`Efforts of Attention': Early Modern Religious Meditation and Historical Witness in the Poetry of Elizabeth Bishop, Anthony Hecht, and Geoffrey Hill

Abstract

This study assesses the development of meditative poetry in the second half of the twentieth century, within the British and American literary contexts, through a compared reading of the poetry of Elizabeth Bishop (1911-1979), Anthony Hecht (1923-2004), and Geoffrey Hill (1933-2016). Their `meditative' poetics are defined in relation to Christian treatises of religious meditation such as the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises. Historically associated with literature, these mystical techniques regained prominence within the socio-cultural postwar context and informed reflections around historical witnessing, socio-political activism, and ethical representation. Other than engaging with meditative practices, these mid-century `transatlantic' poets shared a similar approach to faith, a common literary tradition, and a preoccupation with history and its memorialisation. Their literary background, common to many of their contemporaries, contributed to shaping their meditative stance; as such, their example speaks to a general tendency in late twentieth-century anglophone poetry. To demonstrate the significant impact of meditation on their work, this thesis engages with poetry analysis, cross-comparison between their poems and the mystical treatises they read, and archival research. This study highlights previously unexplored aspects in the poetry of each of these authors and establishes the first compared reading of the poems of Bishop, Hecht, and Hill. Its findings contribute to several debates currently relevant to the field, including the discussion around modernist periodisation, the question of poetic influence in twentieth-century British and American poetry, and the challenge of mapping the varied development of `poetry after modernism.'