Book contents
- The Cambridge Companion to John Clare
- The Cambridge Companion to John Clare
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Notes on Contributors
- Chronology
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Part I Clare the Poet
- Part II Clare the Naturalist
- Part III Clare’s Image
- 9 Self-Identity in a World of Influence
- 10 ‘Leading Strings’
- 11 Constructed Image
- Part IV Influences and Traditions
- Further Reading
- Index
- Cambridge Companions To Literature
9 - Self-Identity in a World of Influence
from Part III - Clare’s Image
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 November 2024
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Book contents
- The Cambridge Companion to John Clare
- The Cambridge Companion to John Clare
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Notes on Contributors
- Chronology
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Part I Clare the Poet
- Part II Clare the Naturalist
- Part III Clare’s Image
- 9 Self-Identity in a World of Influence
- 10 ‘Leading Strings’
- 11 Constructed Image
- Part IV Influences and Traditions
- Further Reading
- Index
- Cambridge Companions To Literature
Summary
The chapter explores the ways in which Clare’s sense of personal identity and selfhood is first created, and then fashioned and influenced, by the many differing pressures brought to bear upon it. Such pressures include poetic antecedents, social and economic conditions, literary associations and relationships, as well as the more personal features of an upbringing rooted in the natural world, which is authoritative and confirming, and an internal world, which is increasingly fragile and unstable. The chapter traces these evolutions – from the earliest verse that Clare wrote to the last poems of his asylum years.
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- The Cambridge Companion to John Clare , pp. 137 - 150Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2024