Irony and the self in the lyric poetry of James Merrill.

Abstract

The paper also discusses Merrill's use of form and formal poetic convention in his early lyric poetry, as well as the function of form in his two novels. His use of form suggests that it is a distancing device so that the material he is dealing with (the pain of his childhood and of love relationships) may be made more manageable.

With regard to irony, the paper deals with Merrill's great theme of the evolution of the self. This great theme is manifested through two important subjects found in all of his lyric poetry: childhood and love. Merrill chooses his own life as the subject matter of most of his lyric work so that he may, through writing, resolve many of the problems his childhood created. His later lyrics suggest that he has come to terms with his past and with the fundamental ironies of existence so that he is free to live in the present. Ultimately, it is vision, and the poet as visionary, which resolves the dilemmas of his history. This vision is the stance he takes in the three book-length poems which crown his poetic career and were published in 1976, 1978, and 1980 respectively.

This study was concerned with the lyric poetry of James Merrill and how irony functions in his work. The paper focuses upon the lyric poetry found in six volumes published between 1951 and 1972. It examines the concept of irony, both superficial (rhetorical) and profound, and discusses how Merrill uses both types in his work.