I Want to Learn How to Think Beyond Academic Disciplines
2013.03.19 Ellis, Toshiko
Ellis, Toshiko
Eloquence or Reticence? The Japanese Poetic Voices in the Age of Deprivation
- Outline
In March, 2013, our Project will start off with research lectures at the University of Melbourne by two Faculty members from the University of Tokyo. For more information, please look at the web page on the University of Melbourne Research Lectures.
My presentation will deal with the question regarding the potential power of the poetic language in an age when the freedom to speak and express one’s thoughts is overtly or covertly suppressed. I will focus on the Japanese poetic scene of the late 1930s and look into the ways in which Japanese poets confronted the dominant literary discourse of the time, which was quickly showing signs of being infiltrated by the ideology of a militarist state. At a time when writers and poets are confronted by censorship, there are simply two options: to write tactfully so that you won’t be caught; or to stop to speak. I will make references to a variety of poetic works that demonstrate traces of a desire to speak in the age when poets were sensing that their freedom of expression was steadily being undermined.
Overall, my presentation discusses the relationship between literary language and history, focusing particularly on the poetic endeavours to battle with the forces of history, agitating or draining the prevailing discourse of the time. It is a comparative study of eloquence versus reticence, which leads to a broader study of the question concerning the potential role of the literary language. Furthermore, I wish to link this theme to a comparative study of poetic languages across linguistic and national borders and suggest how we can approach poetic texts from diverse cultures without falling back on the familiar comparative method of examining the texts in relation to the language and nation of their production.
- Schedule
March 19, 2013 (Tue) an approximately one hour session from around 15:00
Place
University of Melbourne
- Instructor
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- Ellis, Toshiko
- My research focuses on the linguistic voice of Modern Japanese poetry. Along with re-questioning modernism as a concept, I think about the relations between Japan's “modern times” and the language of poetry. Chiefly attending to the 1920's and 30's and tracing the venues where language becomes poetry as well as reconfiguring it in its historical context, I hope to examine modern Japanese poetry where various voices crisscross and interact with one another.
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