Culler -- Chapter 5 Rhetoric, Poetics, and Poetry

Rhetoric/Poetics n The definitions have shifted about through time, right, but basically, n Rhetoric is the art of persuasion, the language and thought that is used to construct discourse. n Poetics the attempt to account for literary effects by looking at writing and reading conventions.

Rhetoric/Poetics n Poetry is, of course, rhetorical language in that it works to persuade. n Plato thought poetry was frivolous and distracting and banned it from his republic. It persuaded people to slack off. n Aristotle found it useful because it allowed people to release their pent up emotions. It persuaded people to live vicariously, instead of looking for trouble.

Rhetorical Figures: They’re what make something literary n All language, really, is figurative. We’ve just forgotten what the original substitutions were. “Grasping” a “hard problem.” n Metaphor -- treats something as something else. Links by similarity. n Metonymy -- moves from one thing to another. Links by contiguity. n Synecdoche -- substitutes part for whole. n Irony -- juxtaposes appearance and reality.

Genres who speaks? n Poetic or Lyric = narrator speaks in 1st person n Epic or Narrative = narrator speaks in his own voice, but allows characters to speak in theirs. n Drama = characters do all the talking

Or, Genres Relation of speaker to audience n Drama = author concealed from audience n Lyric = poet turns back on listeners, and pretends to talk to himself or to someone else. n Prose = author addresses audience throughout.

Poetry as word and act n Poem as structure made up of words –How does sound produce sense? n Poem as event (an act of the poet, an experience of the reader) –relation between poet and narrator –how do we determine this? –why is this discussion of “voice” important?

Poetry as utterance overheard n When we read poetry or hear it read, we imagine or reconstruct a speaker and a context –identify a tone –infer a posture –infer a situation –infer concerns and attitudes of speaker –We ask, what might lead someone to speak this way?

The extravagance of lyric n What about poems that address the wind or a tiger or some other usually not addressed object? –O wild west wind... –Tiger, tiger burning bright... n Aspiration to the sublime -- something beyond the human. It invokes prophetic, inspirational, mystical power of word spinner, the mystical, the magical

Poems doodle and riddle us. n And it’s this playing with us, by us, that is important in reading poetry. n Don’t treat a poem like you would a conversation -- assume it has a structure of its own. n Read it as if it were an aesthetic whole n All parts should fit together harmoniously.

So, let’s practice. n P My Last Duchess n Dramatic situation. Who is speaking? What’s going on? What’s he saying? Do trust him? Like him? What’s his problem with his last Duchess? n How does the structure add to sense? n Which words do you notice? How do they affect the sense you make? n Any figurative language? How does it work? n What’s the theme, do you think?

Wild Nights--Wild Nights n P. 708 n Who’s the speaker? What’s the situation? What’s the tone? Where do you imagine her to be? Where is her lover? n Language: Rhythm? Diction? Figurative language? n Theme?

Leda and the Swan n P. 718 n What’s the situation? Who is speaking? To whom? Why? n Form and structure? n Language? n Theme?