The Anthropocene poetry of J.H. Prynne, Will Alexander, and Jorie Graham

Thesis

The thesis examines the poetry of J.H. Prynne (1936-), Will Alexander (1948-), and Jorie Graham (1950-), in the context of the ‘Anthropocene’, a term used to designate the current period of planetary history, in which human activity has altered the Earth’s geology, atmosphere and ecosystems. Deteriorating ecological conditions have impelled both reconsideration of human activity, and retheorization of human-nonhuman relations and nonhuman agency. As with other art forms, poetry confronts and transforms these problems of conceptualization and representation. Poetry especially can respond to such major disjunctions by creating appropriate forms of complexity, indeterminacy, interrelationality, and entanglement. The thesis pursues this idea via comprehensive readings of these exemplary poets in their distinct contexts, reading each diachronically and developmentally in relation to the Anthropocene. It shows how their individual explorations of human agency’s planetary consequences have produced radical creative engagements with the causes and effects of Anthropocene conditions. The chapter on Prynne moves from the emergence of extractivism and waste in his earliest poetry, through his examination of disasters such as toxic foodchains, nuclear irradiation, oil spills and global warming, towards a deanthropocentrized ontology of matter that includes the first integrated reading of his late works. The chapter on Alexander highlights his understanding of climate crisis as a global legacy of colonial genocide and ecocide, and foregrounds how his transformative counterpart combines the heritages of Caribbean surrealism and non-Occidental thought with terminologies and determinations taken from biological, climatological and geological sciences. The chapter on Graham tracks the intricate development of an Anthropocene awareness that entails the poetic dynamics of error and suspension, the ecological disasters of war and ideological dematerializations, the agency of matter itself, the admission of more spatialized or swarming formal arrangements, and the contemplation of encroaching ecocide.

Authors: Hand, D

• DOI: 10.5287/ora-7q844a8e1
• Type of award: DPhil
• Level of award: Doctoral
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford
• Language: English
• Keywords: Will Alexander; Anthropocene; poetry; Jorie Graham; J.H. Prynne
• Subjects: Poetics--Poetry; Poetry; Poetry, Modern--21st century