월러스 스티븐스의 여성관

Abstract

Sung Yon ChungThis paper concentrates on the various aspects of women shown in the works of Wallace Stevens. Aspects of women presented in the poems are not fixed to be categorized into groups according to their type, but diverse and manifold. In fact, Stevens has no rigid idea of women, and this is displayed throughout his poems. Stevens employs a variety of woman characters to explain his own poetic theory. Denying Christian God, Logos and the absolute Truth, Stevens struggles to create a human truth based on the reality. In search for a human truth, the poet should see things with no human passion, feelings or prejudice. This is the process of 'abstract' and the poet can get a 'true reality' as a result. Then, a true reality and the imagination are compounded to make a brand new 'imagined reality,' which is a 'supreme fiction' in Stevens' term. Women are mentioned in every aspect of the creative processes. Thus, a woman character symbolizes the imaginative poet himself in one poem and symbolizes varied realties in other poems. Women in the poems are hard to definitely classify because of their arbitrary aspects, and they are only meaningful when considered in the viewpoint of Stevens' own poetic theory.