Elizabeth Bishop: The Restraints of Language

In poetry, the constraints of language and the tension between desire and possibility constitute the problematic in which the poem occurs. Approaching Elizabeth Bishop's work from the standpoint of this problematic, C.K. Doreski's illuminating study examines Bishop's rhetorical strategies and the way they shape the formal and thematic movements of her poetry and stories. Unlike other recent studies of Bishop, Doreski's does not concern itself primarily with her visual imagery, but rather deals w…