번역과 노래: 드니스 레버토프의 시

Abstract

Denise Levertov's early poetry has long been associated with that of the Black Mountain poets. Despite the justifications of the criticism there is a danger that to categorize her poetry within the above group may obscure the uniqueness of her own poetic works based on her poetic theory. Though she admits her indebtedness to Williams and Pound, she aligns herself primarily with John Keats. Thus she strongly assimilates the poetic attitude of Keats into her works emphasizing the concept of 'Negative Capability.' Singling out for approval of Keatsian attitude toward the objects Levertov asserts that a poet must bring to his/her material and subject the ecstatic attention and as a result it reveals its reality and speaks to the poet. In this way the poet experiences the contacts with the object to recognize its unique characteristics and translate its speaking into his/her own words. The experience is a communion with objects which are in themselves signs of their own secret mystery. In this process it is necessary for the poet to keep open his/her senses towards the object. With the open senses the poet catches the reality of the objects's relationship with the other ones as well as its words to the poet, who actively bids imagination keep doing its work to translate and recognize the object's own word. Thus for Levertov the source of a poem is an experience, a sequence or constellation of perceptions through which the poet is brought to speech.