On Harryette Mullen’s Poetics Of "Cracks"

Harryette Mullen(1953-)is an African American poet whose work is known for its distinctive avant-garde style and various experimental approaches.Her poetry has long revealed various “cracks” in race,gender,and social aspects,as well as the “cracks” faced by African American writers,making it an important keyword in Mullen’s Poetic creation.This thesis focuses on “cracks” writing in Mullen’s poetry,exploring its generation,representation,as well as the poet’s attitude towards it.The symbolic of “cracks” reflects the poet’s recognition of self-identity and the contradictory environment around her,revealing the interrogative spirit of contemporary African Americans.The thesis firstly clarifies the essence of the cracks in African American literature and chooses several African American writers who have influence on Mullen,discussing Mullen’s inheritance from and development of African American literary traditions from the perspectives of race,gender and African American writing traditions.Furthermore,it illustrates Mullen’s representations of cracks from racial,gender,and social perspectives.She inherits the concept to expand on the concerns that African American readers and writers face.The exploration of existing cracks forms two parallel strategies.Through memory tracing,interaction with Africa and introducing African cultural elements,Mullen realizes an imaginary return towards Africa and tries to bridge the cracks between the African diasporic groups and African traditions.She also recognizes that some of those cracks cannot be completely bridged.Therefore,this thesis finally focuses on reproducing cracks under the discussion of defamiliarization,language experimentation,and parody.Mullen reproduces cracks with readers,African writing traditions,and European classics,and shows the creativity of contemporary African American writers.Moreover,she focuses on the individual hidden by the collective,and exposes the individual crisis of being hidden,bound,and manipulated.In order to deal with those crisis,she designs a “tanka walk” in Urban Tumbleweed(2013),to separate individuals from the collective.The state of a single person walking alone,observing,and collecting flash feelings becomes the habitat of the individual spirit.Following a discussion of her seven collections,this thesis concludes that Harryette Mullen’s poetics of “cracks” inform her efforts to redefine and embrace a cracked diasporic identity.It is separate from both African and American identities on the surface,but still demonstrates deep connections with them as well.The open spaces of cracks create a field in which multiple cultures communicate with each other and provides references for people in the African American diaspora to understand the nature of “self” and the various relationships around them.