Research Catalog

Whitman between impressionism and expressionism : language of the body, language of the soul

Title
Whitman between impressionism and expressionism : language of the body, language of the soul / Erik Ingvar Thurin.
Author
Thurin, Erik Ingvar.
Publication
Lewisburg [Pa.] : Bucknell University Press ; London ; Cranbury, NJ : Associated University Presses, ©1995.

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Details

Description
211 pages : illustrations; 24 cm
Summary
"Whitman between Impressionism and Expressionism is the first comprehensive and systematic study of Whitman's language experiment in relation to his artistic and philosophical purposes. Author Erik Thurin's focus is determined by the discovery that his linguistic innovations can be described and interpreted in terms of a dual approach closely resembling what is now called impressionism and expressionism. A number of theoretical and quasi-theoretical remarks in the 1855 preface to Leaves of Grass and the poetry itself suggest that this approach is deliberate. Thurin postulates that it must be related to his determination to be "the poet of the body" and "the poet of the soul," impressionism representing a tendency to passively and objectively record incoming sense data, expressionism the urge to transform and use them in "the efflux of the soul." Whitman is, in fact, prophetically adumbrating a new ideal of health and power, a modern personality that is to balance body and soul. It is autobiography anthropologically conceived."--BOOK JACKET. "Discourse analysis allows Thurin to conclude that Whitman's poems and long sections of poems fall into three categories: (1) pure impressionism, (2) pure expressionism, and (3) a combination of both."--BOOK JACKET.
Subject
  • Whitman, Walt, 1819-1892 > Knowledge and learning
  • Whitman, Walt, 1819-1892
  • Experimental poetry, American > History and criticism
  • English language > United States > Grammar > Theory, etc
  • Language and languages > Philosophy
  • Impressionism in literature
  • Expressionism in literature
  • Human body in literature
  • Soul in literature
  • Language and languages in literature
  • English language > Grammar > Theory, etc
  • Experimental poetry, American
  • Language and languages
  • Stijlen
  • United States
Genre/Form
Criticism, interpretation, etc.
Bibliography (note)
  • Includes bibliographical references (p. 194-201) and index.
Contents
Pt. 1. Dismantling the Sentence. 1. Coordination: Primitivity as an Artistic Strategy. 2. Inversion: Deviation in Conformism. 3. Separation and the Liberation of Words and Meaning. 4. Ellipsis of the Predicate: A Way of Closing the Discourse. 5. Nominal/Pronominal Writing and Whitman's ecriture artiste -- Pt. 2. The Small Change of Grammar. 6. Nominalization: Sense and Essence. 7. Nonclassifying Modifiers of the Noun: Painting Haloes around All Heads. 8. Aspect over Tense: Priorities of a Dynamic Worldview. 9. Transitive and Intransitive: The World as a Dream Play. 10. Person: The Disappearance of the Poet.
ISBN
  • 0838752977
  • 9780838752975
LCCN
94028805
OCLC
  • ocm30780805
  • 30780805
  • SCSB-8816475
Owning Institutions
Princeton University Library