Formative Elements in the Japanese Poetic Tradition

1957 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 503-527 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert H. Brower ◽  
Earl Roy Miner
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Direct Analysis ◽  
Vantage Point ◽  
Successive Generation ◽  
Poetic Tradition ◽  
Japanese Poetry ◽  
Poetic Expression ◽  
Complex Expression

The poetry of every nation and age is a complex expression of the history, spirit, and individual genius of a people; and, as each successive generation evaluates a native or an alien poetic tradition from its own historical and cultural vantage-point, it discovers meanings and values as well as limitations and weaknesses in the poetry it reads. Each generation must reassess for itself the glory that was Greece or the grandeur of Japan—so that the attempt to describe the formative elements which underlie Japanese poetic expression is more than a single essay, individual, or generation can accomplish. But the undertaking nevertheless seems necessary today, when we can no longer be satisfied with the older extremes of Victorian condescension towards “Japanese epigrams”; the exclusively historical or biographical treatment which evades direct analysis of the poetry; or that simple-minded exoticism which prefers ignorant rapture to the disciplined effort of literary criticism. For the Westerner as well as for the Japanese, poetry lives only as it is understood and felt, and our experience of Japanese poetry today must reflect contemporary critical standards and techniques of analysis—the means of understanding given us by our own age and culture.

scholarly journals Euphuism in Robert Southwell’s Religious Poetry (on the basis of “St Peter’s Complaynte”)

2021 ◽  
pp. 82-90
Author(s):  
А. Н. Чекова
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Focus Of Attention ◽  
Religious Conflict ◽  
Writing Style ◽  
Religious Poetry ◽  
Systematic Analysis ◽  
Poetic Expression ◽  
Poetic Texts ◽  
Stylistic Unity

В статье рассматривается духовная лирика поэта-проповедника Р. Саутвелла (1561–1595) как представителя Елизаветинской эпохи. Основное внимание уделяется влиянию на творчество автора такого литературного направления, как эвфуизм. Чтобы продемонстрировать, насколько активно и целенаправленно поэт прибегает к эвфуистическим приемам, и достичь понимания того, с какой целью он это делает, кратко рассматривается биография Р. Саутвелла в рамках религиозного конфликта между католиками и протестантами, являющегося историко-культурным контекстом, в который вписано творчество поэта. Проводится подробный лингвостилистический анализ 26 лирических текстов из стихотворного цикла «Сетование святого Петра» с элементами лингвопоэтического анализа. Новизна данного исследования состоит в том, что впервые систематический анализ лирики Р. Саутвелла проводится с позиций лингвистики, а не литературоведения или религии. По результатам анализа автор делает вывод, что эвфуистические приемы позволили Р. Саутвеллу не только ярко и наглядно отразить в своих текстах остроту религиозного конфликта, в эпицентре и под непосредственным влиянием которого, а также сопутствовавших этому конфликту противоречий обеспечили сохранение стилистического единства во всех текстах рассматриваемого цикла. The article concentrates on the religious poetry of Robert Southwell (1561–1595) as a representative of the Elizabethan era; the focus of attention is the influence of euphuism on the poet’s writing style. Southwell actively and purposefully employs euphuistic means of expression, such as parallelism and especially alliteration, in his works; in order to achieve a better understanding of the reasoning behind this stylistic choice, Southwell’s biography is briefly examined within the framework of the religious conflict between Catholics and Protestants, which provides the historical and cultural context for Southwell’s texts. A detailed linguostylistic and linguopoetic analysis of 26 excerpts from his didactic religious poem “St Peter’s Complaynte” is then carried out. The novelty of the research lies in the fact that this article, unlike most previous works focused on Robert Southwell’s poetry, carries out a systematic analysis of Southwell's poems from a linguistic standpoint, as opposed to that of literary criticism or religion. Based on the results of the analysis, the author of the article concludes that employing euphuistic means of poetic expression as actively as Southwell does allows the poet to achieve a more vivid depiction of the religious conflict in the eye and under the influence of which his poetic texts were born; moreover, euphuism serves to create a stylistic unity between all the poetic texts that comprise “St Peter’s Complaynte”.

A Critical-interpretive Approach to the Ottoman Turkish Ġazel

1973 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-110
Author(s):  
Walter G. Andrews
Keyword(s):  
The Moon ◽  
Poetic Tradition ◽  
Conscious Effort ◽  
Interpretive Approach ◽  
Basic Theme ◽  
The Face ◽  
Poetic Expression ◽  
Apparent Similarity ◽  
Or Organization

The Islamic poetic tradition as it came to the Turks through Persian is characterized by a rather limited catalog of basic themes expressed by an equally limited number of standard tropes. The basic themes are usually quite easily recognizable (e.g. the sâkî theme, the bahâr theme, etc.), even though more than one basic theme may be included in a single poem. The standard tropes — for example, the moon for the face of the beloved, rubies for wine, drunkenness for mystical love — are also used over and over again without any serious attempt to freshen poetic expression by discarding them for new metaphores. Nevertheless, within this atmosphere of apparent similarity, contemporary critics placed high value on creativity, uniqueness, and the invention of ‘new’ fancies. Modern scholarship has, in most cases, attempted to resolve this paradox by stating that ‘creativity’ for the Ottoman poet consisted of rearranging and recombining traditional themes and tropes to create new patterns and, thereby, a subtle and precious uniqueness. Moreover, any internal cohesion or organization other than that provided by rhyme and meter is generally seen as fortuitous and unrelated to any conscious effort to present a unified poetic message. The result of this view is the rather pervasive conclusion that the Ottoman poet is no more creative than the child is ‘creative’ who operates a kaleidoscope which produces infinitely varied patterns, even though the mirrors (themes?) and colored bits of glass (tropes?) remain ever the same.

The Metapolitics of Allegory

2020 ◽  
pp. 107-120
Author(s):  
Erin Graff Zivin
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Third World ◽  
Vantage Point ◽  
Literary Studies ◽  
Political Thinking ◽  
Art Activism ◽  
Fourth Part ◽  
Latin Americanism

The fourth part of this book, “Political Thinking after Literature,” places violent ethics “against” politics by revisiting classical political concepts such as sovereignty and decision from the vantage point of literature, literary criticism, and art-activism. The first section, “The Metapolitics of Allegory,” claims that Latin American literary studies has been haunted by Fredric Jameson’s (in)famous claim that “all third world texts are […] national allegories,” accompanied, more recently, by a critical countertradition in Latin Americanism that rejected Jameson’s argument without pursuing alternative readings of allegory. The author traces a link between allegory and intention, or will, in the “masters” of Latin American literary criticism. The section concludes with an allegorical reading of César Aira’s 1997 novella, El congreso de literatura, in which what is allegorized is the impossibility of politics understood as entailing sovereign decisionism or the intentional fidelity to an event.

The tragedian as critic: Euripides and early Greek poetics

2010 ◽  
Vol 130 ◽  
pp. 165-184 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Wright
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Social Function ◽  
Early History ◽  
The Other ◽  
Poetic Tradition ◽  
The Social ◽  
Looking Back ◽  
Critical Reflections

AbstractThis article examines the place of tragic poetry within the early history and development of ancient literary criticism. It concentrates on Euripides, both because his works contain many more literary-critical reflections than those of the other tragedians and because he has been thought to possess an unusually ‘critical’ outlook. Euripidean characters and choruses talk about such matters as poetic skill and inspiration, the social function of poetry, contexts for performance, literary and rhetorical culture, and novelty as an implied criterion for judging literary excellence. It is argued that the implied view of literature which emerges from Euripidean tragedy is both coherent and conventional. As a critic, Euripides, far from being a radical or aggressively modern figure (as he is often portrayed), is in fact distinctly conservative, looking back in every respect to the earlier Greek poetic tradition.

scholarly journals Tendenser i nutidig fransk poesi - Litteralisme og litterær dj’ing som postpoetiske strategier

2012 ◽  
Vol 27 (67) ◽  
Author(s):  
Louise Højgaard Marcussen
Keyword(s):  
French Literature ◽  
Vantage Point ◽  
The Other ◽  
Poetic Tradition ◽  
Contemporary French Literature ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
French Poetry ◽  
The One ◽  
Critical Resistance

Louise Højgaard Marcussen: “Trends in Contemporary French Poetry. Literalism and Literary DJ’ing as Post-poetic Strategies”The article describes the post-poetic impulse in contemporary French literature. Taking the essay Sorties by Jean-Marie Gleize as vantage point, Marcussen investigates two different ways of breaking off from the essentialist poetic tradition: on the one hand a strand of poetry aiming at critical resistance towards the tradition, exemplified by a reading of Christophe Tarkos’ “Le Bol”; and on the other hand writers trying to activate tradition in new forms, exemplified through a reading of Franck Leibovici’s portraits chinois.

Arabic Literary Theory

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lara Harb
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Literary Theory ◽  
Aesthetic Experience ◽  
Arabic Language ◽  
Aesthetic Judgment ◽  
13Th Century ◽  
Poetic Tradition ◽  
Rhetorical Figures ◽  
Essential Components ◽  
The Aesthetic

The Arabic language has a rich history of literary criticism and theory, starting from the 8th century ce up to the 21st century. This literary criticism and theory engages with a poetic tradition that dates back to pre-Islamic times. The inquiry into literary quality was motivated by an interest in evaluating poetry, a general concern with eloquent speech, whether in verse or prose, and by the desire to articulate the beauty of the Quran. The transmission of Aristotle’s Poetics into Arabic also spurred interest in the poetic, particularly in Arabic philosophy. The study of eloquence crystallized into a standardized science by the 13th century ce, with branches focusing on (1) the role of syntax in literary beauty (the science of meanings); (2) simile, metaphor, and metonymy (the science of elucidation); and (3) rhetorical figures (the science of rhetorical figures). The aesthetic developed in the early criticism of the 9th and 10th centuries was concerned with articulating the merits of an idealized classical style of pre-Islamic poetry, from which the “modern” poets of the early Abbasid period diverged. This classically oriented aesthetic was dominated by a concern with the truthfulness and naturalness of poetry, typical of the style of the “ancients,” on the one hand, and the limits of unrealistic imagery and affected artificiality, which characterized the more ornate modern Abbasid style, on the other. This binary outlook shifted after the 10th century, however, to an aesthetic of wonder. A theory of aesthetic experience began to develop, therefore, which was based on the ability of poetic language to evoke wonder in the recipient. As a result, wonder-enhancing characteristics such as strangeness, the unexpected, and the rare became essential components of aesthetic judgment. Moreover, the ability of language to make meaning manifest in ways that allow for an experience of discovery and hence wonder, became the foundation of aesthetic inquiry in post-10th century Arabic literary theory.

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