Kindverwysing in die poësie van Petra Müller

Abstract

Met die nagaan van die kindverwysing in die poesie van Petra Mulller, blyk dit duidelik dat die verwysings deurgaans literer funksioneel is. Die digteres slaag daarin om die leser se buitekennis van die kind se lewensfeer te ontgin. Die gevolg is die bewusmaking van die vergelyking tussen kind en volwassene as literere gestaltes. Daaruit vloei die besef van die kunstenaar se werk as poging om die wereld te orden en te beskou deur die oe van die onbedorwe kind. Saam met die vele gedigte waar die ontginning van die kindverwysing bloot 'n verfraaiing van die inhoud as gevolg het, word dit as leimotief in Mulller se werk hoogs funksioneel. Die kindverwysing as tegniek word ook herinnering aan die aard van kunstenaarskap soos deur Miuller toegepas. Petra Mulller se oeuvre kan nie los gemaak word van die kindverwysing en die implikasies van die herhaalde gebruikmaking daarvan nie.

When looking at child references in the poetry of Petra Muller, it is obvious that they are literary functional at all times. The poet, as artist, manages to tap the readers' outside knowledge of the child's sphere of life. The result is the foregrounding of the comparison between child and adult resulting in the realisation of the artist's work as an effort to reshape his world by looking at it through the eyes of the unspoilt child. Together with the many poems where child references act mainly as a way of presenting such poems as enjoyable as possible, it becomes extremely functional as a leitmotif. The child reference as used by Muller as poetic technique also becomes reminder to the reader of what art is all about. Petra Muller's poems can not be read separately from the child reference and all it's implications.