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SOURCE: "Momaday's Poetry," in his N. Scott Momaday: The Cultural and Literary Background, University of Oklahoma Press, 1985, pp. 189-254.
In the following excerpt, Schubnell discusses Momaday's poems that center on his Native American heritage, focusing in particular on part two of The Gourd Dancer.
This [essay] is devoted to Momaday's poetic statements on his American Indian heritage and his particular treatment of the American earth. Most of the poems I will discuss belong to part two of Momaday's The Gourd Dancer collection. While many of them are written in a loose style approaching prose, there are also examples of syllabic and free verse as well as one sonnet. This variety of styles suggests a greater ease of expression compared with the rigid and formalized work of Momaday's Stanford period.
Momaday on the oral tradition and the American literary canon:
That whole oral tradition which goes back probably to...
This section contains 8,067 words (approx. 27 pages at 300 words per page) |
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