The Use of Animals in Marianne Moore's Poetry

Jana Brueske

• Publisher: GRIN Verlag
• Year: 2012
• eBook ISBN: 9783656316206
• Edition: 0
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: English Language
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

Seminar paper from the year 2008 in the subject Didactics for the subject English - Literature, Works, grade: 2, 0, RWTH Aachen University, language: English, abstract: "Poetry has "a place for the genuine, " and Moore's favoring of animals as poetic subjects is a tribute to their genuineness." (Allen 1939, 112) In my term paper I want to deal with her special interest in animals. I want to find out why she uses animals in her poems and what function they fulfil.In order to do so, I will first have a look at her poems in general to discover what kind of animals she uses and with which frequency. I will also look at her life outside of the poet's world in order to understand where her influences came from.I will then pick out two of her animal poems to make a more specific analysis on them in order to see what the different functions of animals are and how they are presented. The first example will be Marianne Moore's poem To a giraffe which will then be compared to a second poem The arctic ox (or goat).In a next step I want to give an overview over the other functions of animals used in Marianne Moore's poetry. To understand the quantity and frequency of animal use in her works I will consider another by Marianne Moore which is called The Jerboa. Because of its length I will not analyze this poem in detail, but I will present the most important aspects in regard to the functions of animals given in this frequently cited and interpreted poem.