Historical Reconstruction And Political Concerns: A New Historical Study Of Marianne Moore's Poetry

Marianne Moore(1887-1972)is a shining and unusual literary star in the history of modern American poetry in the 20 th century.For distinctive poetic style and poetic values,Moore has swept the “triple crown” of the American poetry: the Pulitzer,the Bollingen,and the National Book Award.Well known for her civic-mindedness,political perception,and profound historical poetic creation,Moore is esteemed as a forceful “moralist” and “historian”.She bears strong historical-political consciousness,and has been devoting herself to the social and political dynamics of the United States.Her poetry records the historical events of American nativists,and the political lives of the marginalized groups,laying bare the histories hidden or understated by the traditional official archives of the 20 th century.Drawing on the theory of New Historicism,this thesis studies close Moore's six political poems between the 1910 s and 1940 s and examines how history and text are intertwined and how history and text contribute to the poet's political themes and the historical formations.On one hand,history is textualized.History is recorded in text.The writing of history is a poetic process,and that historical narratives are “verbal constructs”.Aiming at the poet's most concerned three groups,the American nativist,the racial other,and the gendered other,the analysis of this part put foci on their seven historical events,including the U.S.Anti-immigrant Sentiment in the 1910 s,the Great Depression and Teapot Dome Scandal in the 1920 s,the Easter Rising in the 1920 s,the Jewish Persecution in the 1940 s,the Sexual Oppression and the Feminist Subversion in the 1920 s.Besides,this part also examines how the poet reconstructs her version of history and features history textuality by using the biblical allusion,fairy-tale allusion,metonymy,quotation and non-gendered first person narration.Through reconstructing them,Moore re-presents multiple heterogeneous,conflicting and marginal “histories”,counters the American official grand narrative in the first half of the 20 th century,and conveys her earnest political appeals and profound political core values: to seek for a pluralistic ideal of ethnic openness and tolerance,a republican ideal of racial freedom and equality,a feminist ideal of gendered neutrality and autonomy,and a moral ideal and ethical state of all human harmony and amity.On the other hand,text is historicized.Since text is always produced in particular historical context,in investigating the eastern and southern European immigration,the Eugenics movement,and the two waves of New Woman at the turn of the century,and poet's personal history,this thesis crystallizes the social,political and cultural reasons of the poet's reconstruction of history,and points out that it is such physical situations that lend her texts great historicity.“The past has shaped the present,and the present reshapes the past”: literary text is the product of history,and at the same time reshapes the history.Moore has affected,for her distinctive poetic practice and feminist claims,the literary production of Elizabeth Bishop,Lorine Niedecker and Cynthia Macdonald.They have worked along to enlarge the strength of women poets in a male-dominating world and enriched the critical discourse of American poetry in the 20 th century.Still,Moore makes herself a “literalist of the imagination” textualize history and politics of the time,providing valuable textual materials for historical rethinking and reflecting;she inspire us a “genuine” way to return to history and “touch of the real”,and inspire us to seek for a “good life” that is free,equal,virtuous and amicable,perceiving that “good life” is poetic pursuit and supreme end of human politics.The conclusion summarizes the arguments and findings of the thesis.Under the guidance of New Historicism,it concludes: Moore is a poet of social responsibility,high morality and a strong sense of historical-political consciousness;she writes history in poetic way and is a brilliant chronicler of modern America.Through her historical rewriting and political concerns,Moore has created for herself a poetic style,a political stance and a public voice,and remains true to her calling—as a functional artist and public intellectual,to be America's faithful mirror and conscience.