Functioning on three distinct but coexistent levels, water imagery unifies Beowulf. On the first level, that of conscious symbolism, Beowulf's three water adventures develop the triple immersion motif present in Anglo-Saxon baptism ritual. On the second level, that of the poet's personal unconscious, the water monsters against whom Beowulf struggles symbolize the hero's Shadow, his fallen nature in which lurk inadmissable and anarchic desires. On the deepest level, that of the port's collective unconscious, the water monsters are symbols for the archetypal Mother to whose womb the hero of myth strives to return in order to achieve immortality by means of rebirth.

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Photocopy of typescript. / Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries

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Thesis (M.A.)--Oregon State University, 2008. / Printout. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 71-74). Also available on the World Wide Web.

This thesis explores the use of water in the writing of Ernest Hemingway. It includes chapters concerning rivers, rain, lakes, and the oceans.

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Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2004. / Supervisor: Keith A. Livers. Vita. Includes bibliographical references. Also available from UMI.

This study examines the correlation between water imagery and the expression of Spleen and the Ideal, the two poles of the psychological struggle fundamental to Baudelaire's identity. We have determined that the poet's major published works contain three principal categories of water imagery: waterbodies; weather's elements; other liquids associated with Man, namely tears, blood and wine. Usually feminine in nature, the water in each of these groups is characterized by a Spleen/Ideal bipolarity, the extension of Baudelaire's psychological being. Aquatic manifestations of the Ideal inspire spiritual escapes from the horror of Spleen as the poet dreamily contemplates the Ideal realm. Such escapes are only brief, however, as the preponderance of spleenetic water imagery reveals. Water associated with the Ideal is a life giving force, whereas water associated with Spleen can only be a force of death. Its diverse forms and moods or characters make water a rich source of poetic images well suited to mirroring Baudelaire's continuous anguished struggle between Spleen and the Ideal. / Arts, Faculty of / French, Hispanic, and Italian Studies, Department of / Graduate

Emily Dickinson's use of water as a dominant poetic trope differs from typical religious archetypal associations with baptism, cleansing, and rebirth. Dickinson transforms rather than recapitulates established theological concepts, borrowing and adapting Biblical themes to suit her artistic purposes. Dickinson's water poems are the poet's means of initiating a discourse with God. Dickinson's poems, however, portray the poet's seeking communion and finding only a silent response to her attempts to initiate an exchange with God. Unable to find requital to her needs for discourse, Dickinson uses Biblical imagery to vindicate ultimately abandoning the orthodox tenets of Calvinism. Resenting the unresponsiveness of God, particularly if the solitude she experiences has been imposed through His will rather than her own, Dickinson poetically reverses roles with God to establish her autonomy, looking instead to the reader of her poetry to requite her need for discourse. And as interaction is seen as a need that Dickinson must have realized, poetry may then be understood as the poet's invitation of the reader into the discourse she finds lacking in God. Refuting Calvinist doctrines allows the poet to validate her autonomy as well. Instead of following a course of life prescribed by God, Dickinson demonstrates her resistance to suppliance through water. Dickinson refuses to follow God's guidance unquestioningly because merely being part of a collective who follow an indifferent god provides no lasting distinction for a poet seeking immortality. Having broken the union with God and established her god-like identity as a poet, Dickinson turns to the similar use of Biblical language in her poetry to establish the communion with her reader that she finds lacking in her relationship with God. Dickinson then strengthens this bond with the reader by asserting that divinity is present in every individual not suppressed by the restraining presence of God.