Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

The Landscapes of Susan Howe's "Thorow"

The Landscapes of Susan Howe's "Thorow" J E N N Y L. W H I T E "T rust the place to form the voice," writes Susan Howe, suggesting that the voice of the poet is linked intrinsically to the location from which that voice emerges (Birth-Mark 156). In her poem "Thorow," which is "about" Lake George, New York, Howe constructs both a place and a voice that are contested, conflicted, and multiple. The poem explicitly references--and reworks--the landscapes of Thoreau, and more importantly, I argue, of James Fenimore Cooper. The title, "Thorow," refers not only to Henry David Thoreau but also to the historical search for a "thorow," or through, navigable passageway in the Northeast. Thus the title signals the poem's engagement with the history of exploration, and ensuing colonialism and national expansion, as well as its engagement with literary history. Howe's references to Cooper, previously overlooked in discussions of this poem, provide a framework for connecting these two divergent meanings of the title.1 The setting for Cooper's novel 1. Several critics have discussed the ideas of place, history, and intertextuality in "Thorow" (as well as in Howe's work more generally), but none have suggested the importance of Cooper for understanding this poem. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Contemporary Literature University of Wisconsin Press

The Landscapes of Susan Howe's "Thorow"

Contemporary Literature , Volume 47 (2) – Sep 25, 2006

Loading next page...
 
/lp/university-of-wisconsin-press/the-landscapes-of-susan-howe-s-thorow-qG90PG6OTU

References

References for this paper are not available at this time. We will be adding them shortly, thank you for your patience.

Publisher
University of Wisconsin Press
Copyright
Copyright © 2006 by the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin.
ISSN
1548-9949
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

J E N N Y L. W H I T E "T rust the place to form the voice," writes Susan Howe, suggesting that the voice of the poet is linked intrinsically to the location from which that voice emerges (Birth-Mark 156). In her poem "Thorow," which is "about" Lake George, New York, Howe constructs both a place and a voice that are contested, conflicted, and multiple. The poem explicitly references--and reworks--the landscapes of Thoreau, and more importantly, I argue, of James Fenimore Cooper. The title, "Thorow," refers not only to Henry David Thoreau but also to the historical search for a "thorow," or through, navigable passageway in the Northeast. Thus the title signals the poem's engagement with the history of exploration, and ensuing colonialism and national expansion, as well as its engagement with literary history. Howe's references to Cooper, previously overlooked in discussions of this poem, provide a framework for connecting these two divergent meanings of the title.1 The setting for Cooper's novel 1. Several critics have discussed the ideas of place, history, and intertextuality in "Thorow" (as well as in Howe's work more generally), but none have suggested the importance of Cooper for understanding this poem.

Journal

Contemporary LiteratureUniversity of Wisconsin Press

Published: Sep 25, 2006

There are no references for this article.