An original work of fiction--in the form of a social novel--which examines themes of gender, race, religion, and nationality in contemporary American life. The dramatic action springs mainly from the perceptions and experiences of the protagonist, an actress of mixed blood, whose spiritual quest for identity is linked to the major themes. Her evolution is central to the exposition. The protagonist's interactions with other characters, and her inner thoughts, mark the transition between past and future events. Stylistically, the novel combines social history, mythology and literary realism. It sets the story through the dramatic and narrative method--and is told from the third person limited omniscient point of view. The primary setting is New York City and Key West; the time of the action is the early 1980s. Locale and setting make character and background function together in the development of the plot in cultural context. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 50-02, Section: A, page: 0434. / Major Professors: Hunt Hawkins; Sheila Ortiz Taylor. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1988.

The author launches a triptych journey into his poetic psyche. The first section of poems explores the socio-political landscape of the postwar, postholocaustic world. The traveler rejects the semi-seductive allures of anomie to which too many modern poets have succumbed. "Complacencies of the peignoir," the minor, mundane sell-outs of spirit and heart are kleig light back-lighted to reveal the grotesque contortions that destroy. Courage and the simple heart are sung. / A strain of koto drifts through the second section in which the poet-traveler records his encounter with the Orient--its philosophies, histories, scents and sinners. Hard learning, transcendence and grace are the general themes of the book, and in this section, particularly, a soft suffusing and diffusing mystic light transforms and lingers, calls forward and back. / To section three. Beginning with an epigraph from Emerson; "Let us affront the smooth mediocrity and squalid contentment of the times," the poet salutes various literati who did just that. Jonathan Edwards, Hawthorne, Melville, Poe, Dickinson, Whitman and Osip Mandelstam comprise a pantheon whose courage, Godliness and/or human sympathy can inspire and direct our paths during this parlous era of transition and confusion when the chrysalis must be self-shattered so we may summon our new being forth. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 49-12, Section: A, page: 3719. / Major Professor: Van Brock. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1988.

An original volume of poetry consisting of fifty-two poems, twelve of which have been previously published. The poems are arranged in a loose chronological order rather than thematically. The early ones are, for the most part, quite traditional in language, tone, and structure even though most of them are unrhymed. The themes are varied, ranging from romantic love to aubades. / Later poems are more modern in that they depend less and less on grammatical statement and more on image and metaphor. Themes are still varied, but a number of them attempt to utilize modern psychological approaches to understanding the dark underside of human nature. / These later poems are written in free verse. The theme of most of them is the human condition: love, rejection, loneliness, alienation, and the search for self and meaning in an existential world. In the most recent poems, there is a noticeable shift away from traditional imagery and grammatical statement. These poems are non-narrative, depending on allusion, tone, and symbols and images that carry their own internal logic rather than depending on grammatical syntax and logical time sequence. They are more innovative in that they attempt to more fully utilize the resources of language. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 49-12, Section: A, page: 3719. / Major Professor: Van Brock. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1988.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 40-07, Section: A, page: 4030. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1979.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 32-11, Section: A, page: 6449. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1971.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 32-11, Section: A, page: 6453. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1971.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 32-12, Section: A, page: 6971. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1971.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 33-02, Section: A, page: 0749. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1970.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 35-05, Section: A, page: 3008. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1974.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 38-06, Section: A, page: 3483. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1977.