Anatomy of Monotony

Anatomy of Monotony

"Anatomy of Monotony" is a poem from the second, 1931, editionof Wallace Stevens's first book of poetry,"Harmonium." Unlike most ofthe poems in this collection, it was first published in 1931, [Stevens, H. p. 260] so it isrestricted by copyright until 2025 in America and similarjurisdictions, because of legislation like the
Sonny Bono Copyright TermExtension Act. However, it is quoted here in full, as justified by
fair use for the purpose of scholarly commentary.

The poet conceives us as evolving and increasingly civilized products of anearthly process. Indeed the earth itself is growing and growing old,while we sport our complex bodies and venture ever more sophisticateddesires. Human experience is a kind of illusion engendered by ourevolved sense organs, vulnerable to "the mother's death" and the colddeath of the universe. The spirit sees this and is aggrieved, for itwould harbor experience in some place that transcends nature, free fromthe contingencies of earth and universe.

The poem can be read as ironic, as calling into question the pretensionof `the spirit'. This reading is supported by the naturalistic tenorof the "Harmonium" collection as a whole, and specifically by theparallel of Invective Against Swans. Thedesire for transcendence of nature is one of those "finer, moreimplacable chords" that the poet disavows, as also in Sunday Morning.

Notes

References

  • Stevens, Holly. "Letters of Wallace Stevens". 1966: Alfred A. Knopf

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