In this analytical research paper, the notions of narrator and narration in poetry are discussed in order to identify why the terminology in this particular genre is considered as problematic by most theorists. In its theoretical section, this paper focuses on Philippe Lejeune’s autobiographical and biographical pacts, and shows the limits of the two reading contracts in the poetical genre. Then, on the background of Brian McHale and Stefan Kjerkegaard’s works on segmentivity, this paper explains the narrative process that can be found in the visual form of poetry. Finally, discussing Brian McAllister and Marie-Laure Ryan’s works on narrativity, this study explains that a story is a mental image that the transposition to a media will transform in order to best represent according to its own limits. In its analytical part, and mirroring the theoretical part, this study focuses on identifying the narrator, the narrative process, as well as the degree of narrativity of four poems by David Diop, Charles Pennequin, Ilse Garnier and Pierre Garnier. Thoses poems, chosen on the ground that they are good representative examples of narrative poetry, lyric poetry and visual poetry, help test the theories in practice. The results show that in the narrative poem, although the identity of the narrator is hard to establish, the narrative process is clear and the degree of narrativity is high. In the lyric and visual poems on the other hand, even if the segmentivity theory helps ‘reconstruct’ the narration when linking words are missing, the difficulty to identify narrative events in the lyric poem and a story world in the case of the visual poetry makes the emergence of a story world, and in turn of a narrator, problematic.

The author's Habilitationsschrift, Universität Bonn. / Includes indexes. Includes bibliographical references (p. 373-390).

The author's Habilitationsschrift, Universität Bonn. / Includes indexes. Includes bibliographical references (p. 373-390).

Honors Project--Smith College, Northampton, Mass., 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 101-106).

Les œuvres poétiques de Fernando Assis Pacheco (Coimbra, 1937 – Lisbonne, 1995) et d’Adília Lopes (Lisbonne, 1960) présentent des éléments communs: un sabotage du langage poétique traditionnel, une dépréciation du sujet poétique, une représentation du monde apparemment triviale. Notre proposition est que ces trois grandes caractéristiques sont liées entre elles, de par leurs modes de concrétisation et les intentions qui les sous-tendent. On y retrouve en effet un même projet de « dégonflement » – d’un langage poétique grandiloquent et ampoulé, d’un sujet lyrique prétentieux et qui se prend trop au sérieux, d’une conception du monde excessivement épurée ou tendant vers le transcendantal. Néanmoins, cette opération ne s’assimile pas à une action proprement déconstructiviste, car elle vise à transmettre à ces entités un « souffle » susceptible de leur conférer une force animique et une capacité d’intervention. C’est sur la base de ce double mouvement que nous proposons le terme de « poétique de la déflation », en choisissant une notion qui recouvre à la fois ces deux acceptions (respectivement, dans les domaines économique et géomorphologique). L’adoption du prisme de la déflation nous permettra d’examiner le modèle sous-jacent des œuvres de Fernando Assis Pacheco et d’Adília Lopes. Pour le faire, notre travail se décompose en trois parties : nous étudions successivement la façon dont ces auteurs s’engagent dans une procédure de déflation du langage poétique qu’ils utilisent (concrètement, en nous penchant sur ses formes narratives) ; du sujet lyrique qu’ils figurent (par l’analyse d’une fluidification dans la figuration de ce sujet) ; et de la conception du monde que dénote leur poésie (en nous intéressant à la dimension éthique qui y est implicite). / The poetic works of Fernando Assis Pacheco (Coimbra, 1937 - Lisbon, 1995) and Adília Lopes (Lisbon, 1960) have common elements: a sabotage of the traditional poetic language, an impairment of the poetic self, an apparently trivial representation of the world. Our proposal is that these three characteristics are interrelated, by their modes of realization and the intentions that underlie them. We find indeed a project of "reduction" – of the pompous and bombastic language of poetry, of a pretentious lyrical self that takes itself too seriously, of a conception of the world excessively refined or tending towards the transcendental. However, this does not amount to a proper deconstructive action because it aims to convey a sense of strength and energy to these entities a purifying "breath". On the basis of this double movement we propose the term "poetics of deflation", choosing a concept that covers both these two meanings (respectively, in the economic and geomorphic domains). Adopting the prism of deflation allow us to examine the underlying model at Fernando Assis Pacheco’s and Adília Lopes’ poetry. To do so, our work is divided into three parts: we successively study how these writers engage in a process of deflation of the poetic language they use (specifically, by looking at its narrative forms); of the lyrical self that they portray (through analysis of a fluidity in this process of portrayal); and the world view they manifest in their poetry (focusing on its ethical dimension).

We all have stories to share, to build, to pass around, to inherit, and to create. This story - the one I piece together now - is about a Thai-/Bengali-/Muslim-/American-/Feminist looking for home, looking to manage the tension and conflict of wanting to belong to her family and to her feminist community. This thesis focuses on the seemingly conflicting obligations to kinship on the one hand and to feminist practice on the other, a conflict where being a good scholar or activist is directly in opposition to being a good Asian daughter. In order to understand how and why these communities appear at odds with one another, I examine how the material spaces and psychological realities inhabited by specific hyphenated, fragmented subjects are represented (and misrepresented) in both popular culture and practical politics, arguing against images of the hybrid body that bracket its lived tensions. I argue that fantasies of home as an unconditional site of belonging and comfort distract us from the multiple communities to which hyphenated subjects must move between. Hyphenated Asian-/American bodies often find ourselves torn between nativism and assimilationism - having to neutralize, forsake, or discard parts of our identities. Thus, I reduce complicated, difficult ideas of being to the size of a thimble, to a question of loyalty between my Asian-/American history and my American-/feminist future, between my familial background and the issues that have become foregrounded for me during college, between the home from which I originate and the new home to which I wish to belong. To move with fluidity, I must - in collaboration with others - invent new stories of identity and belonging.