I'm wondering if anyone can help me construct this thesis in a more concise way. Keep in mind, there are redundancies I'm aware of, but can't choose the better way of expressing. Oh, also, I don't know how I'm using the term mirror-dialectic or objective correlative, I just think it fits in somewhere. Consider this a puzzle. It's puzzling me.
"The Dialectic of Resurrection Theology in the Poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins: Reconciling the Material World with the Spiritual Life as More than Comfort"
The poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins introduces the reader to a world of religious thoughts, imagery and experiences brought to the foreground of the aesthetic experience. The background and foundation of his poetry is bound by the poet's theological tenets and his theories of language, in his early college years' associations and his training as a Jesuit Priest, as well as his responses to and interactions with the people he served. Key to Hopkins's success at communicating religious beliefs and glorified impressions of nature was his method of mantling his ideas in an exacting poetics that gives the reader admittance to his metaphoric theophany. One of the major themes of his theology is the incarnation and resurrection of Christ, God in the flesh according to his Catholic doctrine. Not only is this thematically covered in his poetry, but it is my opinion that through his poetic endowments Hopkins performed the act of concretizing the religious experience for the reader through (specific?) language and rhythm. In a sense he achieved the creation of what I would call a mirror-dialectic: The dialectic method of revealing God in nature (uncovering his hiding place) in theme and content is the objective correlative of "clothing with flesh" the sacred act of the Resurrection, metaphorically, through the poetry.
This requires that Hopkins do several things. Among others, he must synthesize the inscape of things--the natural or material phenomena-- with spiritual noumena or instress. Hopkins's use of language or "the word" to describe the essence or noumena of God as seen in nature sets up a conflict: Material vs. spiritual. But Christ in the flesh becomes God through the atonement. The resurrection which is the sum of both acts, is accessible to Hopkins through his extra sensory response to nature as demonstrated in his journals when he didn't write poetry ( later in the paper). This act of knowing demonstrates nature's instress, which is the noumena of God.) But A fuller appreciation of Hopkins's poetry requires of the reader an acquisition of knowledge as well: close readings of the text as well as familiarity with the basic definitions of Hopkins's unique coinage of terms (see glossology in appendix). Hopkins's skill as a poet requires the reader to know the definition of the newly coined terms he uses, and new rhythms and sound sense techniques, which although they may not have been originated by Hopkins, were formally coined.
My paper will analyze Hopkins' methods in his successful achievement of synthesizing nature's phenomenology with the metaphysical or spiritual "things in themselves" (instress) or to us a term from his mentor, Duns Scotus, haecceitas: The stresses inherent in nature are a manifestation of God.
"The Dialectic of Resurrection Theology in the Poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins: Reconciling the Material World with the Spiritual Life as More than Comfort"
The poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins introduces the reader to a world of religious thoughts, imagery and experiences brought to the foreground of the aesthetic experience. The background and foundation of his poetry is bound by the poet's theological tenets and his theories of language, in his early college years' associations and his training as a Jesuit Priest, as well as his responses to and interactions with the people he served. Key to Hopkins's success at communicating religious beliefs and glorified impressions of nature was his method of mantling his ideas in an exacting poetics that gives the reader admittance to his metaphoric theophany. One of the major themes of his theology is the incarnation and resurrection of Christ, God in the flesh according to his Catholic doctrine. Not only is this thematically covered in his poetry, but it is my opinion that through his poetic endowments Hopkins performed the act of concretizing the religious experience for the reader through (specific?) language and rhythm. In a sense he achieved the creation of what I would call a mirror-dialectic: The dialectic method of revealing God in nature (uncovering his hiding place) in theme and content is the objective correlative of "clothing with flesh" the sacred act of the Resurrection, metaphorically, through the poetry.
This requires that Hopkins do several things. Among others, he must synthesize the inscape of things--the natural or material phenomena-- with spiritual noumena or instress. Hopkins's use of language or "the word" to describe the essence or noumena of God as seen in nature sets up a conflict: Material vs. spiritual. But Christ in the flesh becomes God through the atonement. The resurrection which is the sum of both acts, is accessible to Hopkins through his extra sensory response to nature as demonstrated in his journals when he didn't write poetry ( later in the paper). This act of knowing demonstrates nature's instress, which is the noumena of God.) But A fuller appreciation of Hopkins's poetry requires of the reader an acquisition of knowledge as well: close readings of the text as well as familiarity with the basic definitions of Hopkins's unique coinage of terms (see glossology in appendix). Hopkins's skill as a poet requires the reader to know the definition of the newly coined terms he uses, and new rhythms and sound sense techniques, which although they may not have been originated by Hopkins, were formally coined.
My paper will analyze Hopkins' methods in his successful achievement of synthesizing nature's phenomenology with the metaphysical or spiritual "things in themselves" (instress) or to us a term from his mentor, Duns Scotus, haecceitas: The stresses inherent in nature are a manifestation of God.
