The Metaphor of The Prairie in Nineteenth-Century American Poetry
The metaphor of the prairie reveals the paradoxical characteristics of a burgeoning democracy. In the metaphor the conventional ideals of freedom, hope, equality, future prosperity, and a leading place in world history are juxtaposed with destructive tendencies. As the white civilization encroaches on the natural order of the wilderness, the new political and social order overruns the natural order. The values of the wilderness are threatened by overpopulation and cultivation. In short, the idea of a democracy threatens man's idea of self-worth, as self-worth is defined by man's place in and relationship to nature. Democracy threatens man's idea, that is, of his natural, essential self.
University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign
Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign