ORALITY AS THE REPRESENTATION OF MADNESS IN THE POEM HOWL BY ALLEN GINSBERG
ABSTRACT: This paper examines
the characteristics of orality as the representation of madness in the poem Howl
by Allen Ginsberg. Orality and madness are two major aspects of Beat literary
tradition. The characteristics of orally based thought and expressions as
proposed by Ong are found in the poem and
have significance to
the theme of
madness in the
poem. Madness is
manifested not only
in content, but also in the form of poetic structure of the poem. It
was found that
textual orality in
Howl serves to
represent the effect
of mind and
body alteration caused by
drug-induced madness on
the perception of
reality. Drug-induced madness both accelerates and decelerates the
speaker’s perception in the poem, which is shown in the speech pattern of
the narrative. All the
perceptions captured by
the mind and
all the sensations
felt by the senses take place
almost simultaneously and are
verbally manifested as they are into
written language. This results in incoherent and ungrammatical sentences
creating chaos, a form of language madness.
Author: Randy Ridwansyah
Journal Code: jpantropologigg130016
