루이즈 글릭의 치유의 글쓰기: 어둠의 수용과 온전한 생을 사는 법

Louise Glück’s Therapeutic Writing: Acceptance of Darkness and the Way of Living Whole Life

This paper explores Louise Glück’s writing poetry in terms of therapeutic writing or Poetry Therapy. The poet experienced traumas such as anorexia, the death of her older sister, divorce in her lifetime, and then these experiences have clearly influenced her poetic works. I think that some important techniques in Poetry Therapy could be employed to analyze Glück’s certain poems related to her traumatic experiences when I read them in terms of therapeutic writing. The techniques include facing the trauma of the past and ‘becoming’ the periphery. In this paper, as for facing trauma, I especially focus on the death and absence of the poet’s older sister who died before she was born. The ends of therapeutic writing are to relieve pains resulting from trauma, making people who are troubled by traumatic experiences or memories feel comforted by writing them down and then, as result, to try to overcome their trauma, leading them to a much healthier life. However, in Glück’s case, she rather tries hard to accept the dark aspects found in her lifetime with self-understanding, which would guide the poet to the realization of paradox within life and the world itself. By doing so, I suggest that she presents her own peculiar therapeutic writing. That’s why the title of this paper is “Glück’s Therapeutic Writing,” not “Glück ‘and’ Therapeutic Writing.” Consequently, I would prove that Glück’s poetic works can be read as therapeutic writings from the perspective of Poetry Therapy.