Mysticism In John Wright's Poetry
analytical Essay
772 words
In one sense, this may be taken to testify to the idea that these poets choose the rationale that there are no inborn ideas and that all ideas we have spring, in John Locke’s terms, “ From experience : in that all our knowledge is founded; and from that it ultimately derives itself.” Nevertheless, this may be the case in Gunn’s poetry with its marginal philosophical generalizations. As to the poetry of the rest, the imagination is superior to the intellect yet controlled by it to block any tendency towards sentimentality.(Hassan 190)
This insistence on personal experience brings the whole problem of convention and tradition, and their attitudes to them, into focus. Gunn and the later Enright employ the mythic experience to explore the present. This myth falls short as the myth is awkwardly related to their material.
By contrast Larkin, Amis, Wain and the early Enright observe the earth-bound poet who is really engaged in recreating the familiar. They do not use any mythology, philosophy or references to other poets. Hence their poetry is descriptive. It is rooted in time as it is concerned with everyday life and man’s relation to it. Their achievements as poets are in the depicting things and experiences in exact terms of their existence.
Key Concepts:
The main concepts which deal with the study are as under:
Romanticism:
Romanticism is a sweeping but
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The Concise Oxford Dictionary (1911), after defining a mystic as "one who believes in spiritual apprehension of truths beyond the understanding, “adds, "whence mysticism." Whatever may be the precise force of the remark in brackets, it it is unquestionably true that mysticism is often used in a semi-contemptuous way to denote vaguely any kind of occultism or spiritualism, or any specially curious or fantastic views about God and the universe.
Confessional
In this essay, the author
- Describes romanticism as a sweeping but indispensable modern term applied to the profound shifts in western attitudes to art and human creativity that dominated much of european culture in the first half of the 19th century.
- Explains that mysticism is irresponsibly applied in english that it has become the first duty of those who use it to explain what they mean by it.
- Explains that confessional poetry is an autobiographical mode that reveals the poet's personal problems with unusual frankness.
- Describes romanticism as a sweeping but indispensable modern term applied to the profound shifts in western attitudes to art and human creativity that dominated much of european culture in the first half of the 19th century.
- Explains that mysticism is irresponsibly applied in english that it has become the first duty of those who use it to explain what they mean by it.
- Explains that confessional poetry is an autobiographical mode that reveals the poet's personal problems with unusual frankness.
- Analyzes how gunn and the later enright employ the mythic experience to explore the present. they do not use mythology, philosophy or references to other poets.
- Describes feminist movements and ideologies aimed at defining, establishing and defending equal political, economic, cultural, and social rights for women.
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- Agrees with karsten harries' reflection on what happens when metaphors interact. she believes that poetry forces us to question the claim that metaphor belongs exclusively to the domain of pragmatics.
- Analyzes how davidson's theory goes wrong when it denies that ambiguity exists in language at the literal, dictionary level meaning of words.
- Describes how they yanked the empty bottle from the river's mouth, the hungry thief that filled its stomach with her life, and put an sos message into the mouth. this was the greatest mistake of their life.
- Argues that davidson's theory is too limited because of its absolute dependency upon "present usage" of literal meaning.
- Analyzes how davidson forgot that the meanings of words in natural languages often contain ambiguities at both the literal and metaphorical level.
- Analyzes how a natural language can contain misunderstood suspected innuendoes, injustices and injuries. the surface inhumanity of an artificial language guarantees its truly humanist function.
- Argues that davidson's convictions perversely try to transform, in a certain sense, our natural language into an artificial one devoid of human nature.
- Analyzes how davidson would react to melville's metaphor, assuming that it is inside a novel about anomalous characters and the various levels of unconventional meanings they have created around words and objects in their lives.
- Explains that the candle in the window is grandmother's insecurity. the metaphor needs no paraphrase, for it is a literal statement.
- Argues that davidson's reasoning is wrong and its scope is limited because it fails to discover the layers of meaning in the words of this metaphor.
- Explains that metaphors are two naked bodies tangled together in a bed, under the covers, and secret, hidden meanings exist between them that cannot be seen in their physical features.
- Explains that a metaphor relating to the color pink can be understood at the literal level in hungarian contexts, but they can't be found in american proverbs or dictionaries.
- Analyzes how the simple, uncreative metaphor "he is pink" conjures up ambiguity and contradicts davidson's theory.
- Analyzes how ambiguity in the literal meaning does not end here. pink literally means a host of things they have never been fully aware of.
- Explains that the children looked "in the pink of health" after their holiday.
- Argues that cultural relativism creates further discrepancies and disagreements in the literal meaning of metaphors.
- Illustrates their proposition that two tangled words carrying literal meaning may only carry unusual, metaphorical meaning in another culture.
- Opines that the level of esoteric, special figurative meaning inside this metaphor will ostensibly fluctuate from culture to culture.
- Illustrates how a layer of metaphorical meaning can be entirely dependent upon context if its meaning is to be deciphered.
- Analyzes how pynchon's poem, the crying of lot 49, refers to a special, figurative meaning inside the literary masterpiece that cannot be found in the dictionary.
- Argues that the new figurative meaning of horn has synthesized with all of their other understandings of what it means, surrounded by vapid, superficial, prosaic literal meanings.
- Argues that davidson is wrong when he tries to separate these two domains because it makes language static and hinders words from absorbing new and exciting meanings that the human mind yearns to incorporate.
- Argues that davidson's assertion that words mean nothing beyond the literal meaning is false. intimation is equivalent with special, unordinary meaning that is word-bound.
- Explains that the bowler hat was a motif in sabina's musical composition, which flowed like water through the riverbed like heraclitus' ("you can't step twice into the same river")
- Analyzes how sabina and franz failed to understand the semantic susurrus of the river flowing through them.
- Analyzes how franz felt comfortable when she put on the bowler hat in his presence. it was neither obscene nor sentimental, merely an incomprehensible gesture.
- Explains that while people are relatively young and the composition of their life is still in its opening bars, they can go about writing it together and exchange motifs, but if they meet when they are older, like franz and sabina, their musical compositions are more or less complete.
- Quotes a long passage from this chapter because it illustrates many of their previous arguments.
- Explains that figurative levels of meaning inside words whisper (the semantic susurrus), for they do not exist on the surface. one must create or absorb the meaning from another source before these special meanings begin to dwell inside objects.
6928 wordsRead More - An Analysis of The Intentional Fallacy, by Wimsatt and Beardsleyanalytical essayDuring the time-period when they authored this essay, the commonly held notion amongst people was that “In order to judge the poet’s performance, we must know what he intended.”, and this notion led to what is termed the ‘Intentional fallacy’. However, Wimsatt and Beardsley argue that the intention, i.e., the design or plan in the author’s mind, of the author is neither available nor desirable for judging the success of a work of literary art. It is not available because the author will most certainly not be beside the reader when he/she reads the text, and not desirable because intention as mentioned already is nothing but the author’s attitude towards his work, the way he felt while writing the text and what made him write that particular piece of writing and these factors might distract the reader from deciphering the meaning from the text. This method of reading a text without any biographical or historical background of either the poem or the poet practiced by the New Critics was known as ‘Closed Reading’. This stemmed from their belief in the autonomy of the text.
In this essay, the author
- Analyzes how william k. wimsatt jr. and monroe c. beardsley argue that the 'intention' of is not a necessary factor in the reading of texts.
- Analyzes how wimsatt and beardsley argue that the intention of is neither available nor desirable for judging the success of a work of literary art.
- Explains that wimsatt and beardsley believed in the "organicity" of the text, and that a text can never be revised.
- Analyzes how william k. wimsatt jr. and monroe c. beardsley argue that the 'intention' of is not a necessary factor in the reading of texts.
- Analyzes how wimsatt and beardsley argue that the intention of is neither available nor desirable for judging the success of a work of literary art.
- Explains that wimsatt and beardsley believed in the "organicity" of the text, and that a text can never be revised.
- Argues that if decides to revise the text, his/her intention is not the same as the original intention. this argument strengthens wimsatt and beardsley's point of view that the reader shouldn't let authorial intentions interfere with their reading.
- Analyzes how wimsatt and beardsley assert that the poet's intention is the yardstick of measuring and judging the poem/text. the text is written using language which is a possession of the public.
- Explains that wimsatt and beardsley talk about three different kinds of evidence that can be of help for the reader in the assessment and understanding of a text.
- Analyzes the dangers of the overlapping of external and intermediate kinds of evidence and the difficulties arising due to a preoccupation with either kind.
- Analyzes how wimsatt and beardsley tackle the issue of ‘allusions’ in a poem and how they can sometimes act as hindrance in the process of interpreting the text free of ’s intentions.
- Concludes that wimsatt and beardsley assert that intentional fallacy arises from the misplaced belief that to judge a piece of art one needs to know about the intention of the poet.
- Agrees with wimsatt and beardsley's view that a text can be read without the interference of ial intention or any historical information. however, once the reader has grasped the rudimentary meaning being expressed in the text, he/she should re-read it armed with certain information
- Analyzes how bhattacharya's poem, 'shooting an arrow', is a dedication to freedom and peace.
- Analyzes how the poem's dedication to freedom and peace is relevant in such a scenario.
- Describes pradip acharya's translation of 'shooting an arrow'.
2297 wordsRead More - After Apple Picking, by Robert Frostanalytical essayRestlessness is the main focus of Phillips’ article, it is the title of his article and in his opinion it is the reason why poems exist at all. “Poetry is the results of a generative restlessness of imagination… uncertainties become obsessions to be wrestled with, and with luck, the result is poetry…” (Phillips 132) Phillips, in summary of his article, claims uncertainties in life trouble our minds until the uncertainties become obsessions. We become restless in our quest to understand the uncertainties we face and by writing poems we can organize our thoughts and try to understand the things we do not. Phillips furthers his explains his claim by admitting “ I write poetry for the same reason that I read it, both as a way of being alive and as a way of trying to understand what it means—how it feels—to be alive.” (Phillips 133).
In this essay, the author
- Analyzes carl phillips' and priscilla paton's perspectives on frost' "after apple picking" and notes that neither article was solely about the poem, but both had good observations and comments about it.
- Explains that restlessness is the main focus of phillips' article and in his opinion, it's the reason why poems exist at all.
- Analyzes how phillips concludes his discussion about restlessness by stating that people are curious, and sometimes regret learning what they know.
- Analyzes carl phillips' and priscilla paton's perspectives on frost' "after apple picking" and notes that neither article was solely about the poem, but both had good observations and comments about it.
- Explains that restlessness is the main focus of phillips' article and in his opinion, it's the reason why poems exist at all.
- Analyzes how phillips concludes his discussion about restlessness by stating that people are curious, and sometimes regret learning what they know.
- Analyzes how phillips' discussion about restlessness and ambition ties into his critique of frost's "after apple picking."
- Analyzes how phillips concludes his critique by exploring the meaning behind the woodchuck and the comparison the picker makes between human sleep and animal sleep.
- Agrees with phillips' argument that "after apple picking" is about restlessness and ambition. the apple picker is unsure of what sleep awaits him, which causes him distress.
- Analyzes how frost's style of "after apple picking" is reminiscent of uncertainty and restlessness.
- Concludes that phillips' critique of "after apple picking" was fitting because earlier discussion on ambition and restlessness was applicable to the apple picker's dilemma of not being able to achieve perfection.
- Opines that paton's source is more about frost’s writing style, as he uses metaphors to the point where it becomes hard to discern what frost means in his poems.
- Compares phillips' article with paton's analysis of how frost writes poems. he talks more about the poem, and has a stronger focus on the theme of restlessness.
1051 wordsRead More