Item Details

abstract

Olga Broumas is a writer of complex poetry that resists many established conventions of written poetry. She is also the translator from Greek into English of the poetry of Nobel Laureate Odysseas Elytis. Born in Greece, she writes in her second language, English. Her poetry, influenced by her Greek heritage, tends toward the abstract and focuses on themes relevant to women’s lives. She is recognized for collaborative composition of poetry with other writers. Unabashedly erotic, one of her well known themes is women’s love for each other. This thesis focuses on the book, Sappho’s Gymnasium, collaboratively written by Olga Broumas and T Begley, with special emphasis on the book-length poem “Prayerfields.” The thesis reveals continuity and connection with a literary tradition that originates from fragmented remnants of poetry attributed to the Sappho of Greek antiquity. Beginning with a principle drawn from one of Sappho’s last collected fragments, Broumas and Begley write of women’s ability to acknowledge such difficult issues as the pain of incest and how to cope with the pain from a transformative stance of strength. Inspired by the fragmentary poetic heritage of Sappho, Broumas and Begley employ innovative composition strategies that include word placement, invented words, sentence fragments and varied poetic forms to approximate unspeakable emotion. © Jill Game Carraway, 2007 All Rights Reserved

subject

American Poetry

Lesbian Writing

Olga Broumas

Women's Poetry

contributor

Carraway, Jill Game (author)

jill@wfu.edu (authorEmail)

Mary K. DeShazer, Ph.D., Advisor (committee member)

Sarah E. Barbour, Ph.D. (committee member)

Olga L. Valbuena, Ph.D. (committee member)

creator

Carraway, Jill Game

date

2008-09-28T10:54:12Z (accessioned)

2010-06-18T18:58:22Z (accessioned)

2009-01-30 (available)

2008-09-28T10:54:12Z (available)

2010-06-18T18:58:22Z (available)

2007 (issued)

degree

null (defenseDate)

MALS (Liberal Studies) (discipline)

Wake Forest University (grantor)

MALS (level)

identifier

carrawayjg_12_07.pdf

http://hdl.handle.net/10339/14759 (uri)

migration

etd-12132007-103113 (oldETDId)

rights

Release the entire work immediately for access worldwide. (accessRights)

I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to Wake Forest University or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. (license)

title

Olga Broumas: Greek in an American Voice © Jill Game Carraway, 2007 All Rights Reserved