Edwin Morgan's Poetry

Analytical Essay # 106400

English > Analysis
Literature > Poetry

This paper analyzes the diversity of voice in Edwin Morgan's poetry and the nature of authorial voice in general.

2,392 words () | 9 sources | MLA | 2003 France

Paper Summary:

The paper discusses how Edwin Morgan assumes a false persona in his poetry. In particular, the paper discusses the issue of the authorial voice, that is the voice or speaker used by the author when s/he seemingly speaks for her/himself. The paper looks at how the notion of authorial voice is understood by twentieth-century critics and illustrated in Morgan's poetry.

From the Paper:

"Critics attempting to encapsulate the poetry of Edwin Morgan in a single term soon find themselves bewildered. His position as the most eminent contemporary poet in Scotland is, indeed, largely due to his enthusiastic multiplicity, in terms of language--Morgan has translated works from Russian, German, French, and even Hungarian--but also in terms of poetic devices. With some cubist restlessness, Morgan has created and abandoned techniques of his own devising: emergent poetry, performance and concrete poetry, instamatics, newspaper cut-outs and even wordless poems. Indeed, his awareness that language is a living and cleverly intelligent tool with which you can play gives rise in his poetry to a prodigious diversity of voices."

Sample of Sources Used:

Morgan, Edwin. Three Scottish Poets: MacCaig, Morgan, Lochhead. Ed. Roderick Watson. Edinburgh: Canongate Classics, 1992. 45-84.
Barthes, Roland. 'The Death of the Author.' The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. Ed. Vincent B. Leitch, et al. New York and London: W. W. Norton, 2001. 1466-1470.
Foucault, Michel. 'What Is an Author?' The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. Ed. Vincent B. Leitch, et al. New York and London: W. W. Norton, 2001. 1622-1636.
Fulton, Robin. Contemporary Scottish Poetry: Individuals and Contexts. Loanhead: Macdonald Publishers, 1974.
Morgan, Edwin. Essays. Cheadle: Carcanet New Press, 1974.