본문 바로가기
KCI 등재

The Poetry of Contact: William Carlos Williams’ Quest for American Mode of Verse

영어영문학연구
약어 : -
2012 vol.54, no.2, pp.103 - 122
DOI : 10.18853/jjell.2012.54.2.006
발행기관 : 한국중앙영어영문학회
연구분야 : 영어와문학
Copyright © 한국중앙영어영문학회
인용한 논문 수 :   -  
135 회 열람

William Carlos Williams’ concept of the “contact” is pivotal in understanding his work and poetical theories. What Williams means by contact functions as an important question putting into consideration the distinct historical and cultural identity of the period. For Symbolist poets the things of this world become symbols through which they strive to express abstract ideas above words. But for Williams Symbolist poetic tropes such as simile and metaphor stick to the associational or sentimental value and only blur the uniqueness and the individuality of things. He objects to the way that the trope of similarity deprives language of particularity and presence. Instead, Williams emphasizes the Precisionist and Objectivist language that does not describe or classify the meanings of words. Williams proposes that if there is to be artist’s own presence in his poetry, it must be impersonal and objective. And he compels his readers to focus on the vivid gestalt of “things” he presents in his poems. Williams’ poetical theory is not simply distinguishable from that of Symbolist poetry; but his Precisionist Objectivism serves as a stepping stone to his vision of both American identity and modernist culture. His awareness of American locality leads to his discovery that the American voice must be the foundation of American verse. For him a true American voice reflects “presence” and “particularity” that characterize the immediate cultural and historical ground on which the American stands. Williams’ poetry becomes a microcosm of his culture and society in which he captures and names an identifiable relation with the moment and place where he exists. Preferring to let the actual words that he finds in his immediate environment speak for themselves, Williams only shows by silently pointing in order to present the topography of his time. In Williams’ poetry every object has not simply its own locality but names the unique and particular historical context in which it is situated.

William Carlos Williams, contact, gestalt, things, local, objectivism, metaphor, image
윌리엄 카를로스 윌리엄즈, 접촉, 형태, 사물, 지역적, 객관주의, 은유, 표상

  • 1. [단행본] Burke, Kenneth / 1966 / Heaven’s First Law, In The Dial / Kraus Reprint Corporation : 197 ~
  • 2. [단행본] J. Hillis Miller / 1966 / William Carlos Williams: Two Judgments, In William Carlos Williams: A Collection of Critical Essays / Prentice-Hall : 47 ~
  • 3. [단행본] Christensen, Paul / 1983 / William Carlos Williams, In Dictionary of Literary Biography / Gale Research Company : 583 ~
  • 4. [단행본] Cooper, John Xiros / 1987 / William Carlos Williams, In Dictionary of Literary of Literary Biography / Gale Research Company : 533 ~
  • 5. [단행본] Coleridge, Samuel Taylor / 1997 / The Complete Poems / Penguin
  • 6. [단행본] Duchamp, Marcel / 1973 / Salt Seller: The Writings of Marcel Duchamp / Oxford UP
  • 7. [단행본] Emerson, Ralph Waldo / 1950 / The Complete Essays and Other Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson / Random House
  • 8. [단행본] Halter,Peter / 1994 / The Revolution in the Visual Arts and the Poetry of William Carlos Williams / Cambridge UP
  • 9. [단행본] Hulme, T. E / 1949 / Essays on Humanism and the Philosophy of Art / Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd
  • 10. [단행본] T. E. Hulme / 1982 / Michael Roberts / Carcanet New Press
  • 11. [단행본] Miller,J.Hillis / 1965 / Poets of Reality:Six Twentieth-Century Writers / Harvard UP
  • 12. [단행본] Miller,J.Hillis / 1985 / The Linguistic Moment:From Wordsworth to Stevens / Princeton UP
  • 13. [단행본] Pearls Frederick / 1951 / Gestalt Therapy / A Delta Book
  • 14. [단행본] Roberts, Michael. T.E / 1982 / Hulme / Carcanet New Press
  • 15. [단행본] Schmidt, Peter / 1988 / The Arts, And Literary Tradition / Louisiana State UP
  • 16. [단행본] Simpson, J. A / 1989 / The Oxford English Dictionary / Clarendon P
  • 17. [단행본] Stevens, Wallace / 1970 / Introduction of Spring and All, In Imaginations / New Directions Books
  • 18. [단행본] Wagner,Linda Welshimer / 1963 / The Poems of William Carlos Williams / Wesleyan UP
  • 19. [단행본] Whitaker,Thomas R / 1968 / William Carlos Williams / Twayne Publishers
  • 20. [단행본] Williams, William Carlos / 1919 / Belly Music / The Washington Square Bookshop : 25 ~
  • 21. [단행본] A. Walton Litz / 1986 / The Collected Poems of William Carlos Williams / New Directions
  • 22. [단행본] Christopher MacGowan / 1988 / The Collected Poems of William Carlos Williams / New Directions
  • 23. [단행본] William Carlos Williams / 1967 / Contact / Kraus Reprint Corporation
  • 24. [단행본] Webster Schott / 1970 / Imaginations / New Directions Books
  • 25. [단행본] Webster Schott / 1958 / I Wanted To Write A Poem / Beacon Press
  • 26. [단행본] Webster Schott / 1954 / The Selected Essays of William Carlos Williams / Random House
  • 27. [단행본] John C / 1957 / The Selected Letters of William Carlos Williams, In Thirlwall / McDowell, Obolensky Inc.