A quixotic scholar eating peanut butter on a spoon and translating Machaut's poetry is interrupted by a rumination on desire for love lost. This moment from "Fugue for Sexual Tension, Androgeny, and Wingmen in A Minor" is perhaps exemplary of the poems in False Idol Flash Mob: they depict a speaker trying to reconcile a world in which boundaries between sacredness and sacrilege, sexuality and purity, and myth and reality are never obvious or lucid. The result is a man suffering anxiety from trying to construct identity in chaos' midst, a situation comical, frustrating, and latent with yearning. The title of this manuscript is derived from the large cast of characters and concepts that the speaker makes an idol of in attempts to find solace. From Sufjan Stevens to Saint Lucy to Satan to ex-girlfriends, these characters flood the speaker's consciousness and leave just as quickly, and the speaker is abandoned, feeling empty and dirty as the streets of New Orleans the morning after a parade. The development in many of these poems mimics J.S. Bach's use of fugue. The Harvard Dictionary of Music describes a fugue as, "Imitative counterpoint, in which the theme is [..] tonally established, continuously expanded, opposed, and reestablished" (336). For example, the poem "Fugue for Alligators, Anton Webern, and Disorder in Bb Major" juggles several thematic threads to portray the speaker's fear of disorder: the sexuality of alligators, the untimely death of many icons who attempted to create order, and the relationships between musical pitch and meaning. Several poems also use fixed formal structures such as the double helix abecedarian or sestina. The contrast between the high order of strict forms and the disorder of the speaker's situation both laments and celebrates the tension and beauty found in language and the human condition. The goal of these poems, then, is not to answer the impossible questions about faith or identity that are raised, but rather to celebrate and bring those struggles to light through, as Barbara Hamby said about the work, "wordplay and verbal pyrotechnics." / A Thesis submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts. / Spring Semester, 2012. / March 30, 2012. / Catholicism, Identity, Idol, Poetry, Religion, Rob / Includes bibliographical references. / Barbara Hamby, Professor Directing Thesis; David Kirby, Committee Member; Andrew Epstein, Committee Member.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_183555 |
| Contributors | Stephens, Rob (authoraut), Hamby, Barbara (professor directing thesis), Kirby, David (committee member), Epstein, Andrew (committee member), Department of English (degree granting department), Florida State University (degree granting institution) |
| Publisher | Florida State University, Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, text |
| Format | 1 online resource, computer, application/pdf |
| Rights | This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s). The copyright in theses and dissertations completed at Florida State University is held by the students who author them. |
Page generated in 0.0015 seconds