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validate her own aesthetic evaluations is to validate another, opposite view; otherwise, Bishop's ideas would seem egocentric and thus, in her view, worthless. To her, only by being objective can one have a truly valid subjective view, yet the idea of objective aesthetic evaluation is still highly subjective and differs from one person to the next. This subtle insinuation blurs the lines between subject and object, further revealing Bishop's self-perceived inability to gain mastery over truth and even her own concept of beauty.

Bishop presents two different perceptions of beauty in order to contrast her investigative, considerate method of aesthetic evaluation with Mr. Swan's abrupt, impulsive style. She takes great pains to examine every detail of her surroundings, investigating each aspect and incorporating that into her final aesthetic judgment; the description of the town and the wasp's nest encompasses almost the entire poem. Mr. Swan, on the other hand, makes a hasty dismissal after no more than a glance; his evaluation is a quick, surface-level response"what's that ugly thing?" The exhaustive description in Bishop's own view of beauty bespeaks the time and energy spent on examination, suggesting that perhaps a different, deeper concept of beauty can be developed through closer, more thorough investigationsomething that Mr. Swan's evaluative process obviously lacks. This suggestion implies that Bishop and Mr. Swan's dichotomous positions on aesthetics are valid, but not fixed. With greater study and attention to detail, Mr. Swan's concept of beauty could deepen, or even change entirely. Bishop's thoroughly considered aesthetic position is not beyond the possibility of modification either, as further inspection of nature or the act of examining something totally new could still alter her perception of what she considers to be beautiful. This unstable, ever-evolving property of mankind's relation to truth, which defies the subjective/objective dichotomy, is at the heart of Bishop's work and the entire postmodern project.

Works Cited:

Costello, Bonnie. Elizabeth Bishop: Questions of Mastery.
Boston: Harvard University Press, 1993.

Weis, Shannon and Wesley, Karla. "Postmodernism and its Critics."
UA Anthropology Department Website. University of
Alabama. Oct. 27, 2005.
< http://www.as.ua.edu/ant/Facul ty/murphy/436/pomo.htm>

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