This thesis is the is the first detailed study of the unpublished radio work of the poet, Louis MacNeice, who worked for BBe radio as a scriptwriter and producer from 1941 until his death in 1963. lts overall timeframe is from the early 1930s until the publication of his 1948 collection, Holes in the Sky, but its main focus is on the between his propagandising radio work and his poetry during the war and its aftermath. Historically situating scripts and poems enriches parallel readings of contemporaneous texts producing new interpretations and identifies areas cross-fertilisation between the gemes. Chapters One and Two draw on MacNeice's work of the 1930s to establish a fiitical context for explicating political aspects of his work ofthe 1940s. Tbey involve his sponses to political tension at borne and abroad and to the rise of mass culture, both of which complicated any idealistic notion of the individual and the exercise of free will. Four succeeding chapters uncover the modifications to his political view against the changing backdrop of the events of the war: Chapter Three focuses on 1941, the blitz and the urgent need to encourage America to join the allies; Chapter Four covers 1942, transatlantic convoys, opposed landings and MacNeice's reception of the Beveridge report; Chapter five concentrates on 1943-1944, with Greece as an abiding interest of Mac Neice's; and Chapter Six deals extensively with D-Day. Finally, Chapter Seven analyses his work in the few months of the peace, including his increasing interest in parable as a means of discussing the individual's place in a complex post-war world. Cumulatively, this thesis traces the evolution of Mac Neice's political views, and counters the tendency in influential criticism to posit MacNeice as politically detached. It concludes that MacNeice was a politically engaged 'Writer whose complicated views remained radically socialist throughout these years.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:594844 |
| Date | January 2012 |
| Creators | Golphin, Peter |
| Publisher | Open University |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
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