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CONCEPT MAP: ENG 3111(A) - POETICS (Maeve O'Briain), The works in this…
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The works in this category all focus on the role of art (more particularly poetry) and aesthetics in human development, what qualifies as beauty and "truth"
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This group of pieces focus more on the functions of poetry and its structure - mainly formalists, structuralist and post-structuralist authors and/or critics.
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Gerard Genette – Poetic Language, Poetics of Language
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These pieces tend to focus on the possible relationships between language and poetry and how readers experience or are affected by poetry.
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These works focus on the social functions of poetry and how it reacts with society in a political lens (for example: race, gender norms, abuse, etc.).
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Adrienne Rich – Blood, Bread, and Poetry
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Christopher Nealon – The Matter of Capital, or Catastrophe and Textuality
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Date: 375 BC
Key Concepts
Points of connection:
- Kant: Plato reflects on how the suspicions of art and how it is an imitation that invokes emotions while Kant discusses how art creates such emotions through the judgements of the beautiful and the sublime.
- Schiller: The socrates in Plato think that art should be banised as it is too emotional which is similar to Schiller who thinks humans are to "specialized" now and lack space for art and its "uselessness". Thus, Schiller in a way represents the dangers of what would occur if the socrates were deemed right.
- Adorno: Both authors discuss the role of poetry in society and how it presents a form of resistance from the "truth" (Plato) and commodification (Adorno).
- Yeats: Plato reflects on how poets are three times removed from the "truth" and is dangerous for the emotions and passions it evokes, which is similar to Yeats belief that symbolism is the language of emotions and is continuously changing thus is also far removed from our emotions and dreams.
- PLATO: Poetry giving the readers an experience without experience it reflects PLATO's idea that art and poets are "three times removed".
- Baraka: Baraka refers to PLATO's idea of poetry being three times removed from "the truth" as it is an imitation. They both view this imitation as being bad
- Socrates argues that poetry and other arts are form of imitative art are THREE TIMES removed from "truth" (truth is an idea).
- Socrates thinks that poetry appeals to our emotions thus making poetry and poets (i.e. Homer) dangerous as they inflame the passion (runs counter to reason).
- Seek to banish poets and artists from his "ideal state".
Bed (idea) - God - "Truth" (divine thing/idea)Bed (caregiver) - Material world"Bed" (Painting) - Images
Date: 1794
Key Concepts
- Humanity is too specialized in modern society.
- Declares political freedom to be the most perfect of all human endeavours, & asserts that only through beauty can humanity make its way to freedom.
- The role of Art - "Aesthetic state": when individuals would be free to not be rational all the time.
- The Greeks: their humanity rested upon their ability to do many things.
- Advises artists to focus on higher moral principles, in order to improve their audience's taste.
Points of connection:
- Plato: The socrates in Plato think that art should be banised as it is too emotional which is similar to Schiller who thinks humans are to "specialized" now and lack space for art and its "uselessness". Thus, Schiller in a way represents the dangers of what would occur if the socrates were deemed right.
- Kant: Both discuss beauty and its capacity to allow people to achieve freedom and pleasure through its lack of rationality.
- Adorno: Schiller thinks that humans have become too specialized which reflects Adorno's view that poetry reflects the alienation and lack of emotional response from individuals. In this case, the humans in Schiller experience the same alienation through their specialization.
- Perloff: Both discuss the importance of learning (Schiller speaks in order to not be as specialized and Perloff discusses learning from avant-garde forms) in order to become more fragmented.
Date: 1795
Key Concepts
- Naive poetry: stems from a direct relationship between the poet and nature - Characterized by simplicity, spontaneity, and a natural harmony with the world.
- Naive poets: express themselves with ease and joy and their poetry reflects an innocent unity between the self and nature.
- Examples of naive poets: Homer and Pindar.
- Ideal poet: poet that is a combination of the naive (purity and spontaneity) and the sentimental poet (depth and awareness).
- Naive poet represent the innocent stage of human development
- Sentimental poet reflects the development self-consciousness, intellectual conflict, and a deeper awareness of the world’s imperfections.
- Schiller sees both as important stages in the development of human consciousness and artistic expression and that the ideal poet would offer the better representation of the human condition.
Points of connection:
- Plato: Both refer to Homer.
- Yeats: The intellectual symbol (Yeats) reflects the sentimental poet (Schiller) as they both create more depth through deeper meaning and connection.
- Olson: Both discuss the element of spontenaiety in expression. Schiller reflects to the naive poets spontaneity through its relationship with nature and Olson reflects to projective verses spontaneous expression of experience.
- Rich: Both authors express the need for new poetry that reflects the real struggles in the world while still remains pure in emotion.
Date: 1790
Key Concepts
- Four possible judgments of aesthetic: the agreeable, the beautiful, the sublime, & the good.
- The pleasant is a sensory judgment — a purely subjective judgments, based on desire.
- The good is a judgment of ethical value— a purely objective judgment (things are either moral or they are not).
- The beautiful and the sublime are not tied to any absolute and determinate concept.
- These judgements are dependent on the belief that other people would agree.
The judgement of beauty relies on its purpose, even if it has no practical function and is adherent.
- Beautiful is universal and is independent of the existence of the object
The judgment of sublime is beyond the limits of comprehension (an object of fear – must not actually be threatening).
- Faculty of mind: What is going on in our mind when we find something beautiful?
Points of connection:
- Plato: Plato reflects on how the suspicions of art and how it is an imitation that invokes emotions while Kant discusses how art creates such emotions through the judgements of the beautiful and the sublime.
- Schiller: Both discuss beauty and its capacity to allow people to achieve freedom and pleasure. through its lack of rationality as both view art as a means of elevating human consciousness and moral progress.
- Shelley: Both authors are interested in the individual experience of the beautiful and the type of pleasure it creates.
- Adorno: Both authors address the aesthetic experience and how engagement with art for the sole purpose of engaging with it and not wanting anything else from it.
Date: 1957
Key Concepts
Lyric poetry: a deeply subjective, conveying the personal emotions, thoughts, and experiences of the poet.
- The lyric allows for the expression of the self, but the poet’s voice is often disconnected or distant from the external world.
- what is it? (thesis): utopian and projects a "dream" society.
- what it isn't? (antithesis): cold and material reality
- A modern phenomenon (Modernism) that is in response to reification (post-industrialization).
Problem: tendency to apply society onto poetry and not vice versa (renders lyric poetry as an object).
- The lyric poetry retains a certain level of autonomy from social forces: Art resists being fully instrumentalized by society, allowing it to critique and reflect society from a distance.
- The critical function of lyric poetry: The lyric can reveal the friction between personal experience and the collective structure.
Important qualities of lyric poetry:
- Rejects ideas of systems of power.
- Very individualistic (creates a form of resistance as it preserves the individualistic voice in the face of mass culture).
- Emotion and expression.
- Use of the "I" and "you" (functions as the form of lyric poetry and gives rise to the universal).
- These qualities are used to create social under current by countering society (it is dialectic: defines something based on what it is not).
The "I" and "you".
- separates notions of subject (individual) Vs. object (collective).
- Serves as a point of humanization that presents a new point of opposition through language.
The aesthetic experience: engaging with art for its own sake, rather than for any utilitarian or ideological purpose — a crucial element in the lyric poetry because it allows the poetry to transcend.
- The aesthetic autonomy of the lyric presents truths and reflections that challenge the status quo which creates freedom.
Paradox of Language:
- (1) Subjective impulses.
- (2) Bring concepts into being.
- Thus, poetry provides a space for contradiction and opposition—offering a chance to challenge the social norms .
Points of connection:
- Plato: Both authors discuss the role of poetry in society and how it presents a form of resistance from the "truth" (Plato) and commodification (Adorno).
- Schiller: Schiller thinks that humans have become too specialized which reflects Adorno's view that poetry reflects the alienation and lack of emotional response from individuals. In this case, the humans in Schiller experience the same alienation through their specialization.
- Kant: Both authors address the aesthetic experience and how engagement with art for the sole purpose of engaging with it and not wanting anything else from it.
- Vendler: Both authors are very concerned about the goal and characteristics of lyric poetry. They both think that lyric poetry is highly emotional and conveys the emotions of the poet. They also both view lyric poetry as transcendent as it mirrors individuals emotions.
- de Man: Both thinkers refer to the dialectic concept of knowing what a word means by knowing "what it isn't". Adorno refers to it as an "antithesis" and presents it as one of the qualities of lyric poetry wheras de Man uses it to define the origin of language.
- Perloff: Both thinkers engage with the importance of language and the ways it can reflect reality and both think that art is not revolutionary but instead offers chances to challenge societal norms.
- Milosz: Both pieces question the differences between individual and collective. Adorno reflects on subject vs. objects when thinking of the "I" and "you" whereas Milosz contemplates the tension between individual hope and collective hope.
Date: 1903
Key Concepts
Poetry is trying to say the un-sayable
- Symbolist writing is notoriously difficult – poems seek to evoke a mood rather than tell or describe anything by including imagery, colours and the idea of the senses (scent, sound).
- Symbols are incorporated into the emotional & "dream-like" world of personal experience.
Metaphor: has a bigger meaning - all language is metaphoricalSymbolism is the language of dreams and has a meaning that differs from person to person & time period to time period.
- The images evoked by symbols provide poems with many meanings that depend on each individual.
- 1st type of symbol = emotional symbol - evokes an emotional response (has no particular, logical reason).
- 2nd type of symbol = intellectual symbol - takes an emotion and focuses it into a concept (they convey depths of meaning rather than just a general feeling or nostalgia).
Points of connection:
- Plato: Plato reflects on how poets are three times removed from the "truth" and is dangerous for the emotions and passions it evokes, which is similar to Yeats belief that symbolism is the language of emotions and is continuously changing thus is also far removed from our emotions and dreams.
- Schiller:The intellectual symbol (Yeats) reflects the sentimental poet (Schiller) as they both create more depth through deeper meaning and connection.
- Shelley: Both engage with the deeper meanings within poetry. Yeats reflects on symbols ability to create this meaning while Shelley focuses more on the poets role in creating symbols in order to express emotions and human existence.
Date: 1821
Key Concepts
Points of connection:
- Kant: Both authors are interested in the individual experience of the beautiful and the type of pleasure it creates.
- Yeats: Both engage with the deeper meanings within poetry. Yeats reflects on symbols ability to create this meaning while Shelley focuses more on the poets role in creating symbols in order to express emotions and human existence.
- Césaire: The tree and its all encompassing nature reflects Shelley's idea that poets have the capacity to unite.
- Frye: Both agree that imagination is central in poetry as it faces the truths of society.
- Stein: Both are concerned with the calcification of language and its loss of meaning. Stein goes further as to propose a way to prevent the calcification.
- Lowell: Both refer to the idea of sound and how it plays a role in poetry and language. Shelley focuses on how the renovation of language through poetry forces us to pay attention to sound, whereas Lowell focuses on how the spoken poetry (the sound of it) is what creates deeper connection and emotion.
- The invention of language represents the human impulse to reproduce the "rhythmic" and the "ordered".
- The faculty of approximation: Those who possess this faculty in excess are poets and they try to communicate the pleasure of their experiences to the community. Thus, their poetry can be used as a moral guide (helps foster compassion and understanding).
- Shelley recognizes that the creation of language adheres to the poetic order, harmony, unity, and a desire to express delight in the beautiful.
- Metaphors come from the creation of similarities between things that appear unfamiliar.
"Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world" (363).
- Poets have the ability to see truths that others cannot: they perceive deeper meanings and connections in the world.
- The poet uses the imagination to explore the truths of human existence, society, and the universe. They thus express "universal truths".
- Freedom is the condition for poetry (freedom turns into autonomy)
- The poet is capable of understanding emotions, desires, and ideals that cannot be understood through science and logic.
Effects of poetry: Renovation of language.
- forces us to pay attention to sound.
- language gets rusty/boring and loses its meaning when overly used/
- reminds us of the fundamental ways that humans live.
Date: 1962
Key Concepts
Points of connection:
- Shelley: Both agree that imagination is central in poetry as it faces the truths of society.
- Césaire: Both agree that art and science are opposites in their purpose and goals as art is more emotional and science is marked by facts.
What happens in our mind when we read poetry?
- Reason (problem-solving) Vs. Emotion (no solution/answers).
- An educated imagination is an active response to the pleasure we get from the arts — Anyone can respond with pleasure to a work of art at the moment it is experienced.
- Necessity (what we have to do) and Freedom (what we want to do).
Science: Begins with the world we have to live in and moves towards imagination - evolves and improvesArt: Starts with imagination (the world we construct) and moves towards ordinary experiences
- Literature is more directly in touch with the transformative powers of the imagination.
- Art imposes from/order (imagination) on the world.
- Art has a moral quality due to its form
- Literature can only transform everything it encounters into some form of human concern.
- Literature does not evolve, improve or progress
Date: 1926
Key Concepts
Points of connection:
- PLATO: Poetry giving the readers an experience without experience it reflects PLATO's idea that art and poets are "three times removed".
- Lowell: Sound is crucial to the reading and understanding of poetry. Lowell goes deeper and breaks down the qualities of sound and how it adds more meaning.
- Genette: The importance of meaning. Richards speaks of figurative languages ability to generate new meanings. Genette offers the choice of bending meanings in order to close the gap between signified and signifier.
- Poetic experience combines emotion and thought brings coherence and unity through its use of language, structure, and imagery.
- Poetry elicits a subjective response—each reader may respond differently, but their engagement is crucial.
- Poetry uses figurative language (metaphor, simile, and symbol) to generate new meanings and connections which creates a richer experience.
- The reading and understanding of poetry starts with Sound
- "Our thoughts are the servants of our interests" (155) - our interests and desires point our thoughts in manny directions
The poet, in a sense, acts as a mediator: uses language, imagery, and form to shape the poetic experience and influences how the reader will engage with the text.
- Poetry is built upon words that have emotional and associative meanings that extend beyond their direct dictionary definitions.
- Readers go to poetry to regulate emotions as poems unlock the emotions that readers correspond with each piece.
Function of poetry:
- gives the readers an emotional experience without actually experiencing it physically
- readies our emotions for similar situations
- This act of preparation is ART
Date: 1950
Key Concepts
- The poet as someone who is engaged in a quest for precision and truth through language.
- The poet must focus on the objective aspects of language and its ability to capture the complexities of the world.
- The poet’s job is to create poetry that speaks to reality—to represent the world as it is, not just as a reflection of subjective emotions. This requires the poet to be attuned to the most subtle aspects of language and meaning.
- Form of poetry: sound or sonic (interest in meter) distinguishes poetry from other arts
- Concept poetry: blends rhythm and images
- Free verse does not exist
Points of connection:
- Stein: both emphasize the relation between language and poetic form.
- Moore: Both are focused on the concept of precision in poetic language. Moore argues that it is emotions that must be precise in order to guarantee the poets emotions are felt while still being understood.
Date: 1935
Key Concepts
Style of writing: breaking from sense (no clear meaning)
- Repetitions
- Poetic (feels like an internal monologue)
- Fragmentation
- Merging of form and content
- Words are lively if they are active (if they change in meaning, are ambiguous, or if they can be mistaken) – Stein dislikes words (especially nouns) with a single meaning or function.
- Punctuation – understanding a sentence should be a slow & concentrated process.
- “Sentences are not emotional but paragraphs are” – sentences are a structural unveiling, while paragraphs create an emotional response which creates temporal movement in space.
Natural image/closing "the gap" seems stale: moves away from it to get to the "truth" (the thing in itself: Nouns).
- Nouns are calcified and should be rid of.
- Stein confronts nouns by exploring them in writing – This turned into poetry.
- If you name something it is done: taking language for granted and becomes stale.
- Poetry is all about the love of nouns — The ultimate desire of poetry is to eliminate the noun & try to give a sense of the emotional connection to the loved object through repetition.
- Poetry needs to refresh language: Stein uses nouns by getting away from their ordinary use.
Points of connection:
- Zukofsky: both emphasize the relation between language and poetic form.
- Shelley: Both are concerned with the calcification of language and its loss of meaning. Stein goes further as to propose a way to prevent the calcification.
- Genette: Both thinkers are concerned with the notion of "the gap" in language. Stein wants to get away from closing the gap as they think it will make language stale whereas Genette does not thinks in closing the gap as it is where poetry is created.
- Jakobson: Jakobson thinks language is constantly changing with time and needs to be refreshed which Stein agrees with as they think naming something means "it is done".
- de Man: They are also concerned in "the gap". Stein disagrees with de Man as Stein thinks closing the gap is harmful to language whereas de Man thinks that the attempt to close the gap is what creates poetic language.
- Perloff: Both are very concerned with the concept of "calcification" and "closure". Perloff applies Stein's argument of the calcification of language and applies it the idea of "endgame". Perloff's "endgame" refers to closure and the end of evolution of poetry which goes against Stein's fear of the ending of the meaning of words through "calcification".
Date: 1944
Key Concepts
- Emotion without discipline and accuracy (precision: using language precisely and carefully without wasting words) can become overly sentimental or vague.
- Without feeling, poetry would be dry, mechanical, or abstract but they need to be shaped in order to not overwhelm the poem.
- Emotions need to be expressed through precise language.
- To achieve both feeling and precision, the poet must maintain objective (they must distance themselves enough that their own emotions do not overwhelm their expression without suppressing their emotions).
The structure of the poem (arrangement of words, the rhythm, the line breaks) contributes to the precise expression of the emotional content.
- Precision also involves careful observation of the world to enhance the emotional depth of the poem by anchoring the emotional in the real.
- Precision: potential energy is "coiled" in order to accurately leap onto a point.
- Moore thinks that the best poetry finds a balance between emotion and intellect.
Points of connection:
- Zukofsky: Both are focused on the concept of precision in poetic language. Moore argues that it is emotions that must be precise in order to guarantee the poets emotions are felt while still being understood.
- Olson: Both thinkers are focused on the the "potential energy" found in language in poetry which allows the poets to express their emotions efficiently and accurately.
Date: 1995
Key Concepts
The Soul: deeply connected to emotion, experience, and imagination.
- The novel/self (identity) and poem (soul - "I"/"you") transcendent; and the abstract voice that everyone can see themselves in) are fundamentally different.
- Through the act of imaginative creation, the soul transcends ordinary life and enters a space of pure expression.
- Duality of the soul: its capacity for deep pleasure often exists alongside the sorrow that comes from the awareness of mortality and impermanence.
The use of abstracted voice:
- The multiplicity of voice cause the utterances to be short and spontaneous.
- Transcendent due to the lack of detail.
Silence creates a space for contemplation and reflection.
- The tension between silence and expression reflects the unresolvable nature of the soul's longing and searching for meaning.
Goals of lyric poetry:
- Embodying soul through form.
- Personal mirror to our emotions.
- Through form, it extends past the here and now.
- Its significance relies on its ability to mirror emotions.
Points of connection:
- Adorno: Both authors are very concerned about the goal and characteristics of lyric poetry. They both think that lyric poetry is highly emotional and conveys the emotions of the poet. They also both view lyric poetry as transcendent as it mirrors individuals emotions.
- Jakobson: Both thinkers are focused on the idea of voice and its function in poetry. Vendler is concerned with the types of utterances that make up abstracted voice while Jakobson is focused on the qualities of utterances that fit into the "six functions of speech".
Date: 1960
Key Concepts
Points of connection:
- Vendler: Both thinkers are focused on the idea of voice and its function in poetry. Vendler is concerned with the types of utterances that make up abstracted voice while Jakobson is focused on the qualities of utterances that fit into the "six functions of speech".
- de Man: Jakobson's idea that language exists in time reflects de Man's notion that the language is a human creation thus it does not precede humans. Thus, Jakobson's relationship between time and language is reflected in de Man's attempt to originate language like a flower.
- Genette: Both are concerned with structure and "function". Jakobson is focused on the function of speech and Genette is focused on the function of "the gap".
- Stein: Jakobson thinks language is constantly changing with time and needs to be refreshed which Stein agrees with as they think naming something means "it is done".
Jakobson wants to bridge the gap between the literary and the linguistic.Thinks of language as an object and exists in time - "virtual object" (conceptual)
- unfolds over time.
- the interplay between language and time (diachronic) forms the poetic function
Six functions of speech: Addresser, Addressee, Context, Message, Contact & Code
The different functions include:
- The Referential Function = context: descriptive statements that inform about the world around us.
i.e. “The autumn leaves have all fallen now.”
- The Emotive Function = Addresser: expressing something set to yourself.
- The Conative Function = Addresse: elicits an action from someone else.
i.e. “Tom! Come inside and eat!”
- The Poetic Function = Message: focuses on sound and creates parallels ("figurative language").
“i.e. I like Ike”. Debbie Downer.
- The Phatic Function = Contact: not saying anything but verifies the communication channel.
“Hello?”, “Ok?”, “Bye”.
- The Metalingual Function = Code: What do you mean by [BLANK]?
If poetic function is dominant in a set of utterances, it is ART.
Date: 1970
Key Concepts
Interested in Origins
- Only understood by what it isn't
- Literature points to something it cannot get to = originates from failure.
- The origin of language: it is a human creation, thus it cannot point at anything outside of itself.
- Language is not supposed to originate anew and its recognition excludes pure origination. Therefore, the relationship between words & things is not based on any natural connection between language & objects.
Image: fundamentally contradictive
- things can mean anything as it produce different images for each person.
The fundamental intent of the poetic Language: "Word originates like the flower" (415) - not possible as flowers are not concepts and exist outside of human creation.
- Poetic language seems to originate in the desire to draw closer and close the gap between the object and the language (not possible).
- There can be flowers that “are” and poetic words that “originate,” but no poetic words that “originate” as if they “were.”
Language = fundamentally descriptive
- reactive
- "freedom", "joy" - conceptual (not tied to an object or a thing)
- romanticist: want to go back in time to get back to "nature"
- wanted everyone to think the same thing (see the same image) when a certain word is uttered.
- Adorno: Both thinkers refer to the dialectic concept of knowing what a word means by knowing "what it isn't". Adorno refers to it as an "antithesis" and presents it as one of the qualities of lyric poetry wheras de Man uses it to define the origin of language
- Stein: They are also concerned in "the gap". Stein disagrees with de Man as Stein thinks closing the gap is harmful to language whereas de Man thinks that the attempt to close the gap is what creates poetic language.
- Jakobson: Jakobson's idea that language exists in time reflects de Man's notion that the language is a human creation thus it does not precede humans. Thus, Jakobson's relationship between time and language is reflected in de Man's attempt to originate language like a flower.
- Derrida: These thinkers are connected through their reference to physical object to represent the concept of language and poetry. Derrida refers to the image of the rolled up hedgehog on the highway to represent his point about translation and language; while de Man hyperfocuses on the image of a flower to understand the purpose of language.
Date: 1988
Key Concepts
- A text about translation: about the necessity & impossibility of translation.
- A hedgehog on a European highway: it would like to be picked up despite its quills and moved out of harms way to be given a chance to survive.
- The headhog: the true meaning of the poem/the heart.
- The quills: protection - poetic language and poetry
- The road: possibility for communication to fail and not be properly understood - translation.
- Poetic language must erase the knowledge that "going back to nature" is not possible.
- you interpret the poem for yourself but it still exists otherwise (exists two places at once but are unrelated)
- The reader relates to the language but not the poet.
Points of connection:
- de Man: These thinkers are connected through their reference to physical object to represent the concept of language and poetry. Derrida refers to the image of the rolled up hedgehog on the highway to represent his point about translation and language; while de Man hyperfocuses on the image of a flower to understand the purpose of language.
- Genette: Genettes belief that metaphors are created by "bending the meaning" is directly reflected in Derrida as he bends the meanings/adds meaning to the object of the hedgehog, the quills and the road in order to present the importance of poetic language.
- Olson: Both works refer to the idea of the heart. Derrida focuses on the heart of the poem as being the emotions and the true intention, whereas Olson refers to the idea of the heart and breathing into the poem and how it affects the way we read poetry.
Date: 1969
Key Concepts
Poetic language draws attention to its form, structure, and sound.
- Key characteristics of poetic language: deviation from the norms of everyday speech and writing.
- "The Gap" = shortcomings between trying to bring the signifier and signified together - Creates Poetry.
Sonic Functions - Morphological phenomena
- how a word turns into another words.
These deviations serve several functions:
- They encourage readers to focus on the language being used.
- They allow words to have deeper meaning and more possible significance.
- They give poems rhythm, sound, and texture.
- Deviations may be unusual word order or metaphors, or the use of archaic or rare words.
The role of metaphor in poetic language.
- Metaphors are fundamental to the way poetry generates meaning.
- Metaphors are created by "bending the meaning".
- Poetic metaphors often lead to multiple interpretations.
Motivation of poets: creating a sensory experience that can evoke emotions and sensations.
- Through its deviations, poetry asks readers to engage more deeply with the text and the world.
- Making figurative language.
- To bring the signifier closer to the signified: (1) morphology (create new words) and (2) create new concepts (figurative language) by adding meaning to things = new signified.
Points of connection:
- Richards: The importance of meaning. Richards speaks of figurative languages ability to generate new meanings. Genette offers the choice of bending meanings in order to close the gap between signified and signifier.
- Stein: Both thinkers are concerned with the notion of "the gap" in language. Stein wants to get away from closing the gap as they think it will make language stale whereas Genette does not believe in closing the gap as it is where poetry is created.
- Jakobson: Both are concerned with structure and "function". Jakobson is focused on the function of speech and Genette is focused on the function of "the gap".
- Derrida: Genettes belief that metaphors are created by "bending the meaning" is directly reflected in Derrida as he bends the meanings/adds meaning to the object of the hedgehog, the quills and the road in order to present the importance of poetic language.
Date: 1917
Key Concepts
- The sound and rhythm created by the voice of the poet causes an emotional and physical impact that cannot be fully appreciated through silent reading alone.
Rhythm is a central component of poetry as it connects the poem to the emotions of the audience by creating an art form that is alive and transformative.
- Meter, stress, and pause contribute to the power of poetry when spoken.
- The rhythm creates flow and movement.
- The spoken voice of the poet shapes the listener’s experience of the work as it conveys meanings and emotions that cannot be achieved through silent reading.
- Modern poets should return to the roots of poetry as a spoken art, and not just focus on the written word as it would help them communicate more effectively.
- The act of speaking a poem creates sensory connection: involves auditory and physical elements (breaths and gestures).
- Poetry as a performance art and cannot be fully appreciated if it is removed from the spoken or performed context.
Spoken poetry thus has the potential to unite communities as it links the poet and the audience through a shared experience.
Points of connection:
- Shelley: Both refer to the idea of sound and how it plays a role in poetry and language. Shelley focuses on how the renovation of language through poetry forces us to pay attention to sound, whereas Lowell focuses on how the spoken poetry (the sound of it) is what creates deeper connection and emotion.
- Richards: Sound is crucial to the reading and understanding of poetry. Lowell goes deeper and breaks down the qualities of sound and how it adds more meaning.
Date: 1941/1945
Key Concepts
Art being viewed as an object that can be bought and sold strips poetry and makes art and science less differentiable.
- Art: "Where science falls silent".
- Science is detrimental: it summarizes the world (calsifies, kills, measures, etc.), depersonalizes and maintains racism.
Need poetry to reconstitute the human:
- relies on refreshing language with an inherent equality.
Trees = poets (embraces all life as equal).
- The ultimate spiritual groundess and expansion (the roots and branches).
- The willingness to accept that everything is equal.
- If power is understood as playing a disciplinary function in society, art can therefore become a tool to govern society – the opposite of ‘human flowering’.
Points of connection:
- Shelley: The tree and its all encompassing nature reflects Shelley's idea that poets have the capacity to unite.
- Frye: Both agree that art and science are opposites in their purpose and goals.
- Baraka: Césaire and Baraka are both concerned with language and art's ability to shape society. Césaire seems to be more hopeful in believing that art can change they way society is being shaped whereas Baraka is critiquing the way politics manipulates language.
Date: 1964
Key Concepts
- Critiques the symbolic use of violence in colonialism and imperialism.
- The "heads on the wall" symbolize the mutilation of culture and the "prize" won by the oppressors
- Suggest that resistance to oppression requires the facing of truth and reality.
- Resists the idea that Black bodies are simply there to be hunted, collected, or exploited.
- Critiques that colonization still affects modern society as the violence inflicted upon Black people is commonly being dismissed and/or romanticized.
- Critiques the way Black experience has been written in history and how their narratives have been distorted by colonization.
- Baraka demands that victims of oppression should be kept as more than just symbols for those in power.
Hunting = process (poetry is process)
- Process vs. Objectification/dehumanization
- Process of “Be-ing” (existence is doing)
- Poetry is not “-ing” – it is a completed thing
Points of connection:
- Olson: Both works include symbols of human anatomy to better present their arguments. Olson refers to the heart and ear to represent what happens in the body when we read poetry. Baraka refers to the head to represent the mutilation and violence inflicted upon Black people and how this oppression has been written.
- Walcott: Both authors demand for a voice to be given to the victims of oppression. Baraka focuses on the distortion of the Black experience through literature. Walcott chooses instead to focus more on the silencing of oppressed voices while still providing a sense of hope.
Date: 1965
Key Concepts
- Highlights the state's role in maintaining oppressive structures through violence, surveillance, and control.
- Meaning of the title: State dictates (through language) what is qualified as identity, culture, and existence by determining what is acceptable and what is not.
- Critiques how political discourse often manipulates meaning of therms such as "freedom," "justice," and "equality" to fit within the status quo which adds to the physical and psychological violence experienced by Black people.
- Baraka calls for a rejection of the imposed narratives placed upon Black identity and experience by the state.
Imitation = bad (break from the past creates the present)
- Wants new forms to escape from the calcification of language through racism.
Art can be separated from the artist.
- Worship of the verb (act of doing): it is the space between the art and the artist.
Black art is a way of reclaiming humanity by reclaiming language (was initially used against them).
Points of connection:
- PLATO: Baraka refers to PLATO's idea of poetry being three times removed from "the truth" as it is an imitation. They both view this imitation as being bad.
- Césaire: Césaire and Baraka are both concerned with language and art's ability to shape society. Césaire seems to be more hopeful in believing that art can change they way society is being shaped whereas Baraka is critiquing the way politics manipulates language.
- Rich: Both are heavily concerned with the role of language and how it is used to fuel oppression. Baraka acknowledges how language is manipulated to conform to the political narratives whereas Rich thinks that language in poetry has the ability to challenge the status quo. Both demand for change in poetry as it has the possibility to bring change and reclamation of identity.
Date: 1974
Key Concepts
History is seperate from time.
- History is a heavy, almost oppressive presence that shapes the artist's work (wanders through the past). Colonized people carry a history of oppression, exploitation, and violence.
- For Caribbean artists they are caught between the desire to create something new and the haunting influence of the past.
- The legacy of colonialism as an inescapable influence as it shaped Caribbean landscapes and cultures.
- Colonization affects the physical and psychological as it causes inherited senses of displacement and alienation, and a struggle identity as they attempt to navigate the imposed culture and their indigenous heritage.
- The poet must learn to engage with history from a distance in order to give it a new meaning and not fall victim to it once again.
- Postcolonial societies must work to reclaim their identities through the acknowledgment of how history has shaped their current identities.
The Poet's Task: Transforming History
- The poet's task is to transform history by providing a voice to those who have been silenced.
- Thus, the poet must express pain and trauma while also balancing a vision of hope and reconstruction by creating new meanings.
- The poet must not get swallowed by the notion of revenge.
The muse of history is a double-edged sword that seeks balance: Caribbean artists must grapple with the influence of their historical context, while trying to move beyond the repetition of historical narratives.
- The muse is an active force that requires the artist to confront history while liberating them from the past.
Points of connection:
- Baraka: Both authors demand for a voice to be given to the victims of oppression. Baraka focuses on the distortion of the Black experience through literature. Walcott chooses instead to focus more on the silencing of oppressed voices while still providing a sense of hope.
- Perloff: Both are concerned with the engagement and the transforming quality of history and the limitations it creates. Walcott argues that Caribbean poets must reclaim their identities by acknowledging the impact that history has had on their identity. On the other hand, Perloff questions the importance of avant-garde and how they remain valuable as historical concept.
Date: 1983
Key Concepts
- In modern capitalism, poetry tends to be dismissed as unprofitable as it does not contribute directly to economic growth.
- Poetry has a cultural value that transcends monetary value as it challenges culture norms by providing a space for self-expression.
- Poetry provides a space to foster reflection, resistance, and innovation.
- Critiques the culture industry (Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer) and suggests that poetry has been excluded from mass production and commercialization.
- Poetry becomes a "niche" art form as it is less marketable which makes it hard for poets to earn a living.
- Paradox of poetry: poetry has social and cultural value but its economic value is very low.
- Despite its low monetary value, poetry's value is outside this economic framework.
- Poetry defies and resists commercialization and commodification as it is reliant on personal engagement, emotion, and individual meaning.
- Poetry’s function in society: it is a disruptive force that engages with language, thought, and experience in a way that challenges dominant ideologies and has the potential to shape the imagination by offering alternative ways of thinking.
- Marginalization = freedom for poetry as it is not tied to expectations and is free to explore forms, ideas, and expressions.
- The idea of poetry’s "economic future" is about ensuring that poetry’s cultural significance is continuously recognized and valued.
Problem: language can become commodified and used politically: what happens to the "I" AND "You"?
- Thus, poetry’s worth lies in its ability to engage, disrupt, and transform the ways we think and feel about the world by offering a kind of resistance to the commodification of culture through the ability to express and explore their deepest thoughts, feelings, and experiences.
Points of connection:
- Adorno: Bernstein refers to "culture industry" which is a coined by Theodor Adorno. It refers to the production and the economic value of artistic forms such as music, painting and films.
- Nealon: Both are heavily concerned with the commodification of poetry. Bernstein thinks that poetry is excluded from having any economic value whereas Nealon acknowledges the ecominic value that poetry has developed in the present. Both are also arguing peotry's capacity to resist commodification.
Date: 1984
Key Concepts
- Poetry is a form of personal expression while the poets have the responsibility to reflect the struggles on the oppressed in the real world, such as: gender, race, class, and power.
- Poetry can be a tool for resistance challenging the status quo.
- Argues women’s voices have been marginalized in poetry and society and critiques the patriarchal systems that shape the arts.
- She calls for a feminist poetry that opens space for women’s voices, experiences, and struggles as they have often been silenced.
- Critiques how language has been used to oppress women.
- Poetry is an outlet where individuals can engage in a process of self-discovery and empowerment while also connecting people to bigger social movements through the project of social justice.
Symbolism in the title:
- Blood symbolizes how poetry is grounded in the realites by providing a voice for those who suffer and struggle.
- Bread symbolizes how poetry must also nourish the soul and the mind.
- Poetry symbolizes the nourishment needed to sustain us through difficult times while also connecting us to the urgency of social change.
- Critiques how language is political as it is often a tool of oppression, used to control and silence marginalized voices.
- Poetry is connected to the body as it an embodied knowledge that stems from lived experiences and is grounded in the real world.
- The act of creating poetry (form, language, and content) is political because it challenges the norms of society and is as a catalyst for change.
- Poetry has the ability to reflect and shape history by engaging with social struggles and offering insights into social change by creating resistance and hope against oppression.
- The poet is an observer of the world while also being an activist by participating in shaping it through language.
- Poetry is alive and inclusive as it speaks for the oppressed and marginalized by bringing attention to the interconnectedness of personal and collective liberation.
Points of connection:
- Schiller: Both authors express the need for new poetry that reflects the real struggles in the world while still remains pure in emotion.
- Frye: for its focus on the emotional and moral engagement of poetry.
- Césaire: in their shared understanding of poetry’s role in resisting oppression.
- Baraka: Both are heavily concerned with the role of language and how it is used to fuel oppression. Baraka acknowledges how language is manipulated to conform to the political narratives whereas Rich thinks that language in poetry has the ability to challenge the status quo. Both demand for change in poetry as it has the possibility to bring change and reclamation of identity.
- Milosz: Both refer to poetry's ability to instill hope agaisnt oppression. Rich refers to Milosz concept of "active hope"
as his hope requires the act of resistance through social change.
Date: 2011
Key Concepts
- Capitalism operates in a way that commodifies culture, turning everything (including language and art) into a marketable product.
- Poems and other literary works are aesthetic and economic objects.
- The catastrophe is a perpetual crisis that capitalism creates by forcing individuals into a cycle of consumption, production, and alienation.
- Poetry is often commodified, packaged, and sold, even as it attempts to resist these forces through its language and form.
- Poetry is contradictory in this system: it resists the logic of capitalism even as it participates in it.
- The process of textual production (writing a poem) and textual consumption (reading it) are a part of an economic system, where literature is marketed as part of the cultural industry.
- Argues that literary works (such as poetry) are shaped by economic values: from the materials (paper and ink) to the economic status of the writer to the social environment in which they live.
- In a neoliberal society, artistic production is more concerned with marketability than with critique or social engagement by creating easily consumable art rather than works that challenge the status quo.
- For poetry to be meaningful, it must confront the systemic inequalities that shape people’s lives.
- Poetry can serve as both a response to the catastrophic effects of capitalism and a form of resistance to those effects.
- Poetic form can be a form of critique: its material (structure, language and relation to reality) make it that the act of writing qualifies as a way to resist dominant capitalist ideology.
- The relationship between capitalism and textuality will continue to evolve, and poets and writers must accept the role of embracing or resisting the influences of this system.
- Thus, the use of structure and language in poetry can serve as a resistance to the forces of commodification, even as it remains part of the very system it critiques.
Points of connection:
- Bernstein: Both are heavily concerned with the commodification of poetry. Bernstein thinks that poetry is excluded from having any economic value whereas Nealon acknowledges the ecominic value that poetry has developed in the present. Both are also arguing peotry's capacity to resist commodification.
Date: 1983
Key Concepts
- Hope is a paradoxical phenomenon that exists alongside despair: For Miłosz, hope in response to the difficult and often painful conditions of human existence.
- The history of the 20th century is marked by the rise of totalitarian regimes, war, and genocide.
- Passive hope: waiting for something to change in the promise of a perfect future ("utopian" hope).
- Active hope: enacting personal effort and acts of resistance. Hope must be constantly cultivated and fought for against the set backs and despair.
- The poet's role is to give a voice to human suffering while preserving a sense of hope. Poets are thus tasked with offering a form of resistance against the forces of silence and indifference.
- Hope can also be a search for transcendence, for a deeper meaning. Thus, faith and hope are interconnected.
- "Eternal hope" is flawed as it disregards the suffering and injustice that characterize human life and claims to offer perfect solutions. Thus, hope must be grounded in the everyday struggles of human life.
Tension between individual hope and collective hope.
- Individual hope is tested by personal loss, aging, and the passage of time.
- Collective hope is tied to the survival and dignity of humanity.
- Thus, personal hope can transcend individual suffering by connecting to collective human concerns, even if the collective future remains uncertain.
Points of connection:
- Rich: Both refer to poetry's ability to instill hope agaisnt oppression. Rich refers to Milosz concept of "active hope" as his hope requires the act of resistance through social change.
- Adorno: Both pieces question the differences between individual and collective. Adorno reflects on subject vs. objects when thinking of the "I" and "you" whereas Milosz contemplates the tension between individual hope and collective hope.
Date: 1956
Key Concepts
- The line of poetry should be determined by the poet's breath, making the poem more organic and direct. This would allow for a more authentic expression of emotion and experience.
Imposed verse: based on meter and rhyme, and is seen as restrictive by forcing the poet into rigid forms. Projective verse: allows the poet to freely express their experience in a direct, spontaneous way, guided by emotions and energy. The poet is able to project their energy into he poem to create an expressive and personal piece.
- Projects poets into the "open field" composition (how you get emotion out of yourself).
- Energy: a poem is a dynamic process where the energy of the poet’s breath and experience is projected into the poem and communicated to the reader.
Relation between composition and body (ear and heart).
- Syllable: ear (produces sound through vowels).
- Line: breathing.
- Both cannot be detached.
The pace is dictated by the body when it breaks from form.
- Syllable - Intellect (processing): when you hear, your brain processes what is happening.
- Line - Heart (spiritual force): no thought involved to breathe.
Syllables, lines, images, sound and sense = moving parts that are put into tension to build up potential energy that projects the poem forward.
Points of connection:
- Schiller: Both discuss the element of spontenaiety in expression. Schiller reflects to the naive poets spontaneity through its relationship with nature and Olson reflects to projective verses spontaneous expression of experience.
- Moore: Both thinkers are focused on the the "potential energy" found in language in poetry which allows the poets to express their emotions efficiently and accurately.
- Derrida: Both works refer to the idea of the heart. Derrida focuses on the heart of the poem as being the emotions and the true intention, whereas Olson refers to the idea of the heart and
- Baraka ("Hunting Is Not..."): Both works include symbols of human anatomy to better present their arguments. Olson refers to the heart and ear to represent what happens in the body when we read poetry. Baraka refers to the head to represent the mutilation and violence inflicted upon Black people and how this oppression has been written.
Date: 1991
Key Concepts
- The avant-garde was associated with radical innovation and aiming to transform society.
- The avant-garde was driven by the belief that art could enact social and political change.
- Shift in the second half of the 20th century: the avant-garde gave way to a sense of closure, exhaustion, or “endgame” which is evident in postmodern art.
- Postmodernism is about recycling or reinterpreting older forms.
- Role of language: writers and artists who engage with avant-garde techniques in a postmodern era are often self-reflexive, aware of their historical positioning, and less inclined to think that art can still radically alter society.
- The "endgame" arises from the belief that everything has already been done.
- Postmodern art and literature tends to be fragmented, open-ended.
- Mid-20th century, avant-garde movements had become institutionalized which meant that the revolutionary potential had been absorbed into the mainstream.
- Suggests that avant-garde practices still have value as long as they are understood as part of a historical tradition.
Points of connection:
- Schiller: Both discuss the importance of learning (Schiller speaks in order to not be as specialized and Perloff discusses learning from avant-garde forms) in order to become more fragmented.
- Derrida: in terms of poetry’s self-awareness and engagement with the limits of language.
- Adorno: Both thinkers engage with the importance of language and the ways it can reflect reality and both think that art is not revolutionary but instead offers chances to challenge societal norms.
- Stein: Both are very concerned with the concept of "calcification" and "closure". Perloff applies Stein's argument of the calcification of language and applies it the idea of "endgame". Perloff's "endgame" refers to closure and the end of evolution of poetry which goes against Stein's fear of the ending of the meaning of words through "calcification".
- Walcott: Both are concerned with the engagement and the transforming quality of history and the limitations it creates. Walcott argues that Caribbean poets must reclaim their identities by acknowledging the impact that history has had on their identity. On the other hand, Perloff questions the importance of avant-garde and how they remain valuable as historical concept.
Colour code meanings:
- RED: Categories of topic aborded in the works.
- GREEN: Aesthetic Theory and Judgement.
- PURPLE: The Poetic Experience.
- ORANGE: Language and Poetics.
- TEAL: Politically and/or Historically Engaged.
- PINK: Key Concepts of each piece.
- BLUE: Points of connections between the works mentionned.