On The Matter Of Time In The Poetry Of Brodsky

Joseph Brodsky, a famous Russian-born American poet, is one of the greatest poets in the20th century, and is the winner of1987Nobel Prize in Literature. The motivation and the overall theme of Brodsky’s poetry creation are focused on life itself,"this is the time of life", and the thinking of the matter of time is always with his poetry creation. Like most people in the modern society, Brodsky gets the thought that time flows from past to the present and points to the future with linear flowing, birth and death being inevitable. But he doesn’t view life and time negatively. Death is inevitable, but in Brodsky’s opinion, death is just the end of the body; he regards death as another existent way of time, and explores the meaning of existence by the thought of time and life. Brodsky’s thinking about life focuses on how to surpass life. Different from many other poets resorting to religion, Brodsky thinks that poetry creation is the way to resist death and the only way to surpass the stream of time. So he attaches great importance to poetry creation, and in his poetry world, he controls poetry time by the means of time materialization, cosmic synchronization and controlling time rhythm, thus he has become the master of time in his poetry.The main body of this thesis is divided into four parts.The first part is the analysis and exploration of time concept and its causes in Brodsky’s poetry. The second part is the analysis to the presentation of the matter of time in Brodsky’s poetry theme. The third part is the analysis of the time art in Brodsky’s poetry. Brodsky attaches great importance to poetry creation, being a master in innovating poetry presentation. In his creation, time is materialization, and is treated as authentic existence and cosmic synchronization. He applies the poetic techniques by the means of time materialization, cosmic synchronization and controlling time rhythm to control time. The fourth part is the analysis of the significance of poetry creation. Brodsky treats poetry or poetic words as the means to resist death and get eternity.