Norman MacCaig and the fascination of existence
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Ingrassia2014.odt (271.3Kb)
Date
03/07/2014Author
Ingrassia, Nathalie Sylvie
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Abstract
This thesis is a comprehensive study of the poetry of Norman MacCaig. His
poems have received relatively little critical attention and scholars appear to have
concentrated on a few specific points such as MacCaig’s characteristic restraint or
his inscription in a given literary tradition. Critics have notably pointed out different
dichotomies in his works. I argue that these dichotomies are fundamentally interrelated.
It is characteristic of MacCaig’s writing to simultaneously engage with and
challenge philosophical and linguistic concepts and positions as well as literary
traditions and stylistic choices. These dichotomies are both a cause and a symptom
of this phenomenon. They take on a structuring role in a body of works often
regarded as a collection of independent lyrics rather than a cohesive totality. The first
half of the thesis will follow a thematic approach: considering first the poetic project
MacCaig outlines and the interplay of celebration, faithfulness to the object and the
problem of perception; then the treatment of religion and the divine by this
notoriously atheist author and how it relates to his worldview. This will provide a
basis to address MacCaig’s lifelong concern with the relationship between
perception, language and description and what this entails for both his writing and
his philosophical positions. In the second half of this study, I will address MacCaig’s
engagement with tradition – and its limits – through consideration of three different
modes and how they relate to his writing project: elegy, pastoral and amatory verse,
regarding the latter two as specific examples of the former. Through these
interconnected studies of MacCaig’s poetry, I argue that the critical tendency to
either undervalue his central place or treat his works in a fragmentary fashion
originates in MacCaig’s sense of the instability of our perceptions and our possible
discourses about the world. This uncertainty at the root of his writing reflects his
constant and often uncomfortable awareness of the elusive nature of existence and
meaning – death and the limits of language threatening both his perception of the
world he evinces such fondness for and his ability to write about it.