탈(脫)서정의 서정 ―루이스 그릭의 『충직하고 고결한 밤』

Abstract

Louise Glück has a distinct poetic voice whose lyrical appeal seems to depend on her personal honesty. Readers are likely to feel as if the poet herself spoke directly to them in a confessional way. However, it would overlook the flexibility and complexity of what comes out of her annulled or negated self. Granted that she is somehow lyrical in the Romantic tradition, this paper intends to examine how she is to utter a deliberately detached voice with emotional intensity, standing against lyricism. A close reading will be given to “Faithful and Virtuous Night,” a title poem from her 2014 National Book Award winning collection. “Faithful and Virtuous Night” can be appreciated with its full meaning when the speaker is approached as without egotistical self. Without preconceptions about the world, the speaker is at liberty to respond what comes to her body and mind. In her negative capability, biographical materials are mingled with, and extended to, the speaker’s aspirations and introspections. The anecdote of orphan’s solitude is both lyrical and metonymical. It feels like personal, but it still is capable of evoking all the places where we are isolated between what things are and what they might be.