Reading physical and virtual “poetic spaces” in contemporary Japanese experimental poetry

Thesis

When a poem written on the ground suddenly appeared around Ōmiya station in Japan in spring 2020, it caused a sensation on Twitter and irritation among residents. To read it, people had to walk along its written words, connecting the text to the surrounding scenery. What emerged was a reading experience of poetry different from a conventional setting – a reading of a “poetic space”.

Shi no kasoku is just one of many recent experiments with exhibiting poetry in space by young Japanese poets. Instead of a book or magazine, they publish poems in art galleries, on the streets, in food halls in department stores or in the virtual space of the internet. Using a selection of these poetic spaces as examples, my thesis examines the intersection of reading, poetry, and space in contemporary Japanese poetry, asking what “happens” when we read poetry in a spatial configuration. Its theoretical framework combines theories of space by authorssuch as Henri Lefebvre, Edward Soja, and Maeda Ai with the fields of literary studies and art studies. It proposes that poetic spaces create a more activated way of engaging with literary text, highlighting ideas about the role of the readers in the process of meaningmaking as proposed by Roland Barthes, Umberto Eco, and Jacques Derrida. It also argues that poetic spaces can serve as “sites of resistance” that negotiate normalised spatial practices by creating moments of irritation.

Methodologically, the project combines close reading of poetic texts with exhibition analysis, while also including qualitative data gathered on-site from interviews, surveys, and participant observation. By examining the act of reading in poetic spaces, the thesis demonstrates that poetic spaces hold the potential to inspire new ways of imagining both space and poetry.

Authors: Puetzer, S

• DOI: 10.5287/ora-6qxq8ygb1
• Type of award: DPhil
• Level of award: Doctoral
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford
• Language: English
• Keywords: contemporary Japanese literature; installation art; theories of space; experimental poetry
• Subjects: Installations (Art); Japanese literature; Experimental poetry, Japanese