The Indeterminacy And Immanence Of William Carlos Williams's Poetry

William Carlos Williams is one of the most outstanding American poets. Since the 1960s, more and more American poets have followed his principles of poetry writing. He is explicitly against the Eurocentric poetic tradition and calls for abandoning the English and European traditions in American poetry. He makes innovation in theme, subject matter, language, and techniques. With language experiment, he makes innovation in poetics based on Americanism through the techniques of collage, polyphony, and fragmentation, and has composed many poems that are different from modernist poetry. Because Williams's writing career shares the identical period with the emergence of postmodernism in America, it is necessary for us to study his poetry and poetics in the context of postmodern culture and literature and to analyze whether his poetry possess any postmodern features. Based on the theories of postmodernism, especially on Ihab Hassan's theory of postmodernist literature, this thesis is intended to reveal two postmodern features of Williams's poetry: indeterminacy and immanence. Through an investigation of these two features of his poetry in relation to theme, subject matter, language, and writing techniques, we will be able to see clearly Williams's postmodern awareness and his influences on contemporary American poetry. A textual analysis of Williams's poetry from a postmodern perspective will result not only in our awareness of his postmodern features but also in our recognition that he is a pioneer of postmodern American poetry.