Date of Award
Spring 5-2019
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
M.A.
Degree Program
English
Department
English
Major Professor
Gery, John
Second Advisor
Easterlin, Dr. Nancy
Third Advisor
Doll, Dr. Daniel
Abstract
Kazimierz Dabrowski’s psychological theory of positive disintegration is a lesser known theory of personality development that offers an alternative critical perspective of literature. It provides a framework for the characterization of postmodern protagonists who move beyond heroic indoctrination to construct their own self-organized, autonomous identities. Ezra Pound’s The Cantos captures the speaker-poet’s extensive process of inner conflict, providing a unique opportunity to track the progress of the hero’s transformation into a personality, or a man. American Gods is a more fully realized portrayal of a character who undergoes the complete paradigmatic collapse of positive disintegration and deliberate self-derived self-revision in a more distilled linear fashion. Importantly, using a Dabrowskian lens to re-examine contemporary literature that has evolved to portray how the experience of psychopathology leads to metaphorical death—which may have any combination of negative or positive outcomes—has not only socio-cultural significance but important personal implications as well.
Recommended Citation
Nicholson, Michelle A., "“To be men, not destroyers”: Developing Dabrowskian Personalities in Ezra Pound’s The Cantos and Neil Gaiman’s American Gods" (2019). University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations. 2628.
https://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/2628
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Rights
The University of New Orleans and its agents retain the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible this dissertation or thesis in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. The author retains all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis or dissertation.