassured herself that the dead joined a
"blest band" in heaven, happily foreseeing her reunion with them.
26
In
Sexton's curse and her anti-elegy, the dead are opaque, recalcitrant, "alone,"
and poetic mourners cannot redeem them from their ultimate isolation.
But how can a poet who scorns the scornful dead not only "curse"
and "refuse" but also produce elegies? Amid various laments in her earliest
collections, Sexton grants the most salience to her elegies for her parents,
closing her first volume with an elegy for her mother, "The Division of
Parts" (1960), and opening the next with "The Truth the Dead Know"l
and an elegy for her father, "AIl My Pretty Ones" (1962)-the title poem
of the collection. Throughout her career, Sexton returns to her relation-
ships with her mother and father, reexamining these primary bonds under
the aspect of mortality.27 In the epigraphs to her first two volumes, Sexton
provides clues as to how she positions herself within the family romance:
the first links her to the rebeIlious and truth-seeking figure of Oedipus,
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY II
and the second associates her with the inconsolably bereft Macduff, the
poet switching gender in the first case, both gender and family hierarchy
in the second. Put together, the two analogues represent Sexton as antago-
nistic mourner and bereft truth-seeker, Macduffian Oedipus and Oedipal
Macduff. (A third epigraph from Kafka, which interprets the poet's gref
as exemplary, suggests that Sexton's book should painfuIly reawaken the
reader to repressed griefs and ambivalences: "a book should serve as the ax
for the frozen sea within us," should "make us suffer like the death ofsome-
one we love more than ourselves" [48].)
In her truth-seeking elegies for her parents, as in her curse and her
anti-elegy, Sexton does not paper over the gulf that separates the daughter
from the dead but charts and reaffirms it. She iIluminates the no-
(wo)man's-land between the dead and the living by highlighting the inani-
mate objects deposited within it-wiIls, clothing, jewelry, letters, silver,
piclUres, and clippings. Encumbering rather than empowering the survi-
vor, these objects are the opposite of the inheritances easily passed from
the dead to the living, typically from a paternal figure to his heir, in the
traditional elegy as in the traditional family. We have already seen that
Lowell disrupts elegiac inheritance by adopting a satirical stance toward
the dead and by describing their vestiges in catalogs of inert stuff. But even
he borrowed from his grandfather a weaponlike cane, "carved with the
names and altitudes / of Norwegian mountains he had scaled," and this
phaIlic staff, like the thyrsus of traditional elegies, figures the poet's partial
inheritance and familial succession.
2B
Insisting even more than Lowell on
the stubborn materiality of things left behind by the dead, Sexton contin-
ues to appropriate but complicate the elegiac tradition of representing in-
herited objects as vehicles of the power and spirit of the dead. Moschus
had written that Bion's lips and "spirit still breathe" in his Rute and the
echo of his "song is stiIl kept alive in those tubes," and Swinburne had
assured Baudelaire that "not death estranges / My spirit from communion
ofthysong," since Les Fleurs duMalcontained "the sound of thy sad soul, /
The shadow of thy swift spirit."29 Even women poets often took up sorne
form of the motif: Hemans, for example, said ''the things" the dead "loved
on earth, / As relics we may hold," objects that affection had endowed with
"a breathing inRuence."30 But in Sexton's elegies, neither the immortality
300
30\
Chapter Eight
of the dead, nor the loving attention of the living dissolves the empty signs
separating the melancholic daughter from her parents. While the phallic
thyrsus and flute of elegiac tradition were the symbolic purveyors of a pa-
triarchallineage, and while even a woman poet like Ina Coolbrith writes
of the "magic" that "dwelt within the pen" ofHelen Hunt Jackson, Sexton
represents the scattered words, clothes, and pictures of her dead parents
as blocking access rather than enabling transmission, as confirming the
disappearance of the dead and not their survival or recuperabilityY
In "The Division of Parts," Sexton uses the word "obstacles" to de-
scribe the souHess items inherited from her mother:
Your coat in my closet,
your bright stones on my hand,
the gaudy fur animals
I do not know how to use,
settle on me like a debt. (42)
Emptied of their former inhabitant, these objects have not been libidinally
repossessed by the mourner-the poem insistently differentiates between
the two subject positions as your and my. They are intractable in pan be-
cause the daughter invests them with more negative than positive affect.
For her to possess them would be to displace the mother, as if she had
desired her death-another reason for her to emphasize her alienation
from the objects. In the hodgepodge ofgoods, the daughter confronts both
her guilt at outliving her mother and her biological, emotional, and physi-
cal indebtedness; but these objects, like everything else she has received
from her mother, are "gifts I did not choose." Although the elegy closes
with the poet's self-identification as her mother's "inheritor," she resists this
role through much of the elegy, fearing that it requires self-suppression.
Similarly, in an elegy for her great-aunt, "Elizabeth Gone," Sexton says she .
"threw out" her relative's "last bony shells" and cremated ash, and then ;
"sorted" her clothes until she was certain the dead woman was "gone"
(8-9). lronically, several postwar women elegists inherit Sexton's dis-
affection toward the traditional elegiac work of inheritance. Maxine
Kumin depicts her own uncertain attempts to fit into Sexton's jacket in
an elegy for her, and Sandra Gilbert declares in her Sexton-like elegy to
her father:
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 11
What I inherit is impossible:
a car I can't drive,
empty coats in a closet,
a useless middle initial.
32
Unlike the potent pipes that traditional poets inherited from the dead,
these inheritances (sometimes more womblike than phallic) threaten to
stifle the women they encompass.
In Sexton's elegy for her mother, the difficult process of sorting out
her mother's objects plainly corresponds to the work of the elegy itself-
learning how to accept sorne debt without whoHy capitulating to her
mother, recognizing her mother's "will" (in both senses of the word) with-
out denying her own. The title suggests not only the family's division of
the mother's "bounty" but also the daughter's division of her mother into
loved and hated "parts" and even the daughter's self-division into conflict-
ing responses. Many daughters, Rich explains in Dj"Woman Born, "have
split themselves" between resistance to the male-centered, conventional
mother and identification with the "counter-mother," a splitting that exac-
erbates the self-division characteristic of melancholic mourning.
33
Sleeping
uneasily in her mother's nightgown, the daughter has a mysterious dream
that manifests the fragmentation of mother and daughter: "Divided, you
climbed into my head," she says, and then "1 cursed you" until "three
stones / slipped from your glittering eyes" (45). The three stones recall
the "bright stones" she inherited from her mother and the mythical three
daughters with whom Sexton identifies early in the poem, so the dream
conflates daughter and inheritance in a guilty image of the daughter's birth,
the mother's death, and the mother's bequest. Though beset by melan-
cholic anxieties that her ambivalent work of inheritance has somehow
caused her mother's death, the elegist offers not the usual "praise / or para-
dise," stock elegiac gestures that grant coherence to mourner and deceased,
but shattering defiance and curses (46). The daughter, "heavy with cloths
of you," would discard both the mother without and the mother within:
rather than wrap herself in a role defined by her mother, she has tried
"to shed" her "daughterhood"; rather than reincorporate her mother's im-
age, she has "tried / to exorcise the memory" of her mother (44). AH the
while she knows, of course; that to complete this effort is impossiblej
302 303
Chapter Eight
"mother, father, I'm made of," she concedes in anotherpoem (55). Even
so,Sexton,likePlathwhenconfrontedwiththebrokenpiecesof thepater-
nalimago, strugglesfor freedomfrom thedetritusofherabjectedparents.
Among the many things that the motherhas left her daughter is a'
religion, butitis justonemoreof the"cloths" thatthedisobedientdaugh-
terrefuses towear:
Theclutterofworship
thatyoutaughtme, MaryGray,
is old. (43)
Sexton's elegy enacts this refusal in its energetic recasting ofthe mother's.
religion andfolklore.
34
Bradstreetcommendedherdead motherfor being
"Religiousin all herwords andways," much as she invoked the example
ofher pious father to assume his faith: "Myfather's God, be Godofme
andmine" (204,202).ButSexton, indefianceoftheChristianrolewilled
onher byher mother, dons thegarmentnotofthe Christian soldierbut
of thedisbelievingsoldier:sherepresentsherse1f as oneof thethreesoldiers
who, after the crucifixion, "cast" lots for Christ's garment. A "thief," she
seizesandtearsthelegacyofhermother'sreligion. Sherefuses theexample
of''the devout" who "work their cold knees" on this day, Good Friday.
Unableandunwillingto"suffer" for thedeathofChristorhermother,she
repudiates the prostrationofthesubmissive mourner. True, she "grieved"
while her mother was dying ofcancer, but even during those visits she
"neveronce/ forgothowlongittook" (43). Nowshemocks thelingering
pressureto"Convert!," imaginingadmonitionswhenthe"wallscreak" and
thedesk"murmursBoo." She ridicules male mournerswhodependona
patriarchal religion for solace: "Christknowsenough/ staunchguys have
hitched onhim introuble" (45). Just as Sexton despiritualizes the mun-
dane objects bequeathed by the mother, she also refuses to read through
the"grotesquemetaphor"ofChrist"fastenedtohisCrucifix,"toacceptthe
orthodoxmeaningbehindtheliteralobject(46). Steeledbyami-Christian
feeling, sherenouncestheelegiachopefor resurrection-a,hopetradition-
allygroundedintheanalogybetween deceasedhumananddyinggodo
While reinterpreting her mother's religion, Sexton also directs her
ambivalenceathermother'sfolklore, inanticipationof themetamorphoses
offolk and fairy tales in the volume Transftrmations. Undoing another
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY II
storyofadyingpatriarch,Sextonconverts thestoryoftheking's"division
ofmoney" amongthree daughters, castinghermotherinthemale role of
the king (42). This countermyth ofher mother's bequest elevates the
mother but repudiates her willing participation in patriarchy. Likewise,
Sextonmangles the nurseryrhyme"Singasongofsixpence," callingher-
seIf one ofthe "daughters" who, in lieu ofthe king, is "counting" her
money. Refashioning the nursery rhyme inheritedfrom hermother, Sex-
ton usurps the authority ofthe patriarch. Still more provocative1y, she
also claims,
Iaro aqueenalone
intheparlorstill,
eatingthebreadandhoney.
Toassume the role ofqueen, shehaspresumablyhadto displace notonly
herfatherbutalso hermother. Reinscribingherse1finhermother'smyths,
therebe1-daughteroccupiesbothmaleandfemalepositionsof power.Rad-
ically revised, thestories nolonger portraynatural transmission from one
generationtothenextorthepostmortemrebirthof thedeadbutthepoet's
aggressive bid for ascendancy. Nor do the black birds that "pick" and
"peck" at the window hold out promise for the resurrection ofthe dead
momero
Recalling her "old hate" in letters written at the time, Sexton also
said she feIt "guilty" over hermother's dying: "1 feellike it is myfault."35
Inapoemshewroteabouthermother'sillness,"TheDoubleImage,"Sex-
ton recalls thathermotherblamedherfor givinghercancer (38).Andin
"Lament,"Sextonexploresthemourner'sexaggeratedsenseofresponsibil-
ityafter adeath: "1 thinkIcouldhavestoppedit," says these1f-Iacerating
andself-deluded speaker, "ifTd been as firm as a nurse," or"noticed the
neckofthe driver," or"heldmynapkin over mymouth" (52-53).While
suchmasochisticself-accusationandsadisticangershapeSexton'selegyfor
her mother, they are not thesole psychic impulses ofthe poem. Indeed,
SextonreferredtohereIegyas a"lovepoemtoadeadmother."36Rebuking
thepatriarchalmatrixofhermother's rhymes andtales, Sexton neverthe-
less calls hermother"myLadyofmyfirst words," andeven pays homage
toherdeadparentbyweavingthese"firstwords"intoherpoem.Shewould
acknowledge her mother as mother ofher tongue while heavily revising
304
305
Chapter Eight AMERIC AN FAMIL Y ELEG y II
ets. Opening her father's "yeIlow scrapbook," Sexton finds here nothing
more personal than the Hoover and the Hindenburg disasters. Old and
desiccated, the c1ippings objectifY her father's death-"as crackling now
and wrinkly / as tobacco leaves." Next she turns to "the snapshots of mar-
riage," each introduced by the anti-narrative deictic "here," each paratacti-
cally placed beside the others. The snapshot is a visual correlative for Sex-
ton's aggressive cutting up of her father's life: with the detachment of a
camera's eye, she has "shot" each instant, refusing not only to fill in the
surrounding context but also to include herself in any of the pictures. Iden-
tifYing him with these pictorial epitaphs, Sexton writes, "Now 1 fold you
down, my drunkard, my navigator, / my first lost keeper, to love or look
at later," but the detached look she has granted him here falls short of love.
He, though unable to control his own drinking, wanted to control his
daughter, so she, still feeling threatened by his will, now manipulates him,
folding him back into his pictorial grave. Sexton's detachment protects her
not only from his reach but also from her own guilt-guilt over her ambiv-
alence and guilt over having tried to block his remarriage to "that pretty
widow"; by thwarting his desire, she almost seems to have caused his de-
mise, since "Three days later [he] died." Siding with her mother and
against her father, she points to her mother's diary as evidence of his de-
structive alcoholism. But Sexton is still having to undo her mother's respect
for the patriarchal father: the daughter must tell "all" her mother "does not
say," must speak for the reverently silent mother ("You overslept, / She
writes"). Sexton shelves this last document ofhis life, restricting any "Iove"
to "this hoarded span." Momentarily if inadvertently associating him with
ultimate power ("My God, father"), she articulates not hope for his im-
mortallife but fear that his memory may persist in spite ofher defiance-
specifically, the fear that his alcoholism will reassert itself through her every
Christmas drink. Like Plath, Sexton would also use the genre of the e1egy
to exorcise her father's memory and block any legacy that may penetrate
her defenses. Rather than allow the dead man the eternallife traditionally
bestowed by e1egists, as the linkage of "father," "blood;" "wine," and
"Christmas" would once have done, Sexton reassures herself instead that
neither she, nor his bequests, nor her e1egy, nor a religion will reincarnate
him: "1 outlive you." Even her final gesture of kindness, bending down
308
and forgiving her father, is less than flattering, since it c1early indicates
which of these antagonists most needs forgiveness.
Of course the father, though "Iaid out, / useless as a blind dog," con-
tinues to live on in Sexton's later e1egiac poems, such as "The Death of the
Fathers," and continues to evoke both guilt and blame from the daughter,
who later depicts father and daughter engaged in incestuous acts (323).
But like many of Sexton's subsequent poems, her e1egies suffer from dimin-
ished concentration and power, sometimes dwindling into slack, merely
confessional disclosures. After her first collections, many of Sexton's e1egiac
poems are sensational forecasts ofher own death, such as her poem ostens-
ibly about "Sylvia's Death." "Thiefl" she brands Plath, berating her for seiz-
ing "the death 1 wanted so badly and for so long" (126). This poem, like
many of Sexton's suicide poems, approximates a self-pitying whine of
"me, / me too" (127), which casts the reader as voyeur, gawking at a secret
society of bravely suicidal poets. The reciprocal influence between Plath's
and Sexton's e1egies extends to their death poems, but the resultant contrast
is to Sexton's disfavor. In poems like "Sylvia's Death," "Wanting to Die,"
"Suicide Note," and "Letters to Dr. Y.," Sexton parades her "Iust" for death
(142), separating herself from the reader in self-indulgent and literalist de-
scriptions of the apparatus, circumstances, and compulsions of the suicide.
Where Sexton's death meditations narrow her sensibility, Plath's are often
expansive and ecstatic, ontological incantations that blur the boundaries
between poet and world. In the subgenre of the self-e1egy, it is Plath rather
than Sexton who successfully enlarges, advances, and criticizes the tradi-
tion of Keats, Dickinson, Christina Rossetti, and Yeats. But whatever the
aesthetic accomplishments of Sexton and Plath in poetically rehearsing
death, their real deaths prompted Rich to speak out against the "imagina-
tive obsession with victimization and death" on the part of"so many young
women poets."37 After Sexton's death, Rich ostensibly spoke "in Anne's
honor and memory" but angrily denounced female self-destruction in its
many forms, especially the ultimate act: "We have had enough suicidal
women poets, enough suicidal women, enough of self-destructiveness as
the sole form of violence permitted to women." Although Rich inherits
the "feminist" poetics of Sexton and Plath, she forcefully distances herself
from their most ruinous legacy.38
309
Chapter Eight
ADRIENNE RICH
Whereas Sexton and Plath were willing to derive poetic gain from personal
loss, Rich proves herself more concerned about the ethics ofwriting family
elegies. After her former husband "drove to Vermont in a rented car at
dawn and shot himself," she tried to avoid exploiting his death for her
poetry, referring to it obliquely. More than a decade after the fact, she
explained in a prose passage of Sources (1983):
I have resisted this for years, writing to you as if you could
hear me.... I've had a sense of protecting your existence, not
using it merely as a theme for poetry or tragic musings; letting
you dwell in the minds of those who have reason to miss you,
in your way, or their way, not mine. The living, writers espe-
cially, are terrible projectionists. I hate the way they use the
dead.
39
To mourn the dead man without using him, Rich fashions for him "this
strange, angry packet ... , threaded with love"-a packet that recalls him
only briefiy, in a limited edition, and in the unbeautiful rhythms of prose
(33). Her indictment of "terrible projectionists" sets her apart from poets
like Plath, Sexton, and Berryman, who deliberately amplifY the faults of
the dead and discharge on them guilt and anger. As early as "Prom an
Old House in America," Rich was already making painstaking distinctions
between her feelings and the dead man: "1 know my dreams are mine and
not of you" (P 237). Other modern poets have shared Rich's misgivings
about the literary misuse of the dead. Among women writers, Woolf con-
siders "Elegy" as a term for her novels but elegizes family members at a
great remove; Toni Morrison mourns "Sxty Million and more" but warns
that the tale of a former slave girl murdered by her mother is "not a story
to pass on"; and Van Duyn brands herself a "Sneak, Poet, Mon- / ster" for
"trying to rob" her friend "with words."40 In keeping with these reserva-
tions about a literary corpus built on corpses, Carolyn I(zer has faulted
the English tradition of canonical poems about male friendship for con-
sisting of elegies like "Lycidas" in which "all the friends are dead."41 Wary
of this masculine tradition, modern women poets have also eschewed the
opportunism of consolation poetry, in which the nightingale poet, as
AMERiCAN FAMILY ELEGY II
Twain puts it, "warn't particular; she could write about anything you
choose to give her to write about just so it was sadful," especially a recent
deathY
Anti-elegiac for ethical and political reasons, Rich's poetry is also
anti-elegiac in its historical consciousness, as David Kalstone suggests in
his contrast between Lowell, who is "elegiac about history," and Rich, a
poet of "fierce optimism."43 Refusing the elegiac metahistory in which
much poetry by her male counterparts is embedded, Rich distances herself
from male modernist nostalgia: "Por women, the 'breakdown' ofWestern
'civilization' between the wars and after the holocaust has never seemed as
ultimate and consequential as it has for meno ... What the male poets
were mourning and despairing over had never been ours...." (LSS 257).
With patriarchal societies instigating and then surviving both world wars,
Rich rejects what she sees as a modernist masculinist dirge for a "botched
civilization" that never lost its hegemony, though misleadingly feminized
as an "old bitch gone in the teeth." Still, Rich replaces this elegiac metanar-
rative with another-the historical destruction and loss of matriarchy and
the continual destruction and loss offemale power in the lives of individual
women. Better known for her love poems, Rich has nevertheless written
much elegiac poetry, including excavations of the forgotten lives of dead
women, both illustrious and common. Underlying her prose and poetry is
a feminist elegiac narrative that would wrest possibility from loss: women
can be reborn as women through a dialectic of resistance and counter-
identification, through denying the oppressive fathers and reaffirming
"woman-identified experience" (BBP 5I). While the redemptive strain in
Rich's prose and poetry has intensified since the early seventes, her elegiac
poems of the early sixties distill the initial, negative momento Among these
poems are impressive family elegies, notwithstanding her moral reserva-
tions about the subgenre. In the year that Sexton published "The Division
of Parts," Rich also wrote a poem about ''A Woman Mourned by Daugh-
ters" (1960); and soon after the publication ofPlath's and Sextons elegies
for their fathers, Rich composed one for hers, ''After Dark" (1964). Rich
also contributed indirecdy to the domestic subgenre by provid-
ing a theoretical framework for interpreting its psychology and sexual
politics.
The "cathexis betwe,en mother and daughter," Rich could still say in
310
311
Chapter Eight
OfWoman Born (1976), "is the great unwritten story" (OWB 225), and
this domesticconfiguration is indeedrare in canonical elegies written be-
fore thesixties, thoughdaughterslike HemansandmotherslikeMargaret
Davidsonwroteless celebratedelegies for theirlovedones. Helpingto tell
this untoldstoryin her bookabout motherhood as in her elegiac poetry,
Richseems,likeSexton,determinednottosentimentalizeit,exploringthe
ambivalence notonlyofmothers butalso ofdaughters. Thedeathofthe
parent, by heightening such difficult emotions, detaching them from
their immediate object, and revealing the structure ofdomestic arrange-
ments, clarifies family ties for Rich, as for Lowell, Plath, and Sexton.
Although Rich's own living mother could not have been her explicit
subject in ''A Woman Mourned by Daughters," this early poem unveils
the hostility often concealed behind the maudlin stereotype ofthe sob-
bing daughter. Here, Rich represents not so much the "cathexis" as the
"anti-cathexis" between daughterandmother: thedaughtersin this poem
have neither shed a tear nor submitted to their mother's will. They
"often / succeeded in ignoring" her when she was alive, and after her
death they must try even harder to resist her (P 57). It had not always
been so in the daughter-motherelegy: in Hemans's elegyfor her mother,
"No More," the daughter longs to be encircled again by her mother's
warmth:
To dwell inpeace, withhomeaffections bound,
To knowthesweetnessofamother'svoice,
To feel thespiritofherlove around,
Andin theblessingofhereye rejoice-
Nomore!44
Much as the daughters in Plath's "Colossus" and Sexton's "Division of
Parts" wanted freedom from the all-encompassing cluttet ofthe parent,
Richalsoinvertsthedaughter'straditionalnostalgiaforparentalenclosure.
Inaparodyofelegiacaggrandizement,themotherin''AWomanMourned
byDaughters" is grotesquelyinflatedbydeath, assumingproportionsthat
comparewith the gargantuan father in Plath's elegies. "You are swollen,"
say the daughters, "till you strain / this house and the whole sky." Her
bloatedshapealso recalls thewaterydeadofcanonicalelegies, from "Lyci-
das" to "TheQuakerGraveyardinNantucket":
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 11
You are puffedupin death
likeacorpsepulledfrom thesea;
wegroan beneathyourweight.
Massive and heavy, the dead mother will not die. With the loss ofher
bodilyself, shehas becomethepatriarchallawshe onceenforced. Having
compelledherdaughtersintoheterosexualservility,shedominatesthemas
does the satin she once "pulled down / over" their "bridal heads." Like
Sexton, Richrepresents themother'spatriarchaldictates as envelopingthe
daughters from without, while also entering their insides like food: the
motherpressed her daughters to eat morethantheywanted, andnow, as
they reject herand the mourningworkofincorporation, somethinglike
thefood she "proddedin" "rises in ourthroats." Notfor these daughters
megustoofAlice Meynell,whohadapostrophized: "Dead,thoudostlive
in me, / Andall this lonelysoul is full ofthee."45 The mother in Rich's
poem had once been a daughter herself, unshackled by the androcentric
institution ofmarriage, untied by its imperatives and restrictions: "you
were aleaf, / astrawblownonthebed."Butshe"hadlongsince become/
crisp as adeadinsect,"alive notas awoman-identifiedwomanbutonlyas
apurveyorofmasculineprescription.
As inSexton'selegiesforherparents,thedaughtersinthiselegychafe
attheirinheritance,whichembodies patriarchallawandeven includesan
individual patriarch. Theobjects left behindby the motherare, like Sex-
ton'sinheritances,nottransparentbut"solid,"andthoughthemother,like
the dead in Moschus or in Hemans, can still "breathe" through her be-
quests, she transmitsnotananimatingspiritbutburdensomedemands:
You breatheuponus now
through
of yourself: teaspoons, goblets,
seas ofcarpet, aforest
ofoldplants to bewatered,
an old maninan adjoining
room to be touchedandfed.
''Atthecoreof patriarchy," Richwrites in OfWoman Born, "is theindivid-
ual family unitwhichoriginatedwith the ideaofpropertyand the desire
to see one's property transmitted to one's biological descendants" (60).
312
313
Chapter Eight AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY II
Here the property is enumerated in a frightening series, ominously grow-
ing from mere teaspoons and goblets to vast seas and forests of obligation,
ending in a patriarch coldly described as "an old man." Ensnared in code
and property, the daughters are tempted to contravene their mother's an-
drocentric desires, to do everything in any way "save exactly / as you would l.
wish it done."
This bleak poem anticipates by about fifteen years Rich's analysis in
OfWoman Born of the "blind anger and bitterness" between mothers and
daughters in "a male-controlled world" (225). In that book, Rich boldly
articulates and analyzes the aggression underlying an often sentimentalized
relationship, clarifYing the psychopolitical logic of daughter-mother
poems, especially those written at the time when many daughters were
challenging the sex roles bequeathed by their mothers. "Many daughters,"
Rich states, "live in rage at their mothers for having accepted, too readily
and passively, 'whatever comes'" (243). Like the mother in Sexton's elegy,
the mother in Rich's poem is despised insofar as she embodies patriarchal
laws-Iaws that suffocated the woman within the mother and now
threaten her daughters. Although male poets of the time also contest the
traditional elegiac work of inheritance, Rich describes a gender-specific re-
sponse of daughters to mothers: "Thousands of daughters see their moth-
ers as having taught a compromise and self-hatred they are struggling to
win free of, the one through whom the restrictions and degradations of a
female existence were perforce transmitted.... Matrophobia can be seen
as a womanly splitting of the self, in the desire to become putged once and
for all of our mothers' bondage, to become individuated and free" (235-
36). Sexton's "The Division ofParts" also deals with precisely such purga-
tion, self-splitting, and resistance to generational transmission, both poets
trying in their daughter-mother poems of 1%0 to disengage from the pa-
triarchal mother and to re-identifY with her suppressed self. Rich describes
in stark terms her hostile feelings toward her own mother, who carried "out
my father's intense, perfectionist program" of child-rearing (222): "1 know
deep reservoirs of anger toward her still exist: the anger of,a four-year-old
locked in the closet (my father's orders, but my mother carried them out)
for childish misbehavior; the anger of a six-year-old kept too long at piano
practice (again, at his insistence, but it was she who gave the lessons) till I
314
developed a series offacial tics" (224).46 She says she still feels "the anger
of a daughter, pregnant, wanting my mother desperately and feeling she
had gone over to the enemy" (224). In this light, much of Rich's subse-
quent work of passionately identifYing with women could be seen as an
effort to compensate for her frustrated and contradictory identification
with her own mother. According to Rich, "There was, is, in most of us, a
girl-child still longing for a woman's nurture, tenderness, and approval"
(224). The forcefulness with which she celebrates the woman-identified
woman attests to the difficulty of securing this attachment under patri-
archy.
Rejecting the patriarchally constrained mother in ''A Woman
Mourned by Daughters," Rich confronts the patriarch more directly in her
premortem elegy for her father, ''After Dark." This elegy, like the paternal
elegies ofPlath and Sexton, anticipates Rich's definition offeminism as the
renunciation of obedience to the fathers and their vision of the world-
in each poet's case, both the individual father and the symbolic order he
personified (LSS 207). Insubordination is not only a political but an aes-
thetic imperative, "for the dutiful daughter of the fathers in us is only a
hack" (LSS 201). Although she commends "feminist" poetry by Sexton,
Rich appears to esteem more highly the open expressions of anti-
patriarchal rage in the poetry ofPlath and Wakoski (LSS 121-22). But her
own early poems usually mute, universalize, or displace her anger for her
father, at least by comparison with Plath or Wakoski. Part of the problem
with rejecting her father was that it meant rejecting the very "source" of
her poetry:
He prowled and pounced over my school papers, insisting I use
"grown-up" sources; he criticized my poems for faulty tech-
nique and gave me books on rhyme and meter and formo His
investment in my intellect and talent was egotistical, tyranni-
cal, opinionated, and terriblywearing. He taught me, neverthe-
less, to believe in hard work, to mistrust easy inspiration, to
write and rewrite; to feel that I was a person of the book, even
though a woman; to take ideas seriously. He made me feel, at
a very young age, the power of language and that I could share
in it. (BBP 113)
315
Chapter Eight
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 11
Rich denounces her father's authoritarian personality but also admits
her literary debt to him, articulates her outrage but also grants his pan
in forming her character. Her youthful identification with him was so
strong that she always "preferred the masculine roles" in games; and
as late as her twenties she "still identified more with men than with
women" (OWB 193).
Arnold Rich died fout years after his daughterwrote 'MerDark,"
attheendof"along, deterioratingillness; his mindhadgone, andhe had
beenlosinghissightfor years" (BBP 116).Whenhe died, shehadalready
"been mourning a long time for an early, primary, and intense relation-
II
ship." Rich, like Lowell, Plath, Sexton, and Ginsberg before her, delves
intotheoriginsof herpsycheinelegizingalovedbuthatedparent,thank-
ingthefatherasthe"oldtreeoflife"yetdefyinghimas the"oldmanwhose
death I wanted" (P 82-84). This poem ofanticipatory mourning, while
less explosive than Plath's volcanic utterances, smolders with rebellion.
Rich wishes she could "stir" her father up now, but only because he is
fading into oblivion. She represents him as a "terrible record" that has
playedfor yearsinherhead, nomatterhowhardshehastriedtoescapeits
mechanical, iterativesound:
overandover, 1 know you better
than you know yourself 1 know
you better than you know
yourself 1 know
you
Thisis thefather as merciless superego, an internalizedvoice thatravages
thedaughterwithitsclaimtosuperiorknowledge, thatrupturesherinteg-
ritybyviolatingherself-relation.Iris theoppositeofthebeloved,comfort-
ingvoiceofthedead, whichpoetslike HemansandSigourneylongedfor
in their elegies. In Sources, Rich again recalls this oppressive voice: "the
father walks up and down I telling the child to work, work / harder than
anyone has worked befire" (22); elsewhere she writes of"the obsessional
powerofArnold'svoice orhandwriting" (BBP 116). In'MerDark,"she
representsthefathernotonlyastyrannicalvoicebutas censoriousscript-
"your mene tekel fadingonthewall."Inthecontextof thispoem,thebibli-
cal allusion associates the father less with the demystifying prophet than
with the self-deluded rulero The writings ofthe dead, like postmortem
voices, had once inspired elegists like Tennyson (Hallam's letters), Eliza-
bethCarter(Rowe'sshiningpages), andHenriettaCordeliaRay(Dunbar's
genius-filledsongs).47 InRich'selegy, thefather'svoicehasbeendevouring
thedaughter("eatingmyhearttodust"), andtheonlywayshecanescape
its tyrannyis to tearherselfawayandapart
...until, self-maimed,
Ilimpedoff, tornattheroots....
Touprootherselfshehadtomutilateandcrippleherself, muchas inwrit-
ing this poem, she must tear herselffrom the very source ofher poetry.
Detached from his language, she went nearly dumb ("stopped singing a
whole year") and deafand blind ("forgot to listen II orread"). Butonce
deadtoherfather's discourse, shecan be reborn as anewself: she
gotanewbody, newbreath,
gotchildren,croakedfor words....
At this remove, she can finally accept her connection by "Blood" to him
("knew myselfyour daughter"). But "Blood is a sacred poison," at once
inescapable yet corrosive, venerable yet life-destroying. As she tentatively
reaffirms their bond, she suggests that this endorsement is a luxury
afforded by distance; because he is dying, she no longer has to will his
death:
We onlywanttostifle
what'sstiflingus already.
Having wanred him dead while he was killing her, having denied him
when he was denying her, she now can become his motherly preserver,
seeming"toholdyou, cuppedI inmyhands." Inthis poemofemotional
complexity, turningandtwistingbetweenhatredandlonging, resentment
andacceptance, Richimplicitlydefines herself, as Plath had, overagainst
her father's rigidity and monotony-he who conrinues in memory "to
scourge my inconsistencies." When his "memory fails," she is suddenly
startledinro newapprehension oftheworld ("the sashcords ofthe world
fly loose"), aworldtowardwhichshe grows newly"protective."
316
317
Chapter Eight
Shedefinesherselfagainstthefather's discoursenotonlyinitsscien-
tificbutalso initsliteraryregister. Subversivelyechoingclassicmaletexts,
the elegy both incorporates the father's literary language and turns that
language against itself. Inthis poem, Rich is already playing the partshe
describes for herselfin 50urces: "she who mustoverthrowthe father, take
whathetaughtheranduseitagainsthim" (515).JustasSextonnegotiated
her relationshipwithher motherbytransformingherwords andtales, so
too Richreclaimsbutrevises boththepatriarchandhis canon. Firstecho-
ingKing Lear ("hehatheverbutslenderlyknownhimself") inthefather's
mantra, Rich undermines the father's assertion ofspecial knowledge and
supportsherclaimthatshe,likeCordeliaandunlikeLear, "knewmyself."48
SincethewordsareactuallyRegan's, Richrisksassociatingherselfnotonly
with Cordelia but with her more darkly rebellious sister. In the poem's
second Shakespearean echo, the daughter qualifies the father's epistemo-
logical absolute, suggesting that knowledge may notalways be the high-
estvalue:
I'dgive
-oh,-something-notto know
ourstrugglesnowareended.
Although the speaker wishes her relationship with her father were still
alive, she redefines itas struggles ratherthan revels. She renounces the ulti-
matesubmissionof aCordeliaoraMiranda,defyingthefatherinhismany
forms-Lear, Prospero, Shakespeare, Dr. Arnold Rich.
49
"Nowlet's away
from prison" begins the second halfofthe poem, echoing but reversing
Lear's"let'sawaytoprison,"hiscommendationof a"cage" f9rtwo; inthis
transformation, Rich rejects the suicidal mourning ofliterary women,
fromthelegendaryNiobeandAntigonetotheactualPlath.
50
Shewasonce
tempted byacquiescent mourning (as by "dutiful" writing) but nowshe
seesitasself-destructive.LikePlath,she"usedtohuddleinthegrave," but
to have stayed there would have been to condemn herselrto premature
death: "they'dfind methere/someday,sittingupright,shrunken,"nextto
her"embalmed"father. Unequivocalgriefrisksbeingnotonlysuicidalbut
incestuous: sheused to
318
1
"

AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY II
...bite
mytonguefor fear itwouldbabble
-Darling-
andshe worriedthattherewould be found inher "lap/ amess ofbroken
pottery." Like incestandlike thepatriarchalcanon, bereavementis atool
bywhichfathers cansometimesmaintaindominionovertheirdaughters.
Inplaceofthis threateningimage ofthedaughtersubmittingsexu-
allyandemotionallytothefather, Richinterposesadreamimageofrecon-
ciliationwithoutself-effacement. She imaginesnotagravebut
...awalkbetweendoomedelms
(whose likeweshallnotsee muchlonger)
andsomething-grassandwater-
Theywalk between the old patriarchal order and a new reality, between
deathandrebirth.As theyawaithisdeath ("thebluntbarge"),shewillnot
listenpassivelybut"tease" himfor "wisdom."Bytheendofthepoem,she
hasdrawnclosertoherfather, butshehasalsosecuredapositionofpower
in relation to him: shewouldcalm andprotecthimas he faces the terror
of death("yourfears blowout";"yourhandfeelssteady").Shealsoqualifies
this reconciliation as a "dream," "an old dream-photograph," suggesting
thatir isamerefantasy bywhichshecheersherselfup.Theirreal relation-
ship, she hints, must remain more difhcult, more contentious, perhaps
even afterhis death. Writingaboutthisperiodinherlife, Richsaidofher
father, "1 wantedhimtocherishandapproveofme, notas he hadwhenI
wasachild,butas thewomanIwas, whohadherownmindandhadmade
herownchoices. This, Ifinally realized, was nottobe;Arnolddemanded
absolute loyalty, absolute submission to his will" (BBP 116). Only in
"dream" can therebe a reconciliation thatdoes notobliteratethe identity
of the mourning daughter, andthe priceof submissive grief would be self-
annihilation.Movingthroughasimilarpatternofangerandtentativerec-
onciliationin 50urces, Richreanimatesherrage butalso reveals thesuffer-
ingandvictimization hiddenbeneath herfather's oppressive facade-the
Jewwho triedassiduouslytosuppresshis ethnicityandalienation:
319
Chapter Eight
Mteryour death 1metyou again as the face ofpatriarchy,
couldnameatlast preciselytheprincipieyouembodied,there
was an ideology at last which let me dispose ofyou, identify
thesufferingyoucaused, hateyou righteouslyas partofasys-
tem,the kingdomof the fathers. 1saw the power and arrogance
ofthemaleas yourtruewatermark;1didnotsee beneathitthe
sufferingoftheJew, thealienstampyoubore, becauseyouhad
deliberatelyarrangedthatitshouldbeinvisibletome.It isonly
now, underapowerful,womanlylens, that1candecipheryour
sufferinganddenyno partofmyOwn. (5)
Rich's discovery ofweakness behind her father's superficial strength and
herself-critiquefor dehumanizinghimare notmerelyconcessions butre-
affirmations ofherown nontyrannical power. "Love and anger can exist
concurrently," Richasserts,andsheprovesthismaximinherelegiacpoetry
(OWB 52). But the anger toward her parents often overrides the love in
herelegiac poems ofthe sixties, as in those ofPlath andSexton, whereas
herlater Sources, "AWoman Deadin HerForties," and"Grandmothers,"
together with Clampitt's parental elegies, fulfill her desire for a feminist
poetry that will "go through that anger" to expand the love-above all,
thelove betweenwomen (LSS 48).
As an example ofRich's later effort to expand that love, we turn !'
briefly to "A Woman Dead in HerForties," a lesbian elegy that marks a
radical departure in the history of women's elegies for friends (DeL
53-58).To help measure Rich's generic leap, letus recall Sigourney's "On
theDeathofaFriend"-apoemthat,likemanysuchelegies, presentsthe
deadwomanas spiritualexamplefor poetandreader. Thephysical dying
of Sigourney'sfriendcanscarcelybediscernedthroughthethickshroudof
religious abstraction:
So, inhours ofpain,
[God] didrememberher, andonherbrow
Andinherbreast, thedove-like messenger
Foundpeacefulhome.
5
\
Like her "untiring hand in duty," the woman's "brow" and "breast" are
less bodilyfacts thanmetaphysicalcoordinates.Comparetheemphatically
despiritualized breasts atthe beginningofRich's poem:
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 11
Your breastsl sliced-off Thescars
dimmed as theywouldhave to be
years later
lmmediately, harshly, Rich confronts the physical deterioration ofher
friend, cuttingupherlineswithaslashandspaces thatmimictypographi-
callythewoman's bodilymutilation,thepoet'semotionalloss.ForSigour-
ney, Christian doctrine explained the ultimate reality ofa friend's death;
for Rich, "thebodytelis thetruthinits rushof cells."AlthoughRichmust
contentherselfwithtellinghertruthinlanguage,sherepresentsherelegiac
utterances as aspiring to corporeal lamentation: "1 want more crazy
mourning, more howl, more keening." Repeating the word touch, Rich
imaginativelyreaches outtowardthefriend's body:
1wanttotouchmyfingers
to whereyourbreastshadbeen
butwe neverdidsuchthings
Tennysonalso recurredtoHallam's"hand"andmomentarilyfanciedhim-
self"touched" by his friend's "soul," but Rich goes further inliteralizing
and eroticizing elegiac touCh.
52
She repudiates both her father's disgust
with the female body and the gente's habitual occlusion of it. Here
Schenck'snotionofthe"connectedness"soughtbywomenelegistsis help-
fui: Rich picturesherselftiedtoherfriendandotherpotentialloversby"a
bloody incandescent chord strung out I across years." Yet even in this
poem, Rich registers her concern that poetically connectingwith a dead
womanmaybean actnotonlyoflove butalso ofviolation. Sheimagina-
tivelytouchesherfriend's bodydespitethewoman'sdisinclination,exposes
it until, as a "stern statement," the friend pulls herblouse backon. Simi-
lady, the poet's language transgresses her friend's will: Richwrites poetry
for awomanwho "neverread itmuch"; she speaks to awoman who pre-
ferred"muteloyalty";shepresentsher"passion"toawomanwitha"calvin-
istheritage." "1 nevertoldyouhowllovedyou," says Rich, butin telling
hernow, thepoetcannothelp butbetrayherfriendo Reachingout,touch-
ing, confessingherlove, Richwouldcompensatefor lovingdeeds undone
andwords unspoken, butatthesame time herelegy contravenes its own
compensatorylogic, implicatingthepoet's invasivestrategyin theterrible
320
321
Chapter Eight AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY JI
harmherfriendhassuffered. Inthis movinglycandidelegy, Richmourns
poetically but indicts herself for being one ofthe "terrible projection-
ists" who "use the dead." She expands the love and she confronts the
risks.
AMY CLAMPITT
Thefemale bodyis also animportantsiteofmourninginClampitt's The
King/isher (1983),whichincludeselegies for thepoet'smotherandfather.
Her elegy for her mother, ''A Procession at Candlemas," has been ac-
claimed by bothSacks andSchenckas astrongrevision ofthepatriarchal
elegy-arevision thatreinstates theonceoccludedfigureofthemother.
53
Perhaps the nature ofClampitt's achievement can be further clarified.
Whereas recentpoetslikeLowell, Plath,andBerrymanhadmournedand
soughtouttheirorigins in amasculinesource, Clampittredirects theele-
giac quest toward the womb. In this regard she resembles Ginsberg, but
Clampittis less threatened, lessequivocal than he about uncovering and
recathecting the maternal body. This difference exemplifies her quieter
modeofgenericrevision, thesignificanceofwhichshouldnot,however,be l'
underestimated. Forwhile the iconoclastic Ginsberg ends up resembling
canonicalelegists inretreatingfrom thefemale body, Clampittchampions
itas theultimatesettinganddestinationofpoeticmourning.
Clampitt's emphasis onthe mother's bodyalso represents a shift in
daughters' elegies, despite theclaim thather poemextends a"distinctfe-
maletraditionof funeralpoetry."54 Hemansandmanyotherbereftdaugh-
tershadreliedonphraseslike"thespiritof ...love," "heart'sanswer," and
"the beautiful" to elegize mothers, but while Clampitt praises hers, she
does notdissolve herinto spiritual formulae.
55
Eulogisticobligations had
long hampered the access ofpoet-daughters to their mourned mothers.
More recently, the major impediment for many poets was bitterness to-
ward the male-dominated mother, as we have seen in Sexton and Rich.
Clampitt's maternal elegy is notwithout anger, but she, even more than
Sexton or Rich, narrowly focuses her elegiac anger on patriarchy, rather
thanthemotherorthe mother'sembodimentofpatriarchy. ThoughSex-
tonbegins toexalt hermotheras afolkloristic"god-in-her-moon,""gauzy
bride,"and"braveghost,"andthoughthedaughtersinRich'spoembriefly
commemorate theirmotheras free as "a leaf," Clampitt, having circum-
scribedheranger, canmoreforcefully cherish, esteem, andremythologize
themother.
Clampittconcentratesherangerontworeligioustraditionsthathave
degraded mothers while seeming to celebrate them: the cults ofAthena
andoftheVirginMary. Onherbusridewestwardtoseeherdyingmother,
thecarlightsonthehighwaysseemtoturnintoaCandlemasprocessional.
Butin its patriarchalform, thissupposedexaltationofthemotheris a
Mosaicinsult-suchaloathing
ofthecommonorigin, evenavirgin,
havinggiven birth,needs purifying-
Furious thatmaternityshouldbe seen as somethingthatneeds purifying,
Clampitt ridicules the theological concession that "God might have, /
mightactuallyneedamother."Similarly, sheis indignantthatthecultsof
Artemis, Hera, andAthenashouldhave centeredona"wizenedeffigy"-
asmall wooden object, "walled inthedark" and"kept / outofsight like
theincontinentwhimperer/ inthe backstairs bedroom."Athena, though
apparently a fertility goddess in her pre-Hellenic form, was divested of
maternityby theGreeks andrepresented as avirgin. Herauthorityas the
goddess ofwisdomandwarseems tohave requirednotonlythatherma-
ternitybesuppressedbutthatsheherselfbemotherless.Recallingthemyth
thatAthena "hadno mother," Clampitt mocks the offensive notion that
this goddess was "born-it'sdeclared- / ofsorne man's brainlike every
otherpureidea." In the myth ofAthena's birth, emblematicofthe patri-
archalocclusionofthemother,Zeusswallowedhermother,Metis,because
hefearedthebirthofamorepowerfuldeity. Impatientwith"thehampered
obscurity that has been / for centuries the mumbling lot ofwomen,"
Clampittwouldrecoverthesuppressedpowerofsuch maternalfigures as
Maryand(originally)Athena.Whereasandrocentricelegistshadtradition-
ally looked for solace in phallic gods like Orpheus, Adonis, and Christ,
andwhereasmorerecentpoetslikeLowellandPlathhadaggressivelysati-
rizedordemonizedauthorityfigures intheirelegies, Clampittmournsher
mother under the auspices ofthe long-suppressed and devalued mother
goddesses.
Clampitt's mournful quest for the mother, mythic and real, is a
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Chapter Eight
difficultjourney-ajourneythatseems atfirst directionless, "anonymous
of purpose"likethebuses.The firsthalfof the elegylingersin Washington,
D.C., and the first sentence stalls in a blizzard ofcontradictorypreposi-
tions (on, back, from, with, up, down, off, out, up, in). Themourneris un-
willing to grant the finality ofthe journey, her mind "fleeing instead /
toward scenes oftranshumance," or seasonal alternations between low-
land and mountain pastures, which contrast with the poet's sadly one-
directional journey. Her literal quest-herbus ride westward on Route
80-isoverlaidwithotherquestsfor origins,andnotonlyherrevisionary
theological quest. Metamorphosing the buses into bison that drink at a
rest stop named "IndianMeadows," Clampittsuggests a parallel between
hersadjourneyand
Thewestward-trekking
transhumance,onceonly, ofapeoplewho,
in losingeverythingtheyhad, losteven
thenames theywentby....
Searchingbackwardintime, thepoetrecallsthemassbereavementunder-
lying the historicalorigins ofmodernAmerica. "Who,"sheasks, "canas-
sign a trade-in value lO that sorrow?" Summoning an original "sorrow"
uncontaminatedbythe"trade-invalue"cherishedbyAmericancolonizers,
Clampitt would separate the mourning mind from commercial culture.
Glitteringjellies andcandies, begottenbytheinseminationofcoins, offer
onlyacrass parodyofbirth: they "plopfrom theirhousings / perfect, like
miracles." Repulsedbythesightofcosmeticsandtoiletries, themourning
daughter decries them as embodiments of"the pristine seductiveness of
money." Butlatershesuggests thathermournfultributeis itselfaform of
payment, however elevated theeconomytowhich it belongs: itcompen-
sates hermother, unlike the
parentsbythetens ofthousandsliving
unthanked, unpaidbutinthesourcoin
ofresentment.
While Plath andSexton bitterlycompensate their dead parents in accor-
dance with the law ofthe talion-violencefor violence, indifference for
indifference-Clampitt recovers for the parental elegy a different eco-
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY II
nomic strategy: she redescribes and remythologizes her mother's bequest
of anidentity,therebyacceptingandhopingtorepaythisfundamentalin-
heritance.
Onherinwardquestintotheoriginsofherownpsyche,thedaughter
would illuminate her basic debt to her mother. Clampitt represents the
psycheas akindofembryo:
Thelapped,wheelborneintegument, layer
withinlayer, atthecoreadreamof
somethingprecious, ripped....
Wrappedin layersofthemother'sbodilytissue, themindis formedoutof
cohesionwiththemother,yetalsooutofseparation, the'T' tornfromher
enveloping membrane. Ingrief, the daughter reexperiences the traumatic
division from the mother-adivision thatwas, nevertheless, essential to
thedaughter's psychicintegrity. To the poet, people insleep seemable to
heal this rupture temporarily: returning toasense ofselfas encompassed
ratherthandiscrete, they"rewrap themselves / abouttheself's imponder-
able substance." Grief, according to Clampitt, recapitulates notonly the
primordialseparation from the motherbutalso thestill more primordial
continuity, a continuity that she contrasts with shallow commercialism
andurbanconfusion:
beyondthe tornintegumentofchildbirth,
sometimes,wrappedlike apapooseintoagrief
notmerelyoftheego, yourediscoveralmost
the oftheplacentalcoracle.
Alludingonce more toNativeAmericans ("papoose"), she portraysagrief
so profoundthatitresembles botha return lO maternal origins ("the pla-
cental coracle") and a prolepsis ofdeath ("rest-in-peace"). Theword "al-
most" saves this grieffrom tipping over into complete self-obliteration.
Tennyson had likewise wanted to enfold himselfin nullifying despon-
dency: "Inwords, like weeds, 1'11 wrap me o'er," thereby, as ifwith "dull
narcotics, numbingpain."56 ButClampittfeminizes theobjectofthemel-
ancholic drive, extending and altering the tradition ofAmerican elegists
like Whitman, Stevens, and Ginsberg, who hailed a shadowy maternal
figure as origin andend. Like them, she interrelates theoriginaloblivion
324 325
Chapter Eight AMERiCAN FAMiLY ELEGY 11
ofthe embryo, the near-oblivion ofmelancholia, and the ultimate oblivion
ofdeath. But unlike Whitman or Stevens, Clampitt proffers no metaphysi- .
cal monster but a vividly imagined, anatomically detailed womb. And un-
like Ginsberg, she imaginatively reenters the mother's physical body with-
out terror or revulsion. Faced with the brute fact of final separation, she
turns it into an occasion for reconnecting with the maternal body.
In the elegy's many images of layering, wrapping, and integument,
the daughter acknowledges the torn "fabric" that constitutes each separate
life, yet honors the interwovenness of each life with its maternal source.
Clampitt parallels her multilayered elegy not only with an overhauled Can-
dlemas but also with a rehabilitated pagan ritual-the annual presentation
to Athena of "the fair linen of the sacred peplos." Presided over by this
goddess of spinning and weaving, the elegy abounds with figures for the
textual mediation now substituting for the physical mediation of mother
and daughter: the "mother curtained in Intensive Care," the "red-tasseled"
llamas, and the Kurdish women on "rug-piled mounts"; the "knotting of
gears" and the "corn-stubble quilting"; the "shucked-off I bundle" ofwom-
en's history and the "thread of scarlet" slitting a bird's yellow cap. This last
image is the culmination of the daughter's retrospective quest "down the
long-unentered nave of childhood." Ir is a memory that helps Clampitt ro
join the imagery of the "thread" binding mother and daughter with the
"Rame" of each fragile human identity, and thus suggests once more the
necessary continuity with the mother and the necessary individuation of
self. Clampitt interweaves and feminizes the elegiac tropes of fire (Milton's
sun "Flames" in the sky), bird (Whitman's hermit thrush sings a "Song of
the bleeding throat"), and weaving itself (Shelley's "web of being"). Like
Whitman's thrush, Clampitt's image of the bird, "scarlet" and "stilled," ac-
knowledges the mother's death yet renews an ancient figure for immortal-
ity. Clampitt would concede the fact of"the lost connection," but celebrate
the mother as origin, as reserve of "unguessed-at" possibility, as "the
untouched I nucleus of fire." Hardly something to be suppressed, the ma-
ternal source is the fountainhead of the poet's power. this regard,
Clampitt reverses a long poetic hisrory of repression, since canonical ele-
gists from Milton ro Shelley and Swinburne had overridden as powerless
or inadequate such maternal figures as Calliope, Urania, and the Gante,
and even a woman elegist like Jackson had denounced Demeter. In defi-
ance of this tradition and of the shadowy death-mother ofAmerican poets
from Whitman to Stevens, Clampitt moves both the actual and the mythic
mother into the imaginative center of elegy. Relegating death ro a second-
ary status, she sees birth as the archetype ofall transition: "Change as child-
bearing." The magnolias have "pregnant wands," the tunnel heaves "like a
birth canal," and the day's intentions are a "spawn." More comprehensively
than previous elegists, male or female, Clampitt maternalizes the discourse
and landscape of the elegy.
But the maternal figures recuperated in her elegy for her mother dis-
appear in her elegy for her father, "Beethoven, Opus 111."57 Having
restored the suppressed figure of the mythic mother in "A Procession at
Candlemas," Clampitt returns in her elegy for her father to the genre's
traditional male archetype of regenerative power, except that she links her
father not to Adonis or Christ but to the mortal hero Beethoven. By her
willingness ro rehabilitate this androcentric paradigm in an elegy for a fa-
ther, Clampitt marks a significant departure from the sexual politics of
daughter-father elegies by Plath, Rich, and Sexton. Not that Clampitt
merely reverts ro unqualified encomium of the sort that had been tradi-
tional in the parental elegy before the sixties. Her language is more detailed
and candid than that, her analogy between farmer and composer more
circumspect and self-conscious. In comparing one person ro another,
Clampitt humanizes elegiac typology, registers the inevitable differences
separating the dead man from his distant counterpart, and fortifies the
poem against vapid eulogy. She further complicates this play of resem-
blances by subtly writing herself into the poem as a third termo Describing
a performance ofSonata no. 32 in C Minor, op. 111, Clampitt opens her
elegy with a language that mediates the three protagonists of the poem-
Beethoven, her father, and herself. Beethoven: the artist furiously creates
"a sound he cannot hear," a sound that transcends his "rage" to become
"levitations," that rises in the air, that joins the starry heavens, that is fixed
in the "glassy cerements of Art." But the music does not merely rise up-
ward; it also digs downward. The music's earthliness evokes her father the
farmer: hobnails, mining, ores, plowshare, bulldozer. Here and throughout
the poem, each man crosses into the domain of his apparent opposite,
Beethoven creating a music that encompasses not only the stars but the
earth, and her father wQrking the earth without acceding to its limita-
326
327
Chapter Eight
tions. As an artistandas afarmer's daughter, Clampittis somewhere be-
tween her father's earthly and Beethoven's airy tendencies, between the
terrestriallaborofthe farmer andthe transcendental artofthe Romantic
genlUS.
The chthonic associations ofBeethoven's music prepare somewhat
for Clampitt's surprising proposition: "my father / might have been his,
twin." Thecomparison is deliberately strained, its dissonance suggesting
the difficulty ofthe poet's intermediary position and guarding the elegy
againstpatequation.Herintroductionofherfatherimpedesanyimmedi-
ate apprehensionoftheresemblance between thetwo men:
-afarmer
hackingatsourdock,atthestrangle-
rootsofthistIes andwildmorningglories....
Butslowly, in tellingananecdote,she begins tofurnish piecesofthepuz-
zle. Even thoughherstory-herfather dug up andburned poison ivy-
hardlyseems tojustifyherdescription ofherfatheras Beethoven's "twin,"
itbegins tosuggesthis Romanticisminspirit:
Myfather
was na'ive enough-bynature
revolutionary, thoughhe'dhave
disownedthelabel-tosupposehe might
insorneway, minorbutradical, disrupt
thegivens ofexistence....
Romantic, revolutionary, radical-hemighthavebeenafarmer, butinhis
own way, he reconceived the physical ground and perhaps the ultimate
groundof reality.APrometheanhero,hebringsfire tothe"malefic"poison
ivyandmustsuffer tormentfor his rebellion againstthe real. Heinadver-
tentIy fashions a venomous shirt thathe, like Hercules, "writhed inside"
for weeks. The description ofhis airborne creation as "sowing," "brace-
leting," and "spreading" invites comparison with Beethoven's music-
"mounting,""wandering,""disrupting."Thevenomislikea"mesh" anda
"shirt," muchas the "diaphanous" music is like "cerements." Porall their
obviousdissimilarities,thetextIikecreationsoffarmerandartistdilateand
grow. Spawned in rebellion, theyexceed the grasp oftheir aurhors-the
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY II
music burstingintosoundsBeethovencannothear, the"well-meantholo-
caust" filling the air with its poisonous mist. But unlike the traditional
elegist'sconflationof deceasedandimmortalparagon,Clampitt'smultiple
comparisons between composer and farmer are sufficientIy improbable
andstrangethatthereadermusthelptoconstructthem-aninvolvement
of thereaderthatinhibitstheerasureofdifferencesbetweenprototypeand
father. The reader, working out Clampitt's extravagant correlations, is
neverallowedto forget thatBeethoven'smusicdiffersfrom herfather's air-
bornepoisonivy, orthatthecomposer'stransformationofmusical"givens"
is distinctfrom thefarmer's patheticrebellion againstthe"givens"ofagri-
culture.
Whiledepictingthetwomen,ClampitthasalsobeenquietIyinscrib-
ing a discrete self-portrait within the diptych, a self-portrait as elegist
whoseworkis atonce earthlyandtranscendental (unlike the more rigor-
ously anti-transcendental elegies ofher immediate predecessors or the
morecomfortablytranscendentalelegies ofearlierpoets). Buttosketchin
greaterdetail herdifficultposition, Clampittnowsteps backfrom herin-
tricateanalogybetweencomposerandfarmer. Havingconsideredartfrom
anartist'sperspectiveandfarmingfrom afarmer's, shenowponders"High
art" from the perspectiveofthe farmer, implicitIycontemplatingherown
elegiac art from the viewpoint ofher father. Clampittadmits that in the
rural Iowawhere she grewup, high art was notthunderous and ecstatic,
like the music she remembers at the beginning ofthe poem or like the
terrestrial-transcendentalartofthis veryelegy, butrigid, snobbish, nearly
irrelevant:
harpstringsandfripperies ofair
congealedintoan objectnailedagainstthewall,
itssole ironicfunction (ifithas any)
todemonstratethatone, thoughhemay
gruntandsweatatwork, is notadod.
Unliketheupward"levitations"and"downward"disruptionsof Clampitt's
elegy or Beethoven's music, art in this world shrinks into a commodity
fastened on thewall. Highart, atleastfor herfather, was littIe morethan
asignifierofdass, "a susurrus, thesilkandperfume/ ofunsulliedhands."
Whileconcedingthatherartisticcommemorationofherfathermightwell
328 329
Chapter Eight
have seemedsuperfluousro him, Clampittwritesintoherelegyanapolo}
gia for the elegy: she legitimizes her poem byshowing her father ro be,,:
despitehimself,afarmer-artistofthesublime,andshowinghis"twin"Bee"':1
thovenro be,despitehislevitations,amusician-plowmanoftheearth,and'
showingherselftobe,despiteherartisticvocation,askepticof"HighartI!'
with a stiffneck." She has already established that her father need not
"demonstrate,"throughafondnessforart, thatheis "notadod,"since ~
proves his artistryand spirituality byhis daring brandoffarming, byhisj
"radical"struggleagainstthelawsof existence.Havingacknowledgedtheid
differences,Clampittsuddenlyfusesthemanuallaboroffarmer, composer,
andelegistin herimageof"Thosehands" (recallingthefamous tropethad
conjoineddeceased, mourner,andGodbytheendofIn Memoriam). The
threeindividualsshareananguishedlabortocreate"anotherlifeentirely,"
whether in music, agriculture, or an elegiac poem, and they all fail to....
achieve their impossible ifheroic aims: each is a voyager in a "doomed.
divingbell." Muchas Clampitttraces backherpsychicand bodilyorigins
rohermotherin"AProcessionatCandlemas,"shenowlocatestheorigins
ofheridentityas artistinherfather's rebelliousartoffarming. Yetshealso
indicatesthat,as partandparcelofinheritinghis defiantoutlook,she has
had to reject his view of high art in becoming a sophisticated poet.
Clampittintimatesthe narrativeofherownantitheticalgenesis. An"im.
pressionable"daughterwhommusicdrove"wild"formoreart,shewanted\
"anotherlife entirely" from herfather's; buteven as she fell in love with
l
music andseparated herselffrom herfather, she nevertheless internalized
his drive to "disrupt/ the givens ofexistence," beginningwiththe givens
ofherownexistenceas afarmer's daughter.
In the elegy's last verse paragraph, Clampitt switches ever more
boldlybetweenfarmer, composer,andpoet.Beethovenischaracterizednot,
byself-satisfactionorself-completionbutbythewreckageofhiscrockery,
his piano, his hearing, the composer uselessly striving over and over "ro 1
hearhimself."Andoutofthis despairandsufferingrises thebeautyofhis 1
music, "out ofa humdrum squalor the levitations," mu,ch as Clampitt's '
ownelegyemergesoutofthedoldrumsofhergrief, andmuchas herhigh
artpoetryspringsfrom the humbleworldofherfarmer-father. To secure .
these comparisons without concealing differences, Clampitt resumes
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 11
mewilysynthetictechniquethatdosed"A ProcessionatCandlemas."She
runs rogether the ancient elegiac figures oftheflower andofmusic, one
imageassociatedwithherfatherandtheotherwithBeethoven:
theArietta
adisintegratingsurfofblossom
openingalongthekeyboard, alongthefencerows
theastonishmentofsweetness.
Thesyntaxoscillatesbetweencomposerandfarmer, finallymergingthem
in the metaphor of"sweetness." Rehabilitating a great Romantic myth
aboutsuffering and beauty, abouthumbleoriginsandhighachievement,
Clampittrepresents "sweetness" as arisingfrom its opposite-atransfigu-
ration exemplified by the poet's life and by this very poem. But like the
anemones, violets,and poppies of elegiac tradition,the figureof the flower
signifiesnotonlybeautyandtranscendencebutalso mortality: memourn-
ingdaughtersadlyrecalls herfather's failed effortro transplantaflower, a
"pricklypoppymostlikely."FiguringhisRomanticsensibilityandforetell-
inghis death, thedoomedflower also foreshadows the daughter'slonging
totransplantherfatherintoherelegiactext: thefloweris apotent,radiant,
libidinalobjectthatrecalls theelegiac motifofgenerational transmission,
"its luminousness / wounding the blank plains like desire." Perhaps the
wordsprickly poppy themselvesencode thedifficult mutation ofmaninto
text,poppa intopoppy. In her description of her father's terrible, protracted
dying,Clampittfurtherelaboratestheunlikelyanalogybetweenfatherand
composer, comparingherfather's angryisolation toBeethoven'sendosure
within his deafness, linking her father's physical suffering to Beethoven's
callsfor"Freiheit!" Attheendoftheelegyshereturnstotheairyfreedom
or "levitation" with which she began, except that she now correlates the
experience ofartistic transcendencewith the"serenity" ofdeath itself. In
this last comparison, the Nirvana principIe or death drive becomes the
common impetus ofBeethoven's art, herfather's final fury, and her own
poetry.AlthoughClampittis hardlythefirst poetto endanelegywiththe
motif of deathasfreedom-oneof thecommonestendingsof nineteenth-
century consolation poetry-she manages to articulate three separate
quests for oblivionall at once. Theendingmovesvertiginouslythrougha
330
331
Chapter Eight
AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY II
swirlofthepoem'srepeatedimagesofearthandair, enelosureandfreedom,
pain and bliss, mesh and flower, re-creating in this verbal tumult the fa-
ther'slastagony,thecomposer'sturbulentwork,andthedaughter'sintoler-
able grief, until breaking at last into a description offinal "serenity"-a
verbalserenitythatsimulatestheultimate releasesoughtbyal!.
Clampitt,likesuchpostwarAmericanpoetsas LowellandGinsberg,
PlathandRich, uses theparentalelegytorenegotiatethefundamentalin-
heritancesandresistancesthathavedefinedher, bothas anidentitywithin
a domestic nexus and as avoice withina poetic tradition. Again like her
predecessors, she repeats inherelegies the necessaryseparation from and
continuitywithherreal parents(tornfromhermother'sbodyyetthreaded
to it, uprooted from her father's farming yet bound to it) as well as her
literaryparents (reinstatingyetmodifYingtheelegiacarchetypesofthedi- ti
vinemotherandfather). Butas wehave alsoseen,shediffersfromAmeri- .\1
can family elegists ofrecent decades in her greater susceptibility to both
parentalandliteraryauthority."Beethoven,Opus111,"for example,con- .
eludeswithamoresanguinerepresentationofdeaththantheseearlierele-
gists allowed:
...as thoughthespiritmight
aspire, initslastact,
towalkonairo
Clampittis stillvigilant inqualifYingthisapotheosis, constrainingitwith
wordslike"as though"and"mightaspire,"andseeingdeathnotas thefirst
butas the "last act" ofa freed spirit. Even so, she, more than Lowell or
PlathorSexron, tries to balancetheelaimsoftranscendenceandoblivion
in this elegy, as in hermanysubsequent elegies for family and friends.
58
Similarly, in symbols like the "wizened effigy" and the "prickly poppy,"
ClampittismorereceptivethanPlath,Sexton,orRichtotheelegiacmotif
ofthe potentobjectthatfigures intergenerational bequest. Whilethis de-
parturemayreflectpersonaldifferences, itobviouslyresonateswithabroad
culturalshiftfrom amore rebellious to amoreaccommqdatinghistorical
elimate, traceable in many other gentes. Indeed, despite important na-
tionalandgenderdifferences, SeamusHeaney'selegies chartananalogous
turnfrom themelancholicbogpoems ro themore normativeelegies later
in his career, as we shall see in the next chapter. Written in the eighties,
332
bothHeaney's andClampitt'selegies for theirparents reelaim amore pli-
ant,moretraditionalistpoeticsforthegentebycomparisonwiththeearlier
parentalelegies we have been studying-ashift thatcan help us to place
temporal and theoretical limts around our argument that the elegy suc-
ceeds in ourtime bymeans ofastrenuouslycombative andharshlyanti.
elegiacpoetics.
333
NOTES
INTRODUCTION
1. Ezra Pound, "A Retrospect," Literary Essays ofEzra Pound, ed. T. S. Eliot (New York:
New Directions, 1968), 3, and Hugh Selwyn Mauberley, Personae: The Colleeted Shorter
Poems ofEzra Pound (New York: New Direcrions, 1971), 190-91; T. S. Eliot, The Complete
Poems and Pldys ofT. S. Eliot (London: Faber, 1969),61, 197.
2. Wilfred Owen, The Poems ofWilfred Owen, ed. Jon Stallwonhy (New York: Nonon,
1986), 192; Wallace Stevens, Lmm ofWalldee Stevens, ed. Holly Stevens (New York: Knopf,
1966), 729; and Sylvia Plath, Joumals ofSylvia Pldth, ed. Frances McCullough and Ted
Hughes (New York: Dial, 1982), 223.
3. Books on the e1egy rhar have been especially helpful ro me are John Draper, The Fu-
neral Elegy and the Rise of English Romantieism (New York: New York University press,
1929); Rurh Wallersrein, The Laureate Hearse, pr. 1 of Studies in Seventeenth Century Poeties
(Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1950); Ellen Zetzel Lamben, Pldcing Sorrow: A
Study ofthe Pastoral Elegy Convention from Theomtus to Milton (Chapel HiII: University o,f
Nonh Carolina Press, 1976); Eric Smith, By Mourning Tongues: Studies in English Elegy
(Torowa, N.J.: Rowan and Litdefield, 1977); Perer M. Sacks, The English Elegy: Readinr;
in the Genrefrom Spenser to ~ t (Balrimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1985); G. W.
Pigman, Grief and English Renaissanee Elegy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1985); Celesre Marguerire Schenck, Mourning and Panegyrie: The Poeties ofPastoral Cere-
mony (University Park: Pennsylvania Stare University, 1988); Dennis Kay, Melodious Tears:
The English Funeral Elegyfrom Spenser to Milton (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990).
Valuable works on c10sely relared lirerary ropics include Lawrence Lipking, The Life of
the Poet: BeginningandEnding Poetie Careers (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981);
Garren Srewarr, Death Sentenees: Styles of Dying in British Fietion (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1984); Arnold Srein, The House ofDeath: Messagesfrom the English Renais-
sanee (Balrimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986); J. Gerald Kennedy, Poe, Death,
and the Life ofWriting (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1987); Edward Engelberg, Ele-
giae Fietions: The Motifofthe Unlived Life (University Park: Pennsylvania Srate University
Press, 1989); Richard Stamelman, Lost Beyond Telling: Representations ofDeath andAbsenee
in Modero Freneh Poetry (lthaca: Cornell University Press, 1990); Ronald Schleifer, Rhetorie
and Death: The Language ofModernism and Postmodern Diseourse Theory (Urbana: Univer-
sity ofIllinois Press, 1990); Eric L. Santner, Stranded Objeets: Mourning, Memory, and Film
in Postwar Germany (lthaca: Cornell University Press, 1990); Svedana Boym, Death in Quo-
tation Marks: Cultural Myths ofthe Modero Poet (Cambridge: Harvard University Press,
1991); and Joshua Scodel, The English Poetie Epitaph: Commemoration and Conf/iet from
Jonson to Wordsworth (lrhaca: Cornell University Press, 1991).
For compressed but insighrful dlscussions of twenrierh-cenrury e1egy, see Sacks, English
367
Notes to Introduction
Elegy, 299-328, and Celeste M. Schenck, "When the Moderns Write Elegy: Crane,
Kinsella, Nemerov," C/assical and Modern Literature: A Quarter/y 6 (1986): 97-108. Sacks
anticipates my view of the modern elegy as revisionary and skeptical. But where he praises
elegies for renewing consolation (307) and faults them for failing ro console (325), I reinter-
pret this anti-consolarory tendeney as the new foundation of the gente. Schenck briefly
anticipates my emphasis on the nontranscendence and nonconsolation of modern elegies.
though she concludes that such poems are "anti-elegies" (98, 108).
Among modern elegists leEr aside in the present study but discussed elsewhere, see '
Schenck's extended treatment of Crane (98-107), Sacks's of Merrill ("The Divine Transla"
tion: Elegiac Aspects of The Changing Light at Sandover," in James Merrill: Essays in Criti-
cism, ed. David Lehman and Charles Berger [lthaca: Cornell University Press, 1983], 159-
85), and my own ofYeats (Yeats and the Poetry ofDeath: Elegy, Self Elegy, and the Sublime'
[New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990], 14--78, 134--99).
4. For his discussion of the "destructive" and "privative" character of modern art, see
T. W. Adorno, Aesthetic Theory, transo C. Lenhardt, ed. Gretel Adorno and RolfTiedemann
(New York: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1986),23-67.
5. William Carlos Williams, The Collected Poems ofWilliam Carlos Williams, ed. A. Wal-
ron Litz and Christopher MacGowan, 2 vols. (New York: New Directions, 1986), 1:72-74.
6. See "The Last Words of My English Grandmother," "An Elegy for D. H. Lawrence,"
"Two Pendants: for the Ears," and "The Sparrow."
7. Sacks theorizes this paradigm in English Elegy, 1-37; Tennyson, In Memoriam, Epi-
logue, line 140.
8. Milton, "Lycidas," line 172.
9. Sigmund Freud, "Mourning and Melancholia" (1917), vol. 14 of The Standard.
Edition ofthe Complete Psychological Works ofSigmund Freud, ed. James Strachey, 24 vols.
(London: Hoganh, 1953-74): 245, 249, 245.
10. Milron, "Lycidas," line 193.
11. Milron, "Lycidas," lines 66, 153, 152.
12. See Freud, "Mourning and Melancholia," 14:243-58. Modifying Freud, I thus re-
fuse ro cede the rich word "mourning" merely ro its technical use as a term for bereavement
that attains resolution.
13. Owen, Poems, 192, 135.
14. Elizabeth Bishop, "One Art," The Complete Poems, 1927-1979 (New York: Farrar,
Straus and Giroux, 1983), 178. Bishop's poem elegizes, in part, her longtime companion
in Brazil, Lota de Macedo Soares.
15. Tennyson, In Memoriam, 1.11, 5.7-8; Freud, "Mourning and Melancholia," 14:253.
16. John Berryman, The Dream Songs (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1969), Song
155, page 174. Further references ro song and page number appear parenthetically.
17. Thomas Hardy, The Complete Poetical WJrks ofThomas Hardy, ed. Samuel Hynes, 3
vols. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982-85), 2:282. Subsequent references appear
parenthetically.
18. On the elegy and the poetries of praise and love, see Monon W. Bloomfield, 'The
NOTES TO INTRODUCTION
Elegy and the Elegiac Mode: Praise and Alienation," in &naissance Genres, ed. Barbara
Kiefer Lewalski (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1986), 147-57. For a more critical
view, see Pigman, Griefand English Renaissance Elegy, 40-51.
19. Tennyson, In Memoriam, 13.1; Whitman, "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard
Bloom'd," line 203.
20. Williams, Collected Poems, 1:346--48. For a clearer reference to Williams's father, see
the lines later omitted from the poem (530).
21. Gwendolyn Brooks, "old relative," Selected Poems (New York: Harper and Row,
1963),34.
22. Tennyson, In Memoriam, 1.8. Not that qualms about poetic mourning were unprec-
edented in the history of elegy; but earlier antipathies were rooted in theology and dimin-
ished over time. Draper describes how seventeenth-century Puritans had to override anti-
ritualist views in making the elegy the dominant gente of their poetry (Funeral Elegy, 78,
91, 157-60); and Pigman documents sixteenth-century English "rigorism," which "prohib-
its and condemns all grief for those who have died vinuously and are in heaven" (Griefand
English Renaissance Elegy, 27).
23. Dylan Thomas, SelectedPoems, ed. Walford Davies (London: Dent, 1974),68-69.
24. Geoffrey Hill, "September Song," Collected Poems (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1986), 67.
25. Hill, Collected Poems, 31, 49. The following quotations are from the same poems
(49, 31). For astute analysis of these elegiac poems, see Jon Silkin, "The Poetry of Geoffrey
Hill," British Poetry Since 1960: A Critical Survey, ed. Michael Schmidt and Grevel Lindop
(Oxford: Carcanet Press, 1972), 145-47; Christopher Ricks, The Force ofPoetry (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1984),285-303; Henry Han, The Poetry ofGeoffrey Hill (Carbon-
dale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1986),41-44,75-76, 110-12; Vincent Sherry,
The Uncommon Tongue: The Poetry and Criticism ofGeoffrey Hill (Ann Arbor: University of
Michigan Press, 1987),61-62,66-67, 103-5; and Sacks, English Elegy, 307-12.
26. Lawrence L. Langer, Holocaust Testimonies: The Ruins ofMemory (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1991),2. On the refusal or inability ro mourn the Holocaust, see also Eric
Santner, Stranded Objects, and Shoshana Felman and Dori Laub, Testimony (New York:
Routledge, 1992).
27. Two recent collections ofHolocaust poetry are Blood to Remember: American Poets on
the Holocaust, ed. Charles Fishman (Lubbock, Texas: Texas Tech University Press, 1991),
and Ghosts ofthe Holocaust: An Anthology ofPoetry by the Second Generation, ed. Stewan J.
Florsheim (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1989).
28. Algernon Charles Swinburne, "Ave Atque Vale," lines 170-71; "In Memory ofWal-
ter Savage Landor," line 29. Funher, many of the classic pastoral elegies of antiquity did
not close with the jubilant consolations of the son that we find in "Lycidas" and later ele-
gies; see, for example, Theocritus' "Idyl 1," Bion's "Lament for Adonis," and Moschus'
"Lament for Bion."
29. Tennyson, In Memoriam. 34.15-16.
30. Edmund Spenser, "Astrophel," \The Poetical WJrks ofEdmundSpenser, ed. J. C. Smith
368 369
Notes to Introduction
and E. De Selincourt (New York: Oxford University Press, 1912), 547-50. The ensuin!,]
parenchetical references are to line numbers. Spenser's Daphnai'da is an even more disconso;:;l
late elegy chat closes wichout relieving the angry, masochistic grief of the shepherd"''i
mourner Alcyon. "
Similarly, in reinterpreting "Lycidas," Stanley Fish emphasizes the poem's irony towarcf'!
"the traditions of consolation" (" Lycidas: A Poem Finally Anonymous," Glyph 8 (1981):.)
6), and Anselm Haverkamp claims that Milton refutes "the elegiac mode of
-1
("Mourning Becomes Melancholia-A Muse Deconsrructed: Keats's OJe on MelanchoJ,'!
NLH21 [1990]: 698-99).
31. In che June Edogue, E. K. names this trope "Epanonhosis or correction"-a figure
of serring srraight, of recalling a term to replace it wich a berrer term: "verses vaine (yet)
verses are not vaine)," "hardie (too hardie alas)," "felicitie, I Or rather infelicitie," "The,\l
stopt his wound (too late to stop it was)" (68, 72, 79-80, 145). See Spenser, The
Calender, Poetical Wrks, 443. pi
32. Roben Frost, "Departmemal," The Poetry ofRoben Frost (New York: Holt,
and Winston, 1979), 289. On the shortened, professionalized, expensive funeral, see
J. Farrell, Inventing the American Wy ofDeath, 1830-1920 (Philadelphia: Temple
sity Press, 1980), 178-79, 181.
33. John Morley, Death, Heaven and the Victoriam (Pittsburgh: University of Pirrsburgl1j
Press, 1971), 78; Farrell, Inventing the American Wy ofDeath, 180. \\
34. These poims are made by Morley, Death, Heaven and the Victoriam, 75-79; Marrhi\.
Pike, "In Memory Of: Artifacts Relating to Mourning in Nineteemh Cemury America,"]
in Rituals and Ceremonies in Popular Culture, ed. Ray B. Browne (Bowling Green, Ohio:'"
Bowling Green University Popular Press, 1980), 314; and Farrell, Inventing the AmericaJ.
Wy ofDeath, 177. See also David Cannadine, "War and Deach, Grief and Mourning iD"::,
Modern Britain," Mirrors ofMonality: Studies in the Social History ofDeath, ed. Joachim '.j
Whaley (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1981), 192-96; Charles O. Jackson, "Death in}
'I!
American Life," in Passing: The Vision ofDeath in America, ed. Jackson (Westport, Conn.:
Greenwood Press, 1977), 236; and Julian Linen, The English Wy ofDeath (London: Roben
Hale, 1991),87.
35. Freud, "Thoughts for che Times on War and Death," Standard Edition, 14:289.
36. Joseph Jacobs, "The Dying of Death," The Fortnightly Review 66 (1899): 264.
quem references appear paremhetically in the text. For earlier discussions ofJacobs's essay;
see Farrell, Inventing the American Wy ofDeath, 4-5, and Cannadine, "War and Death,"
194.
37. Ann Douglas explains in analogous terms howwomen and clergymen became
dians of deach in Victorian America; see The Feminization ofAmerican Culture (New York:
Knopf, 1977),240-49. __
38. Frost, "Deparrmemal," Poetry, 288. Even the rugged husband in "Home Burial," '
chough reluctant like Frost to mourn ostematiously, grumbles that "Friends make pretense
of following to the grave, I But before one is in it, their minds are turned" (54).
39. W. B. Yeats, The Poems, rev. ed., ed. Richard J. Finneran, vol. 1 of The Collected Wrks
NOTES TO INTRODUCTION
ofW B. Yeats (New York: Macmillan, 1989), 211. Subsequent references appear parencheti-
cally.
40. W. B. Yeats, The Letters ofW B. Yeats, ed. Allan Wade (London: Rupen Han-Davis,
1954),730.
41. Adorno, Aesthetic Theory, 11,58.
42. Mary J. Chisholm Foster, OO., Immortal Hopes (Boston: D. Lothrop Co., 1892);
Canon Knowles, ed., Not Changed But Glorijied (New York: James Pon and Co., 1896), 1.
43. Poets are not, of course, che only modern English-Ianguage writers ro express pro-
found ambivalence roward mourning and its cusroms. Woolf mourns her mother, facher,
brocher, and half-sister in Jacob's Room, 10 the Lighthouse, and elsewhere, and even thinks
of using "Elegy" as a term for her novels. But she, like her poet-contemporaries, abjures che
Victorian way ofdeath: Mrs. Ramsay, Prue Ramsay, and Andrew Ramsay all die parencheti-
cally in "Time Passes," their loss displaced onto the decaying house and premises, in a
striking revision of the pathetic fallacy (Virginia Woolf, The Diary ofVirginia Wolf[Lon-
don: Hogarth, 1980], 3:34; "Time Passes," 10 the Lighthouse [1927; New York: Harvester-
HBJ, 1955], 189-214).
Similarly, Joyce clads the two principal characters of Ulysses in mourning and details
manyan "old cusrom" of mourning that "has not died out" but is endangered by modern-
ization. At the same time he, like other writers, questions mourning strictures: Stephen,
chough tormented by guilt, repudiates his last obligations to his mother, and Bloom, ab-
sorbed by che deachs of his son and father, riorously imagines upright burial and coffins
equipped wich clocks, telephones, airholes, and gramophones Oames Joyce, Ulysses, rev. ed.
[New York: Modern Library, 1961], 88,108, 111, 114).
44. David Cannadine argues for the primary imporrance of "the spectacular fall in the
deach rate itself, from 22 per thousand in the 1870s to 13 per chousand by 1910"; see his
"War and Deach," 193, and Lawrence Stone, "Death and Its Hisrory," The Ncw York Review
ofBooks 25, no. 15 (1978): 30. On similar changes in America, see Jackson, "Death in
American Life," 232, and David E. Stannard, The Puritan Wy ofDeath: A Study in Religion,
Culture, and Social Change (New York: Oxford University Press, 1977), 189. Other histori-
ans caution against the assumption that this demographic change produced new anitudes
roward death; see Joachim Whaley, "Imroduction," Mirrors ofMortality, ed. Whaley, 11-
13, and in the same collection, John McManners, "Death and the French Hisrorians," 122.
45. Freud, "Thoughts for the Times," 14:291. See Cannadine, "War and Deach," 193;
Morley, Death, Heaven and the Victoriam, 78.
46. Philippe Aries, "Death Denied," The Hour ofOur Death, transo Helen Weaver (New
York: Vintage-Random House, 1981), 560. Alchough ascribing che "invisible death" ro the
postwar period, Aries traces che genesis of the taboo on grief ro the First World War (583)
and to "the bourgeois and cosmopolitan European society of the late nineteench cemury"
(594); Geoffrey Gorer, cited below, locates its origins at the end of the First World War;
and Cannadine argues for che period before che Great War ("War and Death," 193).
47. Geoffrey Gorer, Death, Grief, andMourning(Garden City: Doubleday, 1965), 128,
130-31. Later discussions of the suppression of death include Ernest Becker, The Denial of
370
371
Notes to lntroduction
Death (New York: Free Press, 1973), and Robert Jay Lifton and Eric Olson, Living and
Dying(New York: Praeger, 1974).
48. Gorer, Death, 130; on "unlimired mourning," see also 88-91. Ir should be added
rhar, despite rhe nosralgias of Gorer and Aries, rhe Vicrorian overrirualizarion and rhe mod-
ern suppression of mourning result in similar problems. Vicrorian mourning rituals did nor
merely release grief but sometimes, as Neal L. Tolchin has argued, "prolonged" and
"blocked" ir: since Vicrorian culture proscribed public expression of negarive feelings ro-
ward rhe dead, "conflicrs were driven underground, rhus serring rhe scene for lifelong
chronic grief" (Mourning, Gender, andCreativity in theArt ofHennan Melville [New Haven:
Yale Universiry Press, 1988], xii).
49. Gorer, Death, 39; rhe numbers are from Modey, Death, Heaven and the Victorians,
91,97. On rhe rise of cremarion, see Modey's discussion (91-101); Leroy Bowman, "The "
Effecrs of Ciry Civilizarion," Passing, ed. Jackson, 161-62; and Aries, Hour ofOur Death,
577.
50. Farrell, InventingtheAmerican WayofDeath, 157-64.
51. Farrell, Inventing the American Way ofDeath, 151.
52. On rhe modernizarion and professionalizarion of funerals, see Farrell, Inventing the
American Way ofDeath, 146-83; Jessica Mirford, The American Way ofDeath (New York:
Simon and Schusrer, 1963), 199-201, 222-40; and rhe sarirical novel of Evelyn Waugh,
The Loved One: An Anglo-American Tragedy (Bosron: Lirde, Brown and Co., 1948).
53. Williams's anack on expensive, ornare hearses wirh silk-harred drivers could be seen
as a repudiarion of rhe high cosr and opulenr accourremenrs rhar "funeral direcrors" had
imposed on mourners in recenr decades. "Funeral direcrors" had successfully promored
hundreds of differenr "casker" sryles, ornare and often indestructible, in conrrasr ro rhe
simple, wedge-shaped coffins rhar Americans once used. See Farrell, Inventing the American
Way ofDeath, 169-72.
54. On rhese issues, see rhe following essays rpr. in Passing, ed. Jackson: Leroy Bowman,
"The Effecrs ofCiry Civilizarion," 153-73; Herbert Blaney, "The Modern Park Cemerery,"
219-26; and especially Robert Blauner, "Dearh and Social Srrucrure," 174-209. For more
general trearmenrs of rhese ropics, see Philippe Aries, "The Reversal of Dearh: Changes in
Attitudes Toward Dearh in Wesrern Societies," Death in America, oo. David E. Srannard
(Pinsburgh: Universiry of Pennsylvania Press, 1975), 134-58; Aries, Hour ofOur Death,
559--601; Charles O. Jackson, "Deam in American Life," Passing, ed. Jackson, 229-43;
and Elisaberh Kbler-Ross, On Death and Dying (New York: Collier-Macmillan, 1969).
55. W. H. Auden, "Years as an Example," Kenyon Review 10 (1948): 193.
56. Gary L. Long, "Organizarions and Idenriry: Obituaries 1856-1972," Social Foras
65 (1987): 991-92; subsequenr references appear parenrherically. For perceprive commen-
rary on rhe inrerrelarions berween Anglo-American obituaries and epiraphs (which makes
use of Long's study), see Scodel, English Poetic Epitaph, 404-7, 411. On rhe relared
phenomenon of"newspaper memoriams," see Richard L. Sandler, "Mourning Delivery: An
Examinarion ofNewspaper Memoriams," Journal ofPopular Culture 14 (1981): 690-700.
57. Quored in Morley, Death, Heaven and the Victoriam, 63.
NOTES TO INTRODUCTION
58. See, for example, Hardy's War Poems, "Bereft," "She Hears rhe Srorm," "Bereft, She
Thinks She Dreams," "Before Marching andAfter," and Srevens's early srory "Four Charac-
rers," early play Three Travelers Watch a Sunrise, and "Sunday Mourning." Frosr srructures
"Home Burial" around a dramaric conrrasr berween a mater dolorosa, rnourning her child
"inconsolably," and a sroic farher, concerned rhar "A man musr pardy give up being aman I
Wirh womenfolk" (Poetry. 53-54).
59. Elior, The WasteLand, nore 218; lines 367--68.
60. On rhe Vicrorian feminization of culture, and especially ofconsolarion lirerarure, see
Douglas, Feminization ofAmerican Culture, chapo 6; see also Carol Chrisr, "The Feminine
Subjecr in Vicrorian Poerry, ELH 54 (1987): 385-401. On rhe anxious responses of male
modernisrs ro rhe feminizarion of culture, see Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar, The
War ofthe U70rdr, vol. 1 of No Man's Land (New Haven: Yale Universiry Press, 1988-), chapo
3. Frank Lenrricchia explores Srevens's assertions of poerry's masculiniry in response ro rhe
feminization of culture; see Ariel and the Police: Michel Foucault, William James, Wallace
Stevens (Madison: Universiry ofWisconsin Press, 1988), 136-95. On gender redefinirion
in rhe lare ninereenrh cenrury; especially as reflecred in rhe novel, see Elaine Showalrer,
SexualAnarchy: Genderand Culture at the Fin de Siecle (New York: Penguin, 1990), 1-18.
6!. Hulme, "Romanricism and Classicism," Speculations (1924; London: Roudedge and
Kegan Paul, 1977), 126-33; Pound, ''A Rerrospecr," 12; Years, The Autobiography ofWiI-
liam Burler Yeats (New York: Macmillan, 1965),48, 138, 184, and Essays and Introductions
(London: Macmillan, 1961),523; Elior, SelectedEssays (London: Faber, 1951), 18. Carol
Chrisr wrires rhar Elior, enrering rhe Vicrorian debare over "me gender of poeric sryle,"
distinguishes his "urban, masculine vocabulary" from me "senrimenral one" of his female
characrers ("Gender, Voice, and Figurarion in Elior's Early Poerry," in T. S. Eliot: The Mod-
emist in History, ed. Ronald Bush [Cambridge: Cambridge Universiry Press, 1991], 24-25).
Madon Ross argues rhar male poers were anxious ro demonsrrare rheir masculiniry already
in rhe Romanric era; see Contours of Masculine Desire (New York: Oxford Universiry
Press, 1989).
62. Gorer, Death, xxi-xxii; Morley, Death, Heaven and the Victorians, 76-79.
63. Mina Loy and Laura Riding are possible exceprions ro rhis argumenr; even so, rheir
elegiac poetry rends ro be eimer oblique or undeclared. On elegies by women, see Celesre
M. Schenck, "Feminism and Deconsrruction: Re-Consrructing rhe Elegy," Tulsa Studies in
U70men's Literature 5 (1986): 13-27, and Carole Srone, "Elegy as Polirical Expression in
Women's Poerry: Akhmarova, Levertov, Forch," College Literature 18 (1991): 84-91. On
women's war poems, sorne of mem elegies, see Susan M. Schweik, A GulfSo Deeply Cut:
American U70men Poets and the Second U70rld War (Madison: Universiry of Wisconsin
Press, 1991).
64. Even so, rhe sociological lirerature suggesrs rhar American erhnic groups differ less
rhan one mighr expecr in rhe frequency of gravesite visirs, funeral attendance, and orher
relared cusroms; see Richard A. Kalish and David K Reynolds, Death and Ethnicity: A
Psychocultural Study (Farmingdale, N.Y.: Baywood Publishing Co., 1981).
65. Gorer, Death, xiii.
372 373
l
Notes to lntroduction
66. Sen O Silleabhin, lrish WkeAmusements0961; Cork: Mercier Press, 1967), 165.
Chroniding rhe disappearance of rhese "amusemenrs" and rhe shortening of rhe wake, he
inrermittently dares rhese changes (29,76, 157, 164).
67. Seamus Heaney, "Funeral Rires," Poems, 1965-75 (New York: Noonday-Farrar,
Straus and Giroux, 1988), 171. In rhe presenr srudy, I leave aside considerarion of the
e!egies of the posrcolonial anglophone world because rhey and rhe mortuary cuSlOms int-
pinging on rhem sharply diverge from rhe Wesr's. Tayo Olafioye stresses rhe popularity of
rhe e!egy in Mrica, ciring e!egies by Wole Soyinka, J. P. Clark, Kofi Awoonor, and other
major Mrican poers; see Politics in African Poetry (Marrinez, Calif.: Pacific Coasr Mricanist
Assoc., 1984),95-126.
68. Ir should be added rhar rhe proponenrs of rhese rurning points are rhemse!ves sensi'"
rive lO lirerary continuiries. For 1900, see Richard ElImann, ''Two Faces ofEdward," Goldm
Codgers: Biographical Speculations (New York: Oxford University Press, 1973), 115; for
1910, see Virginia Woolf, "Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown," The Captain's Death Bed anJ
Other Essays (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., 1950), 96; for 1916, see Samue! Hynes,
A Wr lmagined: The First Worfd Wr and Eng/ish Culture (New York: Arheneum, 1991),
99-167.
69. FredricJameson, "Magical Narrarives: Romance as Genre," NLH7 (1975): 135.
70. Stuart Curran, Poetic Fonn and British Romanticism (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1986), 5.
71. See Benedetto Croce's trearise, published in 1902 in Iralian, Theory ofAesthetic, transo
Douglas Ainslie (London: Macmillan, 1909).
72. J. E. Spingarn, "The New Criticism" (1910 lecrure), rpt. in TheAchievementofAmer-
ican Criticism, ed. Clarence Arrhur Brown (New York: The Ronald Press Co., 1954),532.
73. Ren Wellek, Discriminations: Further Concepts ofCriticism (New Haven: Yale Uni-
versity Press, 1970), 225.
74. Maurice Blanchor, Le Livrea venir (Paris: Gallimard, 1959), 164; TheSpace ofLitna-
ture, rrans. Ann Smock (Lincoln: University ofNebraska Press, 1982),220. These passages
were made famous by Tzveran Todorov, who cires and discusses rhem in "The Origin of
Genres," Genres in Discourse, rrans. Carherine Porter (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1990), 13-14. For further discussion, in works rhar argue for generic readings of
modern !irerarure, see Adena Rosmarin, The Power ofGenre (Minneapolis: University of
Minnesora Press, 1985),7-8, and Marjorie Perloff, Inrroducrion lO Postmodern Genres, ed.
Perloff (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1989), 3-4. Also arguing for a generic
approach lO modern lirerarure, Hearher Dubrow offers a he!pful conspecrus of twenrieth-
century genre theory, induding Croce and Todorov, in Genre (London: Merhuen, 1982),
82-104. For defenses ofgeneric approaches lO modern poerry, see Renaro Poggioli, "Poetics
and Metrics," in Proceedings ofthe Second Congress ofthe International Comparative Literature
Association, vol. 1, ed. Werner P. Friedrich (Chape! Hill: University ofNorth Carolina Press,
1959), 192-204, and John Wain, "On the Breaking ofForms," ProfessingPoetry (New York:
Viking, 1978),91-112.
75. Irving Howe, "The Culture of Modernism," Decline ofthe New (New York: Har-
NOTES TO INTRODUCTlON
court, Brace and World, 1970),6; Perry Anderson, "Modernity and Revolution," Marxism
and the Interpretation ofCulture, ed. Cary Ne!son and Lawrence Grossberg (Urbana: Uni-
versity ofIllinois Press, 1988),318.
76. Todorov, Genres, 14; Maria Corti, "Lirerary Genres and Codifications," An Introduc-
tion to Literary Semiotics, rrans. Margherira Bogar and Allen Mande!baum (Bloomingron:
Indiana University Press, 1978), 122.
77. Blanchor, Le Livre, 160; cired by Todorov, Genres, 14; Jacques Derrida, "The Law of
Genre," Criticallnquiry 7 (1980): 65. Frank Kermode also remarks thar "rheorerical con-
rempr for form in rhe ans is a fraud" ("Modernisms," Continuities [New York: Random
House, 1968], 22).
78. E!ior, "Whispers of Immortality," Complete Poems, 52. Ensuing parenrherical refer-
ences are ro rhis edition.
79. Elior, The Waste Land: A Facsimile and Transcript ofthe Original Drajis, ed. Valerie
Elior (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1971), 116-17.
80. My reading of The Waste Landas elegy draws on Gregory S. Jay, "The Case of Elegy:
MillOn, Shelley, and Whirman," T. S. E/iot and the Poetics ofLiterary History (BalOn Rouge:
Louisiana University Press, 1983), 156-71; Cleo McNelly Kearns, "Elior, Russell, and
Whirman: Realism, Politics, and Lirerary Persona in The Waste Land," in T. S. E/iot's 'The
Waste Land, "ed. Harold Bloom (New York: Che!sea, 1986), 137-52; and Gilbert and Gu-
bar, Sexchanges, vol. 2 of No Man's Land, 310-14. See also Louis Menand, DiscoveringMod-
ernism: T. S. Eliot and his Context (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), 15-28; and
Maud ElImann, The Poetics ofImpersona/ity: T. S. E/iot and Ezra Pound (Cambridge: Har-
vard University Press, 1987),91-113. Elior suppressed a 1952 artide abour The Waste Land
in which John Perer dared ro inrerprer rhe poem as lamenr, implicirly homoerotic in irs
grief. See John Perer, "A New Inrerpreration of The Waste Land," Essays in Criticism 2
(1952): 242-66; and rhe discussion and exrension of rhis essay in James E. Miller, Jr., T. S.
Eliot's Personal Waste Land (University Park: Pennsylvania Srare University Press, 1977).
81. Olson wrore of Pound: "Gaudier's dearh is rhe source of his hare for conremporary
England and America, ... in 1915, his attack on democracy gor mixed up wirh Gaudier's
dearh, and all his rurn since has been revenge for rhe boy's dearh" (Charles Olson, Charles
Olson & Ezra Pound: An Encounter at Sto E/izabeths, ed. Carherine See!ye [New York:
Grossman-Viking, 1975], 45). AlI cirations of Mauberley are from Personae, 185-204. On
rhe e!egiac "mood" of Pound's Chinese translarions, see Ming Xie, "Elegy and Personae in
Ezra Pound's Cathay, ELH60 (1993): 261-81.
82. E!ior, The Waste Land, lines 176, 183; Pound, Hugh Selwyn Mauberley, lines 57--60.
83. For overviews of classical psychoanalyric accounrs of mourning, see Gorer, Death,
136-52; Lorraine D. Siggins, "Mourning: A Crirical Survey of rhe Lirerature," The Interna-
tional Journal ofPsycho-Analysis 47 (1966): 14-25; Beverley Raphae!, The Anatomy ofBe-
reavement (New York: Basic Books, 1983); and Carherine M. Sanders, Grief The Mourning
After (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1989),22-41.
84. See especially Freud's response lO Binswanger's mourning: ''Alrhough we know rhar
afrer such a loss rhe acure srare of mourning will subside, we also know we shall remain
374 375
Notes to Introduction
inconsolable and will never find a substitute. No maner what may fill the gap, even if it be
filled completely, it nevertheless remains something else. And actually, this is how it should
be, it is the only way of perpetuating that love which we do not want to relinquish" (Freud,
The Letters ofSigmund Freud, ed. Ernst L. Freud, transo Tania and James Stern [New York:
Basic Books, 1960), 386). For discussions of mis letter and Freud's indications elsewhere
mat mourning is endless, see Siggins, "Mourning," 17, and Pollock, "Mourning and Adap-
tation," The Internationa/journal ofPsycho-Analysis 42 (1961): 353.
85. Frost, "Good Relief," Robert Frost: Poetry and Prose, ed. Edward Connery Lathem
and Lawrance Thompson (New York: Holt, Reinhart and Winsron, 1972),363.
86. For discussions of Freud's essay in the context of such early precedents, see Arthur
Kirsch, "Hamlet's Grief," ELH 48 (1981): 17-36; Stanley W. Jackson, Melancholia an
Depression: From Hippocratic Times to Modern Times (New Haven: Yale University Press,
1986), 311-24; Kenneth Reinhard and Julia Lupron, "Shapes of Grief: Freud, Hamlet, and
Mourning," Genders 4 (1989): 50--67; Mark Edmundson, Towards Reading FrtUtl
(Princeron: Princeron University Press, 1990), 143-53; and Haverkamp, "Mourning
Becomes Melancholia," 693-98.
For a fine, sympathetic critique of Freud's essay in light of the AIDS crisis, see Douglas
Crimp, "Mourning and Militancy," October 51 (1989): 3-18. Juliana Schiesari unconvinc-
ingly argues that melancholia is gendered male and mourning female in Freud's text; see The
Gendering ofMelancholia: Feminism, Psychoanalysis, and the Symbolics ofLoss in &naissanct
Literature (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1992), 1-11,33--63.
87. Karl Abraham, "A Short Study of the Developmem of me Libido, Viewed in rhe
Light of Mental Disorders" (1924), Selected Papers ofKarl Abraham, transo Douglas Bryan
and Alix Strachey (London: Hogarm, 1968), 420, 435--42.
88. Melanie Klein, "Mourning and Its Relation to Manic-Depressive States," Love, Guilt
and Reparation and Other Wrks, 1921-1945, ed. Masud R. Khan (London: Hogarm,
1981),344--69. While Klein also distinguishes "normal" from "abnormal" mourning, her
modification ofFreud limits the scope ofthis potentially invidious distinction. And whereas
Freud's model of mourning naturalizes a sexist occlusion of the feminine, Klein's does noto
Both Freud and Lacan characterize mourning as an oedipal substitution of the masculine
symbol for the lost feminine object. Klein reinterprets it not as libidinal displacement from
one object ro another, but rather as a process of reintrojecting the lost parents, who
seem ro be lost with each fresh death as mey were in the infantile depressive position. For
Klein, mourning is not the work of substituting one object for another, the masculine for
the feminine, but of reinstating, re-creating, rebuilding, reintegrating the loved, "good"
objects, or parental imagos, both masculine and feminine, which make up our inner
world.
89. John Bowlby, Loss: Sadness and Depression (1980; Harmondsworth: Pelican-Penguin,
1985),29-30, vol. 3 ofAttachmentand Loss, and Erich Lindemann, "Sympromarology and
Management of Acute Grief," The AmericanJournal ofPsychiatry 101 (1944--45): 142.
90. Generically distinct, me self-elegy receives subsidiary treatment in this book because
of its close interrelation with the elegy proper. As an anthologist stated in 1900: "It might
376
NOTES TO CHAPTER ONE
be said that aman cannot, srricdy speaking, write his own elegy, any more than he can
pronounce his own funeral oration. But many poets have spoken with touching effect of
their own deaths; and I have thought myself entided tO rreat such poems as essentially
elegies" O C. Bailey, ed., English Elegies [London: John Lane-Bodley Head, 1900), xli). For
an introducrory discussion of this modern subgenre, see my Yeats and the Poetry ofDeath,
134-52, 165--67.
91. W. H. Auden, "Craft 1nterview with W. H. Auden," The Craft ofPoetry: Interviews
from "The New York Quarter/y," ed. William Packard (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday,
1974),8.
92. Samuel Johnson, vol. 2 of Lives ofthe English Poets (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1932), 115.
CHAPTER ONE: THOMAS HARDY
1. J. Hillis Miller, Thomas Hardy: Distance and Desire (Cambridge: Harvard University
Press, 1970),269. The aboye quotations are from Edmund Blunden, Thomas Hardy (Lon-
don: Macmillan, 1942), 137, and Samuel Hynes, The Pattern ofHardy's Poetry (Chapel Hill:
University ofNorth Carolina Press, 1961),137. For general assessments ofHardy's elegiac
mode, see Douglas Brown, Thomas Hardy (1954; Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press,
1980), 170-81, and Lord David Cecil, "The Hardy Mood," Thomas Hardy and the Modern
Wrld. ed. F. B. Pinion (Dorset: The Thomas Hardy Society, 1974), 106-12.
2. W. H. Auden, "A Literary Transference" (1940), rpt. in Hardy: A Collection ofCritical
Essays, ed. AlbertJ. Guerard (Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice-Hall, 1963), 142, 139.
3. Thomas Hardy, The Complete Poetical Works of Thomas Hardy, ed. Samuel Hynes,
3 vols. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982-85), 2: 11-13. AlI further references ro
Hardy's poetry are ro this edition and appear parenthetically in the texto
4. J. Hillis Miller, Thomas Hardy, 1-28, and Irving Howe, Thomas Hardy (New York:
Macmillan, 1967), 167; the terms "absolutist" and "rotalitarian" are from R. P. Blackmur,
'The Shorter Poems ofThomas Hardy" (1940), rpt. in The Expense ofGreatness (Glouces-
ter, Mass.: Peter Smith, 1958),39, the term "liberal" from Donald Davie, Thomas Hardy
and British Poetry (New York: Oxford University Press, 1972), 6, and Howe credits Hardy
with a "profound democracy of the feelings" in Thomas Hardy, 166.
5. After Asrrophel's mortal wounding, for example, Spenser's Stella "staied not a whit, /
But after him did make vntimely haste" (''Astrophel,'' lines 175-76). See also Hardy's "Be-
fore Marching and Mter": a mother's "Iow sighing" distinguishes her both from her son,
"indifferent" ro life and ready for death, and from the speaker, whose hawklike perspective
reproduces the soldier's masculine detachment toward his fate (2:297).
6. J. O. Bailey offers a useful compendium of these allusions in The Poetry ofThomas
Hardy: A Handbook and Commentary (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press,
1970), 166. For discussions ofthe poem's echoes ofKeats's "Ode ro a Nightingale," see
David Perkins, "Hardy and the Poetry of Isolation" (1959), rpt. in Hardy, ed. Guerard,
151-52, and James Richardson, Thomas Hardy: The Poetry ofNecessity (Chicago: University
ofChicago Press, 1975), 10-11.
377
Notes to Chapter One
NOTES TO CHAPTER Two
7. T. E. Hulme, "Romanticism and Classicism," Speculations (1924; London: Routledge ,
and Kegan Paul, 1977), 126-33.
8. Thomas Hardy, 20 April 1921, Seiected Letters, ed. Michael Millgate (New York:'
Oxford University Press, 1990),360.
9. For anticipations of Hardy's unsympathetic stars, see Tennyson, In Memoriam 3 and
MaudI8.6.
10. M. H. Abrams, "Strucrure and Style in the Greater Romantic Lyric," The Correspon- 3
dent Breeze: Essays on English Romanticism (New York: Norron, 1984), 76-108. On the
triparrite structure of the literary meditation, see Louis Marrz, The Poetry ofMeditation, 2d
ed. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1962),32-39.
11. Hynes, The Pattem, 138.
12. Blackmur, "Shoner Poems," 72; Perkins, "Hardy," 149.
13. Blunden, Thomas Hardy, 137; C. Day Lewis, "The Lyrical Poetry" (1951), rpt. in
Thomas Hardy: Poems, ed. James Gibson and Trevor Johnson (London: Macmillan, 1979),
157; and Preface ro Thomas Hardy, Love Poems, ed. Carl J. Weber (London: Macmillan,
1963), v.
14. Sacks briefly discusses the "narcissistic melancholy" ofHardy's sequence; see English,
Eiegy. 246, 251-52. Indebted to Sacks's psychological reading, mine differs in emphasizing,;l
the guilt, anger, and anti-feminism of the sequence. lIVing Howe and Jean R. Brooks mar';
underestimate mese qualities, Howe claiming that Hardy does not engage in "relentless self- ':
accusation," Brooks that he indulges neither in "the temptation to blame Emma" nor in 'J,
"excessive self-accusation"; see Howe, Thomas Hardy, 185, and Brooks, Thomas Hardy: h e ~
Poetic Structure (Imaca: Cornell University Press, 1971), 88. John Bayley disagrees wim .
Howe and affirms the significant presence of "self-accusation" and "self-reproach" in me
sequence; see An Essay on Hardy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978), 65.
15. See William W. Morgan's useful schema in "Form, Tradition, and Consolation in
Hardy's 'Poems of 1912-13,''' PMLA 89 (1974): 496-505.
16. Howe, Thomas Hardy, 184, 182. Similarly, F. R. Leavis praises "After a Journey" for
being "a poem that we recognize ro have come directly out oflife" ("Reality and Sincerity," l'
Scrutiny 19 [1952-53]: 98). Peter Shrubb cannor stand the idea mat Hardy's poems "are a .
self-serving re-creation of hisrory" ("Hardy's 'Poems of 1912-13,''' The Critical Review 25
[1983]: 60). Closer to my view is Ross C. Murfin's suggestion that Hardy creates a "phan-
tasmal" Emma in the sequence; see his "Moments ofVision: Hardy's Poems of1912-13," \
Victorian Poetry 20 (1982): 73-84.
17. For this emphasis on the "rruth of memory" in the sequence, see Howe, Thomas
Hardy, 184, Miller, Thomas Hardy, 247, and Rod Edmond, who states me opposite view
of the poems from my own: "Guilt and repentance are muted, and the movement of his
sequence is less one of recovery from bereavement than the attempted recovery of the past"
("Death Sequences: Patmore, Hardy, and the New Domestic Elegy," Victorian Poetry 19
[1981]: 152).
18. Milton, "Lycidas," lines 50-51.
19. Tennyson, In Memoriam, 48.15; Swinburne, "Ave Atque Vale," line 89.
378
20. Kiein, "Mourning," 348-49; Vamik D. Volkan, "The Linking Objects ofParhologi-
cal Mourners," Archives ofGeneral Psychiatry 27 (1972): 216.
21. Freud, "Mourning and Melancholia," 14:251; see also Totem and Taboo, Standard
Edition, 13:60.
22. Florence Emily Hardy, The Lif ofThomas Hardy, 1840-1928 (New York: Sto Mar-
tin's Press, 1962),358. Two srandard commentaries on Hardy confirm rhis link between
me poem and Hardy's Lif; see Bailey, The Poetry ofThomas Hardy, 307, and F. B. Pinion,
A Commentary on the Poems ofThomas Hardy (London: Macmillan, 1976), 108.
23. In "Lycidas," for example, the poer invokes buI dismisses rhe "coy" female muses,
envisions insread a male muse as the mourner ofhis own "sable shroud," and turns ro such
male figures as Apollo, Perer, and a masculine deity. Similarly, Shelley leaves behind me
inadequate Urania in AtJnais and Swinburne abandons me large-breasted Gante in ''Ave
Arque Vale." This gender pattern may repear rhe male child's originalloss of me preoedipal
mother during his entry into rhe "symbolic" order (see Sacks, English Eiegy. 8-12).
24. Volkan, "Linking Objects," 215, 217; see also Volkan, Linking Objects and Linking
Phenomena: A Study of the Forms, Symptoms, Metapsychology and Therapy of Complicat-
ed Mouming (New York: Internarional University Press, 1981), and Volkan and Eliza-
beth Zintl, Lif After Loss: The Lessons of Grief (New York: Scribner's, 1993), 80-84,
125-27.
25. Volkan, "Linking Objecrs," 221.
26. Oxford English Dictionary, 2d ed., s.v. "con."
27. Milton, "Lycidas," lines 152-53; Tennyson, In Memoriam, [Prologue], lines 41-42;
Swinburne, ''Ave Atque Vale," line 95.
28. Tennyson, In Memoriam, "Epilogue," line 140; Geoffrey Hill, "Two Formal Elegies,"
Collected Poems (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986), 30.
29. Dear and Honoured Lady: The Correspondence between Queen Victoria andAlfted Ten-
nyson, ed. Hope Dyson and Charles Tennyson (Madison, N.J.: Fairleigh Dickinson Univer-
sity Press, 1969), 71.
CHAPTER Two: WILFRED OWEN
1. Wilfred Owen, The Poems ofWilfted Owen, ed. Jon Stallworrhy (New York: Norron,
1986), 192. AII references to Owen's poetry are given parenthetically in the texto
2. Jon Silkin, GutofBattle: The Poetryofthe Great W1r(Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1972),210-11.
3. Geoffrey Hill, Coliected Poems (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986), 30.
4. Adorno, ''After Auschwirz" (1949), Negative Dialectics, transo E. B. Ashron (New York:
Continuum-Seabury, 1973), 361.
5. Ruperr Brooke, "The Soldier," The Poems ofRupert Brooke, ed. Timothy Rogers (Lon-
don: Black Swan Books, 1987), 133.
6. Silkin, OutofBattle, 211.
7. Tennyson, In Memoriam, 56.25, 57.1.
8. Freud, Beyond the Pleasure Principie, Standard Edition, 18:37-38.
379
Notes to Chapter Five
18. Yeats, "Adam's Curse," Poems, 80; Autobiography, 311.
19. SeeAries, Hour ofOur Death, 211. ,
20.W. B. Yeats, The Letters ofW: B. Yeats, ed.AllanWade (London:RupertHart-Davis,':
1954),874-75,and The Oxford Book ofModern ~ r s ed. W. B.Yeats (Oxfotd:Clarendon
Press, 1936),xxxiv, xxxv.
21. MonroeK. Spearsglosses theselineswithGeorgGroddeck'sinfluenceonAuden;see
The Poetry ofW: H. Auden: The Disenchanted Island (NewYork: Oxford Univetsity Press. ,ti
1963), 62 n.11. Stan Smithcalls attemion to therepeatedshifts ofthepoem's "we" from I!
"subject-position to subject-position," which instances the precatiousness ofselfhood in .
thepoem;see w: H. Auden (NewYotk: Blackwell, 1985), 10.
22. Fteud, The Interpretation ofDreams, Standard Edition, 5:608.
23. Milton,Paradise Lost, 1.180-83.HaroldBloomdiscusses Freud's earlierepigraphin
Agon: Towards a Theory ofRevisionism (NewYotk: Oxford, 1982), 112. Audenalso makes ,
the connection in one ofthe "Lighter Poems" ofAnother Time ("Sharp and Silem in
the..."):
Let thelife thathas been
Lighdyburiedinmy
Personal Unconscious
Rise upfrom thedead....(AT55)
24. Freud, "WhyWar?" Standard Edition, 22:211.
25. Similarly,Tennyson'sdeadfriendbecamea"diffusivepower" thatextendsimoevety-
thing(In Memoriam, 150.7).
26. Donne,"FitstAnniversarie," lines 220-22.
27. Thelongeroriginalversionofthepoemappearedin Horizon 3 (1941): 379-83.
28. Spears calls thepoema"virtuosoexercise in sympatheticparody...andinhumor-
ouslyinflatedstyle,whichatthesametimepays genuinetributetoJames, finally invoking
himas asaint" (Auden, 199).
29.As originallypublished, thepoembemoanedtheloss notof"words" butof"worlds
ofreflection."
30.Inelegy, thelocus classicus ofthis trope is ofcourseIn Memoriam.
31. HentyJames, Emtyof4Januaty 1910, The Complete Notebooks ofHenry James, ed.
LeonEdelandLyall H. Powers (NewYork: OxfordUniversityPress, 1987),261.
32.James, Complete Notebooks, 261.
33.As John Fuller observes, the original poem was "much mote personal and local
(much more about the war, for instance) than the ten-stanza elegy that we now have"
(A Reader's Guide to w: H. Auden [NewYork: Farrar, StrausandGiroux, 1970], 178).
34. Callan, Auden, 10.
35.See Lucy McDiatmid, Auden's Apologies jor Poetry (Princeton: Princeton Univetsity
Press, 1990), 153. For a fine overview ofAuden's postwar style, see George T. Wright,
w: H. Auden, rey. ed. (Boston: Twayne, 1981), 162-172.
390
NOTES TO CHAPTER SIX
36.As McDiarmid says, "Poetty is justified insofar as it undetmines its own impor-
tance and invokes less frivolous realms." Auden remarks patemhetically that the West-
ern poet cannot save the starving in underdeveloped coumties, because "he cannot
justifY his an wirhout reminding himself that he wtites for a well-fed elite" (Auden's
Apologies, xii).
37.Hans-Georg Gadamer, Reason in the Age of Science, transo Frederick G. Lawtence
(Cambridge: MITPress, 1981),74-75.
38. 1964 letter quoted by Mendelson, Early Auden, 206. For an overview ofAuden's
disenchammemwithYeats, see Callan,Auden, 143--62.
39.See,forexample,"1 LookImoMyGlass," ''A Poet,"and"HeNevetExpectedMuch."
40. MaryJ. Marples, "Life on the Human Skin," Scientific American Oanuary 1969):
108-15.
41. Marples, "Life," 108.
42. Marples, "Life," 111.
43. Ir should be added that Ashbety sttikingly compounds Auden's self-elegiac mode
withStevens's. See, fotexample,"InMyWayI OnMyWay" and"NoGoodatNames" in
Ashbety's Hotel Lautramont (NewYork: Knopf, 1992), 132-36.
44. Edward Mendelson, "Note" to W. H. Auden, Thank You, Fog (London: Faber,
1974),7.
CHAPTER 5IX: AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 1
l.BenjaminFranklin, Writings: Selections, ed.J. A.LeoLemay(NewYork: LiteratyClas-
sics ofthe UnitedStates, 1987),21-22.
2. For a histoty ofthe funeral elegy in the American colonies, see John Dtaper, The
Funeral Elegy. 155-77.
3. MarkTwain, The Adventures ofHuckleberry Finn (NewYork: AirmontBooks, 1962),
118.
4. GregKuzma, ed., Poems jor the Dead (n.p.: TheBestCellarPress, 1984), 15, 56.
5. Richard Wilbur, "To an American Poet Just Dead," New and Collected Poems (San
Diego,Calif.: HarcourtBraceJovanovich, 1988),329.
6. Bishop, "FirstDeathin NovaScotia," Complete Poems, 125.
7. Bishop, "NorthHaven," Complete Poems, 188-89.
8.JamesWright,"LamentforMyBrotheronaHayrake," Collected Poems (Middletown,
Conn.:WesleyanUnivetsityPress, 1971),18;StanleyKunitz,"FatherandSon," The Poems
ofStanley Kunitz, 1928-1978(Boston: Litde, Brown, 1979), 157.
9. James Dickey, "The Hospital Window," Poems, 1957-1967(Middletown, Conn.:
Wesleyan UniversityPress, 1967), 100.
10. HaydenCarruth,"InMemoriam," The Selected Poetry ofHayden Carruth (NewYork:
Macmillan, 1985), 87.
11. Louise Glck, "Lullaby," Ararat (NewYork: Ecco Ptess, 1990), 28.
391
Notes to ChapterSix
12.Jorie Graham, "Fission," Region 01Unlikenerr (New York: Ecco Press, 1991), 5.
Grahamrecalls Shelley, Whitman,andStevens.
13.James Tate, "The Lost Pilot," The Lort Pilot (New Haven: Yale University Press,
1967),26-27;TessGallagher,"WithStars,"Amplitude:NewandSelectedPoemr(SaintPaul,
Minn.: Graywolfpress, 1987), 161.
14.AllenGrossman,"TheBookofFatherDust," The WomanontheBridgeovertheChi-
cago River(NewYork: NewDirections, 1979),5-7;Alan Dugan,"UntitledPoem"and"In "
Memoriam. Unfinished. For RobertBarlow. 1950," NewandCollectedPoems, 1961-1983
(NewYork: Ecco Press, 1983),279,281.See also Grossman's "PolandofDeath," inwhich
thepoetsubtractstranscendencefrom the image ofpostmortemlife (thefather is "under-
groundscratchingwithanail"); The BrightNailsScatteredon theGround(NewYork: New
Directions, 1986),23.
15. RobertHayden,"Elegiesfor ParadiseValley," CollectedPoems, ed. FrederickGlaysher
(NewYork: Liveright, 1985), 167.
16. Mona Van Duyn, "The Creation," Mercifid Dirguirer (New York: Atheneum,
1973),99-102.
17.Joanne de Longchamps, "Letters ro Dare," Poemsftrthe Dead, 24; Ann Stanford,
"TheFathers," The Dercent(NewYork: Viking, 1970),8.
18. MarkStrand, "Elegyfor MyFather," TheStoryolOurLiver(NewYork: Atheneum,
1973),8.
19. Robert PennWarren, "Re-interment: RecollectionofaGrandfather," "NaturalHis-
rory," NewandSelectedPoemr, 1923-1985(NewYork:RandomHouse, 1985),49-50;178.
20. SharonOlds, "OfAlI the DeadThatHaveComero Me,ThisOne," TheDeadand
the Living(NewYork: Knopf, 1984),21.
21.William Heyen, "ForHermannHeyen," TheSwastika Poemr(NewYork: Vanguard
Press, 1977), 15; Wright, "Devotions," CollectedPoems, 82.
22. See GeorgSimme!, Conjfict [Der Streit] (1908), transo Kurt H. Wol/f, in "Conflict"
and"The W't-b oIGroup-Affiliatiom"(NewYork: Free Press, 1955), 11-123.
23. Onoedipal submission and resolution in the e!egy, see Sacks, Englirh Elegy, 8-17;
Schenck discusses pastoral apprenticeship and contest (Mouming and Panegyric, 5-9,
33-53);Lipkinganalyzes the"tensedialogue"betweene!egists andthepoetstheymemori-
alize (Life olthePoet, 138-79).
24. Ofcourse, postwarAmericanpoetshavewrittenfine e!egies innumerousothersub-
genres,includinge!egiesforsiblings,children,cousins,grandparents,uncles,aunts, fetuses,
friends, poets, publicfigures, singers, warvictims, pets, theenvironment, andthebody.
Itshouldbeaddedthatambivalencetowardparentsis notuniqueto theAmericane!egy.
InTonyHarrison'scontroversial v., forexample, thepoetsees theskinheadwhodefaceshis
parents' rombsrone with graffiti as his alter ego ("He aerosolled his name. And it was
mine"). See v. (Newcastle uponTyne: Bloodaxe Books, 1985).
25. FrankBidart, "Confessional," TheSacrifice(NewYork: RandomHouse, 1983),46.
Theseemorionalrealities, Bidartcontinuesinhise!egy for his mother,
NOTES TO CHAPTER Srx
...are howI
carne to UNDERSTANDher-;me-;
mylife ...
Trulyro fee! "forgiveness,"
to forgive herINMYHEART,
meanterasingME. (46-47)
26.Anne Bradstreet, "TotheMemoryofMy DearandEver Honoured FatherThomas
DudleyEsq.," The W'orkr 01AnneBradstreet, ed. Jeannine Hensley (Cambridge: Be!knap-
HarvardUniversityPress, 1967),201-3.Furtherreferences ro this teX( appearparentheti-
cally.
27.Adrienne Rich, On Lies, Secretr, andSilence: SelectedProre, 1966--1978(NewYork:
Norton, 1979), 22.
28. Theodore Roethke, "Elegyfor Jane," The CollectedPoemr01TheodoreRoetMe(New
York:Anchor-Doubleday, 1975),98.
29. On Bradstreet as precursor for contemporaryAmerican poets, see Wendy Martin,
AnAmerican Triptych:AnneBradstreet, EmilyDickimon,AdrienneRich (Chape! Hill: Uni-
versityofNorthCarolinaPress, 1984), 3-76.
30.Wendell Berry, "ThreeElegiacPoems," CollectedPoemr, 1957-1982(SanFrancisco:
NorthPointPress, 1985),49.
31.Warren, "Grackles, Goodbye," NewandSelectedPoems, 117.
32. LindaPastan, "TheFiveStagesofGrief," TheFiveStagerolGrief(NewYork: Norton,
1978),62.
33. Glck, "A Fantasy," Ararat, 16.
34. Sacks, Englirh Elegy, 312-16,325.
35. Robert Lowell, sonnet3of"Charles River," Notebook 1967-68(NewYork: Farrar,
Straus andGiroux, 1969), 37; and manuscriptquoted in lan Hamilron, RobertLowell:A
Biography(NewYork: Random House, 1982),41.According to alaterversionoftheinci-
dent, Lowell recalls "saying the startofLycidasro myse!f/ fevering mymindandcooling
myhotnerves- / we were nomadquicksilveranddrove toBosron; /Iknockedmyfather
down"; see "Anne Dick I. 1936," History (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1973),
112. Unlessotherwisespecified,subsequentreferences toLowell's poetry,givenparentheti-
cally, are to SelectedPoems, rey. ed. (NewYork: Farrar, StrausandGiroux, 1977).
36. OnLowell'sappropriationof satireandotherelementsfromelegiesincluding"Lyci-
das," see HughB. Staples, RobertLowell: TheFirrt Twenty Yearr (NewYork: Robert, Straus
andCudahy, 1962),45-47; Marjorie Perloff, The PoeticArtolRobertLowell(Ithaca: Cor-
nell UniversityPress, 1973), 140-45;AlanWilliamson, PitytheMomterr: ThePoliticalVi.
rion 01RobertLowell(NewHaven: Yale UniversityPress, 1974), 35-47; HeatherDubrow,
"TheMarinein theGarden: Pastoral Elementsin Lowell's 'QuakerGraveyard,''' Philologi-
392
393
Notes to ChapterSix NOTES TO CHAPTER SX
calQuarterly62(1983): 127-45;PhilipHobsbaum,AReader'sGuidetoRobertLowell (New
York:ThamesandHudson, 1988),38-45.ForassessmentsofelegyandmourninginLow-
ell'soeuvre,see Perloff, Lowell, 131-63,andJayMartin,"GriefandNothingness: Lossand
MourninginLowell's Poetry," inRobertLowell:EssaysonthePoetry, ed. StevenGouldAxel-
rodandHelen Deese (Cambridge: CambridgeUniversiryPress, 1986),26-50.Perloffob-
serves thatLowell almostseems to have taken Milton'ssatireand"mademisangryartack
mesubstanceofhisvision" (145).
37.Onthefailedmoverowardreligioustranscendence,seePerloff, Lowell, 143-45;Ste-
ven Gould Axelrod, Robert Lowell: Life andArt(Princeton: Princeton Universiry Press.
1978),60-61;andDubrow,"Marinein theGarden," 137.
38.Klein, "Mourning,"354-55.
39.Theechoconsistsin threeblocksof syllables(311411 3) withanapostrophic
("Yetoncemore,O yelaurels,andoncemore"). StephenYenserhearstheallusionro .
Anrony'sfuneraloration;seehisanalysisofthepoem'sverbalambiguitiesin CircletoCirele:
ThePoetryofRobertLowell(Ithaca: CornellUniversiryPress, 1975), 19, 31-35.
40. RobenLowell, LordW'eary's Castle(NewYork: Harcourt, BraceandCo., 1946),2(}- J
22. For helpful readings ofthe poem, see Staples, Lowell, 29-30; Jerome Mazzaro, TbI.
Poetic Themes of RobertLowell(Ann Arbor: Universiry ofMichigan Press, 1965), 4-19;
Perloff, Lowell, 132-40;andVereen M. Bell, RobertLowell: Nihilistas Hero (Cambridge:
HarvardUniversiryPress, 1983),12-18.
41. RobenLowell, "LifeStudies"and"PortheUnion Dead"(NewYork: Noonday-Farrar.
StrausandGiroux, 1964), 12; further references ro "91 Revere Street" appear
cally. .
42. Onrheelegyandego-formation,see Sacks, EnglishElegy, 8-12.
43. Lowell, SelectedPoems,66--71;subsequentreferencesare ro rhisedition.
44. Perloffdiscusses rhe imponanceofmeronymyinLowell (Lowell, 87-93).
45. Sacks, EnglishElegy, 9-10, 16.
46. CitingSusanSontagandJohnBerger, EricSanrnerdiscusses"theelegiacor
dimensionofrhestill phorograph" (StrandedObjects, 71). .:
47. Hamilron, Lowell, 203;forotherbiographicalderails relatedro his mother'sdeam.lj
have drawn on Hamilron (202-7) and the prose version ofrhe events given in Roben:i
Lowell, CollectedProse (NewYork: Farrar, Srraus andGiroux, 1987),346-63.
48.See Lowell's larer poem on being "Unwanred" in Day by Day (New York: FarraJ;.'
SrrausandGiroux, 1977), 121-24.
49.M.L. Rosenthal, "Poetryas Confession" (1959), rpr. in OurLifein Poetry: Sele,
EssaysandReviews(NewYork: Persea, 1991), 109.
50. Lowell, Day by Day, 78-79,80-81. ']
51. Lowell, Day by Day, 27.Theensuingquorarionis alsofrom rhisvolume(121).ThCl'
elegy is Perloff's poinr ofdepanure in her skeptical rereading ofrhe generarion's self.
undersranding; see "Poetes Maudits ofrhe Genteel Tradition: Lowell and Berryman," in'
RobertLowell, ed.AxelrodandDeese, 99-116.JeffreyMeyersalso discusses rhegenerario
n
;
and irs manyprofessionalelegies in ManicPower: RobertLowellandhis Circle (NewYorlci!,
i
ArborHouse, 1987). See also Lipking's analysis ofelegies for poers ortombeauxin Lifeof
thePoet, 138-79.
52.William Meredirh, "Foreword," John Berryman: A Checklist, ed. Richard J. Kelly
(Metuchen,N.J.: ScarecrowPress, 1972),xviii.
53. Quored in John Haffenden, The Life ofJohn Berryman (London: Ark-Routledge,
1983),319.Foragenericreading ofBerryman's professionalelegies, seeAnne B. Warner,
"Berryman's Elegies: OneApproach ro TheDream Songs," John Berryman Studies 2, no. 3
(1976): 5-22.
54. Berryman, TheDreamSongs(NewYork: Farrar, SrrausandGiroux, 1969),Song37,
page41.Allorherreferences ro rheSongsappearparentheticallyinrherexr,wimrhe num-
bersofSongsiralicized.
55. Stevens, "SundayMorning," CollectedPoems, 67-68.
56.See Vendler's discussion ofBerryman's "mixed feelings" for Srevens (The Music of
WhatHappens: Poems, Poets. Cntics(Cambridge:HarvardUniversiryPress, 1988],76--77).
57. For mis andomerorganizarional devices, see 1rvin Ehrenpreis, Poetries ofAmenca:
Essays on the Relation ofCharacter to Style (Charlottesville: Universiry Press ofVirginia,
1989), 143.
58. QuoredinHaffenden,John Berryman, 29.
59.A1len Ginsberg, "Kaddish"andOtherPoems. 1958-1960 (San Francisco: CiryLights
Books, 1961),7,andCollectedPoems1947-1980 (NewYork: HarperandRow, 1984),209;
funherreferences ro borhedirionsappearparenrhericallyinrhe rext.
60.ArnongorherpoemsrharadaprrheKaddishareelegiesforparentsbyCharlesRezni-
koff("Kaddish" (1941]), Fay Zwicky ("Kaddish" (1967]), and Edward Field ("Visiring
Home" (1977]).See alsoAdrienneRich's elegyfor suicides, "TatteredKaddish" (1991).
61.Anorher possible source here is Shelley's Prometheus Unbound (3.3.105-7): "And
dearh shall be rhe lasr embrace ofher / Who rakes the life she gave, even as a morher /
Foldingherchild,says, 'Leaveme noragain!'"
62.JackKerouac, "EssentialsofSpontaneousProse," Evergreen Review2 (1958): 72.
63.A1len Ginsberg, White Shroud(New York: Harperand Row, 1986),69,49.Helen
Vendleroffers avaluable readingofthese poemsandrheearlierelegyin"Ginsberg's'Kad-
dish,'" 1991 MLAConventionpapero Accordingro Vendler, Ginsbergin"BlackShroud"
"rakes responsibiliryfor rhe murderousimpulses rowardhis morhermather madnesspro-
vokedinhim,"andrhen"beginsrorecriminatewithhimselfforkillingher."Characrerizing
Kaddishas "anelegyofrhebody,"VendlerdefendsrhedigniryofGinsberg's"shamefuland
embanassingdisclosures."1thankrheaumorfor makingrhis paperavailablero me.
64. Emerson, "Threnody,"lines43,46,54,56.
65. SeerheanalyriccomparisonsinGeoffreyGorer, Death, Gne,andMourning(Garden
Ciry: Doubleday, 1965), 121-26;C. M.Sanders,"AComparisonofAdulrBereavementin
rhe Deam ofa Spouse, ChildandParent," Omega 10 (1979-80): 303-21; and Beverley
Raphael, TheAnatomyofBereavement(NewYork: Basic Books, 1983),229-82. Onother
aspecrs ofparental bereavement, see John Bowlby, Loss: Sadness andDepression, vol. 3 of
AttachmentandLoss (1980;Harmondsworth: Pelican-Penguin, 1985), 112-25.
394 395
"
Notesto ChapterSeven
NOTES TO CHAPTER SEVEN
66.JohnGunther, DeathBeNotProud(NewYork: HarperandBrothers, 1949),258.
67. Gwendolyn Brooks, "The Boy Died in MyAlley," To Disembark (Chicago: Third
WorldPress, 1981),53-54.
68. LouiseGlck, "ForMySister," DescendingFigure (NewYork: EccoPress, 1980), 13;
JonSilkin, "Deathofa Son," SelectedPoems (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1980),
8.Later, in"LostLove," GlckagainstreSSes thathersisrerspoke"notonesentence" (Ara-
rat,27).
69. DuBois, SoulsofBldckFolk, 209.
70. ForhelpfulgeneraldiscussionsofHarper'swork,see thespecialsection"MichaelS.
Harper,American Poet," Calldloo 13 (1990): 749-82.
71. Michael S. Harper, Dearfohn, Dear Coltrane (Pittsburgh: University ofPittsburgh
Press, 1970), 63.
72. Michael S. Harper, Nightmare Begins Responsibility (Urbana: University ofllIinois
Press, 1975),76.
73. MichaelS. Harper,Song:1 n t aWitness(Pittsburgh:UniversityofPittsburghPress,
1972),7.
CHAPTER SEVEN: SYLVIA PLATH
l.Sylvia Plath, The Collected Poems, ed. Ted Hughes (New York: Harper and Row,
1981),70.AlI furrherreferences to Plath'spoetryappearparentheticallyinthetext. Refer-
ences ro herjournalsappearparenthetically, abbreviatedas f Uoumals ofSylvia Pldth, ed.
Frances McCullough and Ted Hughes [NewYork: Dial, 1982]). For descriptions ofthe
deathofOttoPlath,see LindaWagner-Marrin, Sylvia Pldth:ABiography(London:Chatto:
andWindus, 1988),25-28,andEdwardBurscher, SylviaPldth:MethodandMadness(New
York: Continuum-Seabury, 1976), 12-16.
2. "Ocean 1212-W;" for example, divides the narraror's life inro the period before her
father's deathand the periodafter it: "Andthis is howitstiffens, myvisionofthatseaside
childhood. Myfather died, we moved inland. Wbereon those nine first years ofmylife
sealedthemselvesoff Iikeashipina bottle-beautiful,inaccessible,obsolete, afine, white
flying myth"(Plath,fohnnyPanicandtheBibleofDreamsandOtherProse Writings[London:
Faber, 1977], 130). Similarly, in The Bellfar EstherGreenwood describeshervisit ro the
crampedgraveofher"German-speakingfather, deadsince 1was nine": "1 laidmyface to
the smoothface ofthe marble and howled my loss into the cold salt rain" (The Bellfar
[1971; NewYork: Bantam, 1972], 27,137).
3. Inherinterview, Platha1so describedAuden'simpact: "atonepointIwas absolutely.,
wildforAudenandeveryrhingIwrotewas desperatelyAudenesque";see PeterOrr's 1962
interviewin The PoetSpeaks (NewYork: Barnes andNoble, 1966), 167-68, 170. Onthe
influenceof Roethke'sandLowel1'sparentalpoems,seeStevenGouldAxelrod, SylviaPldth:
The Woundandthe Cure ofWords(Baltimore:JohnsHopkinsUniversityPress, 1990),62-
70. ForadiscussionofYeats'sinfluenceonPlath,seeBarnettGuttenberg,"Plath's o s m o ~ .
ogyandtheHouseofYeats,"inSylviaPldth:New Views onthePoetry, ed. GatyLane(Balti-
more: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1979), 138-52. On other aspects ofthe relation
396
berweenYeatsandPlath,seeSandraM.Gilberr,"InYeats' House:TheDeathandResurrec-
tionofSylviaPlath,"in CriticalEssaysonSylviaPldth, ed. LindaW. Wagner(Boston:G.K.
Hall, 1984),204-22,andElizabeth Butler Cul1ingford, "A Father's Prayer, A Daughter's
Anger: W. B. Yeats and Sylvia Plath," in Daughters andFathers, ed. Lynda E. Boose and
BettyS. Flowers (Baltimore:Johns HopkinsUniversityPress, 1989),233-55.
4. Celeste M. Schenck, "Peminism and Deconstruction: Re-Constructing the Elegy,"
TulsaStudiesin Women'sLiterature5(1986), 15;CaroleStone,"Elegyas PoliticalExpression
in Women's Poetry: Akhmatova, Leverrov, Porch," College Literature 18 (1991): 84, 85,
90. Theaboyelistoftermsis from Schenck(15, 18-19,20)andStone(87).
5.Adrienne Rich, On Lies, Secrets, andSilence: Selected Prose, 1966--1978 (NewYork:
Norron, 1979), 36, 48.
6. Rich, OnLies, Secrets, andSilence, 207.
7. Fordiscussionsoftraditionalelegyinrelationtooedipalinheritance,seeSacks, English
Elegy. 32, 36-37,andSchenck, "FeminismandDeconstruction," 13-16.
8. Nancy Hunter Steiner, A Closer Look atAriel:A Memory ofSylvia Pldth (NewYork:
Harper's MagazinePress-HarperandRow, 1973),45.
9. EmilyBronte,"Remembrance,"lines 27-28;Tennyson, InMemoriam, 28.14-15.
10.AsAxelrodremarks, Plath"astonishingly" goesontoapplytheessay's insightsroher
mother rather than to her father; see his discussion ofFreud's essay and Plath in Sylvia
Pldth, 26-27. In this passageas e1sewhere, Plathuses the "Electracomplex" ro cloakmur-
derousangerandguilttowardherfather. Forawide-rangingexplorationofPlathandpsy_
choanalysis, seeJacquelineRose, The HauntingofSylviaPldth (Cambridge: HarvardUni-
versityPress, 1992).
11. Freud, "Mourning and Melancholia," 251. MurrayM. Schwartz andChrisropher
Bollas aptlysayofPlath, "Byfocusing murderousnessonherselfratherthanonthefather
wholeft her,shecouldhaveparriallydeniedthemagica1 ideathatherbadfeelings roward
himcaused his death" ('TheAbsence at the Center: Sylvia Plath and Suicide," in Sylvia
Pldth,ed.Lane, 186).Forhelpfulliterarydiscussionsoffemaleanger,seeSandraM.Gilberr
andSUsan Gubar, TheMadwoman in theAttic(NewHaven:Yale University Press, 1979),
85-89;JaneMarcus,ArtandAnger:ReadingLikeaU70man (Columbus:OhioStateUniver-
sity Press, 1988), 122-54;AliciaSuskin Ostriker, Stealingthe Language: The Emergence of
U70men's Poetry inAmerica(Bosron: Beacon, 1986), 122-63;andPaulaBennett, My Lijea
Loaded Gun: Dickinson, Pldth, Rich, andFemale Creativity (Urbana: UniversityofllIinois
Press, 1986),242-67.
12. Butscher,forexample,claimsthatPlathfor thefirst time"givespublicexpression ro
thehateside" ofherfeelings in 'TheBeekeeper's Daughter"(SylviaPldth, 238).
13.Jon Rosenblatt, Sylvia Pldth: The Poetry ofInitiation (Chapel Hill: University of
NorrhCarolinaPress, 1979), 70.
14. VamikD.Volkan,'TheLinkingObjectsofPathologicalMourners,"ArchivesofGen-
eralPsychiatry27 (1972): 216.
15. Shelley, Adonais, 53.477.
16. Sacks, EnglishElegy, 4-8.
397
Notes to Chapter Seven NOTES TO CHAPTER EIGHT
17. See Lynda K. Bundtzen, Plath's Incamations: Woman and the Creative Process (A!ut,
Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1983), 186-88; Pamela J. Annas, A Disturbance
Mirrors: The Poetry ofSylvia Plath (New York: Greenwood Press, 1988),33; and Axelrod'
Sylvia Plath, 45-51.:'
18. Melanie K1ein, "Mourning and Irs Relarion ro Manic-Depressive States," Love, Gui/ti"
and Reparation and Other Works, 1921-1945, ed. Masud R. Khan (London: Hoganh,l
1981),354,363.
19. K1ein, "Mourning," 355.
20. See Bundtzen, Plath's Incamations, 188.
21. See Axelrod's analogous distinction in Sylvia Plath, 50--51.
22. For readings of the poem informed by psychoanalytic concepts (fugue, castration}',1
the lex talionis, etc.), see Judith Kroll, Chapters in a Mythology: The Poetry ofSylvia Platb)
(New York: Harper and Row, 1976), 110--14; Bundtzen, Plath's Incarnations, 186-921\.:
and David Holbrook, Sylvia Plath: Poetry and Existence (1968; London: Athlone,
J
23. See Marjorie Perloff, "On the Road ro Ariel: The Transitional' Poetry of SylvW
iJ
Plath," in Sylvia Plath: The Woman and the Work, ed. Edward Butscher (New York: Dodd"
Mead and Co., 1977), 132. Perloff analyzes the poem's language and black-and-white patJ
I1
tern (130--34). "ir)
24. "Lycidas," lines 171, 187; In Memoriam, 124.23; and the last phrase from both
inda's lay in "Astrophel," line 69, and Sigourney's "The Lost Sister," line 26.
25. Julia Kristeva, Black Sun: Depression and Melancholia, transo Leon S. Roudiez
"
York: Columbia University Press, 1989), chaps. 1 and
26. For a negative assessment of the poem's "grotesque" shifu in discourse, see
blatt, Sylvia Plath, 124-25. For a probing interpretation of the poem that defends its alIu1l!:
sions ro the Holocaust, see Rose, Haunting, 205-38.
27. Jonathan Culler, "Changes in the Study of the Lyric," in Lyric Poetry: Beyond
Criticism, ed. Chaviva Hosek and Patricia Parker (Ithaca: Cornell University prestI1
1985),40.
28. A. Alvarez, "Sylvia Plath," in The Art ofSylvia Plath, ed. Charles Newman
Faber, 1970), 66. In contrast, Wagner-Martin terms the poem "a nearly reasonable hatel!I
1
chant" (Sylvia Plath, 219). Axelrod places the work in the generic context of"poems aboutii,
parents" or "family poems" (Sylvia Plath, 59). My reading draws on Paul de Man's
sion of the dangerous symmetries implicit in apostrophe; see his ''Aurobiography as
Facement," rpt. in The Rhetoric ofRomanticism (New York: Columbia University
1984),
29. At a more general level, Schwartz and Bollas note this psychodynamic
"Plath's response ro her father's death was ro become like her father.... Her aggression,
its verbal and phallic form, is inseparable from the fantasized aggression of the father" ("Ah-
sence of the Center," 187). Still, it could be argued that Plath's aggressivity differs fmm his"
in being the violence of resistance rather than of oppression. My reading is informed by
Lacan's version of the Hegelian master-slave dialectic, in whieh the slave identifies with the
398
dead master; see Speech and Language in Psychoanalysis, transo Anthony Wilden (Baltimore:
Johns Hopkins University Press, 1981),79, 161-70.
30. Freud, "Mourning and Melancholia," 249-50. On mourning and melancholia as
incorporarion, see Karl Abraham, "Short Study," 418-501.
31. Rosenblatt analyzes Plath's poetry as initiation rite, often following the pattern of
entry into darkness, ritual death, and rebirth (Sylvia Plath, 27). According ro Marjorie Per-
loff, the later Plath had only "one subject: her own anguish and consequent longing for
death" ("Sylvia Plath's 'Sivvy' Poems: A Pomait of the Poet as Daughter," in Sylvia Plath,
ed. Lane, 173).
32. See Ted Hughes, "Notes on the Chronological Order of Sylvia Plath's Poems," in
The Art ofSylvia Plath, ed. Newman, 192.
33. Berryman, Dream Songs, Song 172, page 191.
34. Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, transo and ed. H. M. Parshley (New York:
Knopf, 1953), 165. Regarding the male coupling of death with femininity, see also Hlene
Cixous, "The Laugh of the Medusa," in New French Feminisms, ed. Elaine Mark and Isa-
belle Courtivron (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1980), 255.
35. Alvarez, "Sylvia Plath," 67.
36. John Keats, Selected Poems and Lettro, ed. Douglas Bush (Bosron: Riverside-
Houghron Miffiin Co., 1959),261.
37. For a fine reading of the poem that emphasizes its theatricality, see Bundtzen, Plath's
Incamations, 28-34, and 158--61.
38. Freud, "Thoughts for the Times on War and Death," Standard Edition, 14:291.
39. Alvarez, "Sylvia Plath," 67.
40. Seamus Heaney, "The Indefatigable Hoof-taps: Sylvia Plath," The Govemment ofthe
Tongue: Selected Prose, 1978-1987 (New York: Noonday-Farrar, Straus and Giroux,
1988), 164.
41. "The finest poems seem born all-of-a-piece," including "a very great deal of Stevie
Smith" (Plath, johnny Panic, 98-99).
42. Kay Dick, Ivy &Stevie (1971; London: Allison and Busby, 1983),71.
43. On the related quesrion ofwomen and abandonment, see Lawrence Lipking, Aban-
doned Women and Poetic Tradition (Chieago: University of Chicago Press, 1988).
44. Stevie Smith, The Collected Poems of Stevie Smith (London: Allen Lane-Penguin,
1975),340,443,508,562,571 ("sweet"); 508, 562, 368. Further references appear paren-
thetically.
CHAPTER EIGHT: AMERICAN FAMILY ELEGY 11
1. See Sexron's poem, "Sylvia's Death," Berryman's Dream Song 172, and Richard Wil-
bur's "Cottage Street, 1953" (New and Collected Poems, 68). There were many others.
2. Adrienne Rich, OfWoman Bom: Motherhood as Experience and Institution (New York:
Norton, 1976), 46.
3. Adrienne Rich, Sources (Woodside, Calif.: The Heyeck Press, 1983), 15.
4. Plath, journaLr, 296, 219.
399
\.
Notes to Chapter Eight
NOTES TO CHAPTER EIGHT
5. Plath, Interview, 168.
6. Heather Cam discovered this link; see "'Daddy': Sylvia Plath's Debt to Anne Sexton,"
Sexton: Selected Criticism, ed. Diana Hume George (Urbana: University of Illinois Press,
1988),223-26.
7. Anne Sexton, "The Art of Poetry: Anne Sexton" (1968 interview), Anne Sexton: The
Artist and Her Critics, ed. J. D. McClatchy (Bloomington: Indiana University Press,
1978), 13.
8. Anne Sexton, '''Daddy' Warbucks," "Divorce, Thy Name Is Woman," The Complete
Poems (Boston: Houghton MifHin Co., 1981), 543, 545. AlI further references to this
collection appear parenthetically in the text.
9. Maxine Kumin, "The Nightmare Factory," The Nightmare Factory (New York: Harper
and Row, 1970), 93-94; Diane Wakoski, "The Father of My Country," Trilogy (New York:
Doubleday, 1974), 139--43.
10. Sharon Olds, The Father (New York: Knopf, 1992),71,60. See also Alicia Ostriker's
autobiogtaphical description ofPlath's impact (Writing Likea Wman [Ann Arbor: Univer-
sity ofMichigan Press, 1983],42--45).
11. Stone, "Elegy as Political Expression," 85.
12. Cheryl Walker, The Nightingale's Burden: Wmen Poets and American Culture before
1900 (Bloomingron: Indiana University Press, 1982),23.
13. Lydia Sigourney, "On the Death of a Friend," "Death of a Clergyman," "Death of a
Distinguished Man," Poems (New York: Leavitt andAllen, 1841),70,83,91. Furrher refer-
ences appear parenthetically.
14. Elizabeth Brackley, "On my Boy Henry," Kissing the Rod: An Anthology of Seven-
teenth-Century Wmens Verse, ed. Germaine Greer et al. (New York: Farrar, Straus and Gir-
oux, 1989), 117. See the other e1egies in this collection.
15. Aries, Hour ofOur Death, 409-74.
16. Felicia Hemans, "Dirge of a Child," The Poetical Wrks ofMrs. Felicia Hemans (Bos-
ton: Phillips, Sampson, and Co., 1856),307; Sigourney, "On the Death of a Member of
the Infant School," "Death of a Beautiful Boy," "Dirge," Poems, 180, 105, 124.
17. The Female Poets ofAmerica, ed. Thomas Buchanan Read, 7th ed. rey. (Philadelphia:
E. H. Butler and Co., 1857): Anne M. F. Annan, "Burial in the Country" (389); Anne e.
Lynch, "On the Death of an Infant" (272); Mrs. M. T. W. Chandler, "To My Bromer"
(404).
18. Helen Hunt Jackson, "Demeter," Verses by H H (Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1874),
181.
19. Elizabeth Boyd, "On the Death of an Infant of five Days old, being a beautiful but
aborrive Birrh," Eighteenth Century Wmen Poets, ed. Roger Lonsdale (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1989), 135.
20. Mina Loy's posthumously published e1egy explicitly rejects the e1egiac tradition of
consolation: "No creator I reconstrues scar-tissue I to shine as birrh-srar" ("Letters of the
Unliving," The Last Lunar Baedeker [Highlands, N.e.: Jargon Society, 1982],264). For an
extended reading of Bogan's e1egy, see Susan M. Schweik, A Cul/So Deeply Cut: American
400
Wmen Poets and the Second Wrfd Wr (Madison: University ofWisconsin Press, 1991),
7-11.
21. Hemans, "The Raising of the Widow's Son," Poetical Wrks, 359.
22. Schenck, "Feminism and Deconstruction," 13. Schenck also claims that women
have an "e1egiac mode of their own, an interrextually verifiable tradition of mourning their
dead in a poetic form that calls the genre, as patriarchally codified, into question" (23);
similarly, Stone argues for a "specific tradition of female e1egy" (85). Furrher references to
mese anicles appear parenthetically in the text.
23. Bennett disputes the overemphasis placed on "women's tendeney to bond" by Carol
Glligan and Jean Baker Miller, arguing instead for the importance of anger in sixties wom-
en's poery as a tool for banishing oppressive sere0types and liberating creative energies
(Bennen, My Life a Loaded Cun, 242--67). Similarly, Besy Erkkila rebuts the "gynocritical"
model of female lierary continuity, emphasizing he srife and contention among women
poes; see The Wicked Sisters: Wmen Poets, Literary History, and Discord (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1992).
24. Tennyson, In Memoriam, 95.34, 95.36-37. Sexton said Lowell persuaded her to re-
vise he ending: "1 ended i wim he dead saying someming. He said the dead don' speak.
The more I mough about i he more I agreed wih him, and hat's when I turned hem
into stone" (Anne Sexton, "Craft Interview wih Anne Sexton" [1970], Anne Sexton, ed.
McClachy, 43).
25. Margare M. Davidson, ''rhe Lament," Female Poets, 410; Hemans, "Dreams of me
Dead," Poetical Wrks, 383.
26. Hemans, "O Ye Voices Gone," Poetical Wrks, 255; Elizabeh Rowe, "Upon me
Death of her Husband," Eighteenth Century Wmen Poets, 49-51; Sigourney, "Deah of a
Beautiful Boy," Poems, 105.
27. Accused of an infantile preoccupation wih her moher and father, Sexton "insised
ha hese relationships were a he hearr of he matter-and no only her matter bu, by
implication, everyone's" (Diana Hume George, Oedipus Anne: The Poetry ofAnne Sexton
[Urbana: University ofIllinois Press, 1987), 4, 24).
28. "The farm's my own!" he exclaims a he hough of anoher inheritance ha, wih
a timeworn gramophone and pool able, recalls he "Ancien Rgime' he has survived (74).
29. Moschus, "Lamem for Bion," lines 51-54; Tennyson, In Memoriam 95; Swinburne,
''Ave Aque Vale," 10.101--4.
30. Hemans, ''ro he Memory of he Dead," Poetical Wrks, 232-33.
31. Ina Coolbrih, "Helen Hum Jackson," rpt. in American Wmen Poets ofthe Nineteenth
Century: An Anthology, ed. Cheryl Walker (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press,
1992),329.
32. Maxine Kumin, "How It Is," The Retrieval System (Harmondswonh: Penguin,
1978),46; Sandra Gilben, ''After a Deah," In the Fourth Worfd (University: University of
A1abama Press, 1979), 15.
33. Adrienne Rich, OfWman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution (New York:
Nonon, 1976),247.
401
\.
Notes to Chapter Eight
34. On Sexton's "revisionary reading of Christianity" in ocher poems, see George, Otdi-
pus Annt, 16-21.
35. Anne Sexton, A St!f-Portrait in Lmm, ed. Linda Gray Sexton and Lois Ames (Bos-
ton: Houghton MifHin Co., 1977),47.
36. Sexton, St!f-Portrait, 73.
37. Adrienne Rich, On Lits, Strnts, and Si!ma: Stkeud ProS(, 1966-1978 (New York:
Norron, 1979), 121.
38. Rich, On Lits, Strnts, andSi!mct, 122.
39. Rich, Sourm, 32. For earlier references to her husband's deach, see "From a Survivor"
and "From an Old House in America." AH furrher references to Rich appear parenchetically
and byabbreviation: pfor 1950-1974(NewYork: Norron, 1975);
OWB for OfWoman Born; DCL for Tht Drtam ofa Common Languagt (New York: Norron,
1978); LSS for On Lits, Strnts, and Sikna; Sfor Sourm; BBPfor B/ood, Brtad, and Pomy:
Stkettd ProS(, 1979-1985 (New York: Norron, 1986).
40. Virginia Woolf, Tht Diary ofVirginia Woolf(London: Hogarch, 1980), 3:34; Toni
Morrison, Bt/ovtd (New York: Plume-Knopf, 1987), 274-75.
41. Carolyn Kizer, Interview, An Answmng Music: On tht POttry ofCarolyn Ktzn', ed.
David Rigsbee (Boston: Ford-Brown and Co., 1990), 137. Even so, see Kizer's elegies, in-
cluding "Deach of a Public Servant," "Final Meeting," "The Great Blue Heron" (her
mocher), and "Thrall" (her father).
42. Twain, Huckkb"TJ Finn, 118. In che well-known project called Tht Mtmoria/' which
commemorates che deach of Frances Sargent Osgood, a host of writers including Mary
Hewitt "raise" the "star of fame" not only 'To her who wroughr the lay wich minstrel /ire"
but a1so to chemselves who borrow that /ire for their own elegiac fuel, unabashedly ex-
ploiting Osgood's death to enhance cheir bids for literary renown. See Mary Hewitt,
"Proem," Tht Mtmoria/' oo. Mary Hewitt (New York: George Putnam, 1851), 11.
43. David Kalstone, Fivt ump"ammts (New York: Oxford University Press, 1977),
131,137.
44. Hemans, Pottica/ Wrks, 330.
45. A1ice Meynell, "To che Beloved Dead" (1875), lines 9-10.
46. Rich returns tO che piano as scene of mocher-daughter contest in che later poem
"Solfeggietto" ("For years we battled over music lessons"); see Timis POW", Pomu 1985-
1988 (New York: Norron, 1989), 3-5.
47. See Tennyson, In Mtmoriam 95; Elizabech Carrer, "On che Deach of Mrs. Rowe";
and Henrietta Cordelia Ray, "In Memoriam: Paul Laurence Dunbar." For a strong counter-
example, see Loy's "Letters of che Unliving," in which che "Ietters are len authorless" (Last
Lunar, 262).
48. Shakespeare, King ar, 1.1.297.
49. Shakespeare, Tht umpm,4.1.148.
50. Shakespeare, King ar, 5.3.8.
51. Sigourney, Pomu, 69-70. On the female body in recent poetry by women, see
Ostriker, Sua/ing tht Languagt, 91-121.
NOTES TO CHAPTER NINE
52. Christopher Cran sees touch as a1ready being highly eroticized in In Mtmoriam; see
"'Descend, and Touch, and Enter,'" 153-73.
53. Sacks, Eng/ish Ekgy, 320-25: Schenck, "Feminism," 18-20. Amy Clampitt, "A Pro-
cession at Candlemas," The Kingfisher (1983; New York: Borroi-Knopf, 1985), 22-28.
54. Schenck, "Feminism," 19.
55. Hemans, "No More," Poetica/ Wrks, 330, 331.
56. Tennyson, In Mtmoriam, 5.8-9.
57. Clampitt, "Beethoven, Opus 111," Kingfisher, 62-66.
58. Clampitt's other elegies include "Urn-Burial and the Butterfly Migration" and
"Burial in Cypress Hills" in What the Light Ws Like (1985); ''An Anatomy ofMigraine" in
Archaic Figure (1987): "A Winter Burial," "My Cousin Muriel," "A Hedge of Rubber
Trees," and "Nothing Stays Put" in Westward (1990).
CHAPTER NINE: SEAMUS HEANEY
1. Seamus Heaney, The Gov"nment ofthe Timgue: Se/ected ProS(, 1978-1987 (New York:
Noonday-Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1988), xii, xviii. A11 furcher references to Heaney's
works are given parenthetically and by abbreviation in the text: FWfor Fie/d Wrk (New
York: Noonday-Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1979); GT for The Governmmt oftht Tongut;
HL for The Haw Lantern (New York: Noonday-Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1987): P for
Pomu, 1965-75 (New York: Noonday-Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1988); Pr for Prtoccupa-
tions: Se/ecud Prose, 1968-1978 (New York: Noonday-Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1980): SI
for Station Island (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1985); and STfor Seeing Things
(London: Faber, 1991).
2. On Heaney and pastoral, see Henry Hart, Seamus Heaney: Poet ofContrary Progressions
(Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 1992), 9-31, and Sidney Burris, Tht POttry of
Resistance: Seamus Heaney andtht Pastoral Tradition (Achens: Ohio University Press, 1990).
3. See Wordsworth, "The Thorn" (1798): 'Tve measured it from side to side: / 'Tis chree
feet long, and two feet wide."
4. T. S. Eliot, "Ulysses, Order, and Myth," rpt. in Sekcted Prose ofT. S. E/iot, ed. Frank
Kermode (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1988), 177.
5. For a fine reading of chis sequence, see Neil Corcoran, Stamus Htaney (London: Faber,
1986),114-17. For a suggestive and wide-ranging discussion of North, see Hart, Htaney,
74-98.
6. Maurice Blanchot, The Gaze ofOrpheus and Oth" Literary Essays, transo Lydia Davis,
ed. P. Adams Sitney (Barryrown, N.Y.: Station Hill, 1981),83.
7. Among helpful commentaries on che elegies, see Blake Morrison, Stamus Htaney
(London: Methuen, 1982),77-80; Thomas C. Foster, Seamus Heaney (Boston: Twayne,
1989),78-80,88-93; Corcoran, Heaney, 128-29, 135-38; and Hart, Heaney, 123-28.
8. Morrison, Heaney, 77.
9. James Joyce, Ulysses, rey. ed. (New York: Modern Library, 1%1), 583.
10. An earlier version of the lines appears in Station Island m.
11. James Joyce, A Portrait ofthe Artist as a Young Man (New York: Viking, 1964),212.
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