Ideological Restraint in Gary Snyder's Nature Poetry Elucidated by a Few Prosaic Excesses

Author: Brøgger, Fredrik Chr.¹

Source: Comparative American Studies, Volume 7, Number 2, June 2009 , pp. 162-172(11)

Publisher: Maney Publishing

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Abstract:

In its discussion of Gary Snyder's nature poetry, this article focuses on what it defines as its deliberate strategy of ideological restraint, the way in which its direct and precise imagery studiously avoids projecting cultural ideas onto the natural environment. For purposes of elucidation, this poetic strategy is contrasted with some striking prosaic excesses — examples of anthropocentric projection — in the opening essay of Snyder's The Practice of the Wild, 'The Etiquette of Freedom', in which Snyder equates the meaning of 'wildness' with 'freedom', an equation heavily fraught with ideological connotations. Snyder's nature poetry, however, is seen to eschew ideological discourse by way of its mimetic techniques and its language of concrete perception that is physically and materially grounded in a particular locality. This argument is rounded off by an analytical illustration in the form of a close reading of an exemplary poem from Axe Handles.

Keywords: AMERICAN LITERATURE; ANTHROPOCENTRISM; CONTEMPORARY POETRY; ECOCRITICISM; NATURE WRITING; GARY SNYDER

Document Type: Research article

DOI: 10.1179/147757008X280768

Affiliations: 1: University of Tromsø, Norway;, Email: Fredrik.Brogger@hum.uit.no

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