
Contents
36 Contemporary Poetry and Belief
Get accessMICHAEL SYMMONS ROBERTS was born in 1963 in Preston, Lancashire. His poetry has won the Whitbread Poetry Award, and been shortlisted for the Griffin International Poetry Prize, the Forward Prize, and twice for the T. S. Eliot Prize. He has received major awards from the Arts Council and the Society of Authors. His continuing collaboration with composer James MacMillan has led to two BBC Proms choral commissions, song cycles, music theatre works and operas for the Royal Opera House, Scottish Opera, Boston Lyric Opera and Welsh National Opera. Their WNO commission, The Sacrifice, won the RPS Award for opera. He has also published two novels, and is Professor of Poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University.
-
Published:16 December 2013
Cite
Abstract
The role of poet had shifted, in the late twentieth century, from ‘poet as truth-seeker’ (ò la Marianne Moore) to ‘poet as truth-maker’. But this relativism and denial of truth beyond the poem (the collapse of so-called ‘meta-narratives’) is in reverse now. Why? Because, according to post-secular philosophers like Blond, the project of relativism has failed. But, given the damage to religious symbolism and currency, that David Jones warned of fifty years ago, this is both crisis and an opportunity for poets. There is a need to find new forms and images to express ‘religious’ ideas and experiences. Bonhoeffer looked for the emergence of a new kind of language for this. But ‘religious’ poetry has always been innovative—e.g. modernists like Eliot, Jones, Moore, Bunting. Science offers new metaphors too, new approaches. And science has led the way out of the ‘hall of mirrors’ because climate change is nothing if not a meta-narrative. The ways forward for poetry include ascension, through difficulty and abstraction, and this essay shows three ways of exploring it—Auden, Lewis, Levertov—along with three theoretical approaches, those of Williams, Milbank, Pickstock, ‘praise poetry’ being the ultimate challenge. It also looks at a way forward through Welsh-language poetry, exemplified by Bobi Jones and others.
Sign in
Personal account
- Sign in with email/username & password
- Get email alerts
- Save searches
- Purchase content
- Activate your purchase/trial code
- Add your ORCID iD
Purchase
Our books are available by subscription or purchase to libraries and institutions.
Purchasing informationMonth: | Total Views: |
---|---|
October 2022 | 5 |
November 2022 | 4 |
December 2022 | 2 |
January 2023 | 2 |
February 2023 | 4 |
March 2023 | 7 |
April 2023 | 1 |
May 2023 | 1 |
June 2023 | 2 |
July 2023 | 5 |
August 2023 | 2 |
September 2023 | 6 |
October 2023 | 5 |
November 2023 | 4 |
December 2023 | 2 |
January 2024 | 2 |
February 2024 | 3 |
March 2024 | 1 |
April 2024 | 1 |
May 2024 | 1 |
June 2024 | 2 |
July 2024 | 1 |
August 2024 | 1 |
September 2024 | 2 |
January 2025 | 2 |
March 2025 | 8 |
May 2025 | 1 |
Get help with access
Institutional access
Access to content on Oxford Academic is often provided through institutional subscriptions and purchases. If you are a member of an institution with an active account, you may be able to access content in one of the following ways:
IP based access
Typically, access is provided across an institutional network to a range of IP addresses. This authentication occurs automatically, and it is not possible to sign out of an IP authenticated account.
Sign in through your institution
Choose this option to get remote access when outside your institution. Shibboleth/Open Athens technology is used to provide single sign-on between your institution’s website and Oxford Academic.
If your institution is not listed or you cannot sign in to your institution’s website, please contact your librarian or administrator.
Sign in with a library card
Enter your library card number to sign in. If you cannot sign in, please contact your librarian.
Society Members
Society member access to a journal is achieved in one of the following ways:
Sign in through society site
Many societies offer single sign-on between the society website and Oxford Academic. If you see ‘Sign in through society site’ in the sign in pane within a journal:
If you do not have a society account or have forgotten your username or password, please contact your society.
Sign in using a personal account
Some societies use Oxford Academic personal accounts to provide access to their members. See below.
Personal account
A personal account can be used to get email alerts, save searches, purchase content, and activate subscriptions.
Some societies use Oxford Academic personal accounts to provide access to their members.
Viewing your signed in accounts
Click the account icon in the top right to:
Signed in but can't access content
Oxford Academic is home to a wide variety of products. The institutional subscription may not cover the content that you are trying to access. If you believe you should have access to that content, please contact your librarian.
Institutional account management
For librarians and administrators, your personal account also provides access to institutional account management. Here you will find options to view and activate subscriptions, manage institutional settings and access options, access usage statistics, and more.