Constituent and Pattern in Poetry

Constituent and Pattern in Poetry is a collection of essays on literature and language. It is built on the assumption that works of literature have existence in the real world and that they may be analyzed in a fashion that is not totally subjective. Using models derived from structural linguistics, Archibald A. Hill presents a number of theoretical contributions to the study of poetry, as well as new ways of looking at specific poems. The book as a whole provides an overview of the tools and ideas Hill has developed for analyzing works of literature, and it is the first time the essays have been gathered together in one volume.

The book is divided into three sections: Definition of Literature and Study of Its Patterns, Types of Meaning and Imagery, and Principles for Interpreting Meaning. Each section opens with a theoretical essay, followed by three essays that work analytically with specific poets and poems using the methods defined in the first. In his examination of such poets as Hopkins, Browning, Milton, Blake, Keats, and Dickinson, Hill uses such proposals as the law of least lexical contribution and maximal contextual contribution; the hypothesis that, when possible meanings occur together in a cluster, they support each other; and the idea that it is sometimes possible to recover underlying language sequences from which the author has departed for identifiable reasons. By applying these suppositions to the study of particular poems, Hill shows how the reader may arrive at statements about the relative artistic merit of works of literature.

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Constituent and Pattern in Poetry

Constituent and Pattern in Poetry is a collection of essays on literature and language. It is built on the assumption that works of literature have existence in the real world and that they may be analyzed in a fashion that is not totally subjective. Using models derived from structural linguistics, Archibald A. Hill presents a number of theoretical contributions to the study of poetry, as well as new ways of looking at specific poems. The book as a whole provides an overview of the tools and ideas Hill has developed for analyzing works of literature, and it is the first time the essays have been gathered together in one volume.

The book is divided into three sections: Definition of Literature and Study of Its Patterns, Types of Meaning and Imagery, and Principles for Interpreting Meaning. Each section opens with a theoretical essay, followed by three essays that work analytically with specific poets and poems using the methods defined in the first. In his examination of such poets as Hopkins, Browning, Milton, Blake, Keats, and Dickinson, Hill uses such proposals as the law of least lexical contribution and maximal contextual contribution; the hypothesis that, when possible meanings occur together in a cluster, they support each other; and the idea that it is sometimes possible to recover underlying language sequences from which the author has departed for identifiable reasons. By applying these suppositions to the study of particular poems, Hill shows how the reader may arrive at statements about the relative artistic merit of works of literature.

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Constituent and Pattern in Poetry

Constituent and Pattern in Poetry

by Archibald A. Hill
Constituent and Pattern in Poetry

Constituent and Pattern in Poetry

by Archibald A. Hill

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Overview

Constituent and Pattern in Poetry is a collection of essays on literature and language. It is built on the assumption that works of literature have existence in the real world and that they may be analyzed in a fashion that is not totally subjective. Using models derived from structural linguistics, Archibald A. Hill presents a number of theoretical contributions to the study of poetry, as well as new ways of looking at specific poems. The book as a whole provides an overview of the tools and ideas Hill has developed for analyzing works of literature, and it is the first time the essays have been gathered together in one volume.

The book is divided into three sections: Definition of Literature and Study of Its Patterns, Types of Meaning and Imagery, and Principles for Interpreting Meaning. Each section opens with a theoretical essay, followed by three essays that work analytically with specific poets and poems using the methods defined in the first. In his examination of such poets as Hopkins, Browning, Milton, Blake, Keats, and Dickinson, Hill uses such proposals as the law of least lexical contribution and maximal contextual contribution; the hypothesis that, when possible meanings occur together in a cluster, they support each other; and the idea that it is sometimes possible to recover underlying language sequences from which the author has departed for identifiable reasons. By applying these suppositions to the study of particular poems, Hill shows how the reader may arrive at statements about the relative artistic merit of works of literature.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781477300107
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Publication date: 07/03/2014
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 172
File size: 2 MB

About the Author

Archibald A. Hill (1902–1992) was Professor of English at the University of Texas at Austin.

Table of Contents

  • Introduction
  • Part One. The Definition of Literature and the Study of Its Patterns

    • 1. A Program for the Definition of Literature
    • 2. Toward a Literary Analysis
    • 3. Pippa’s Song: Two Attempts at Structural Criticism
    • 4. An Analysis of The Windhover. An Experiment in Method

  • Part Two. Types of Meaning and Imagery

    • 5. Poetry and Stylistics
    • 6. Analogies, Icons, and Images
    • 7. Imagery and Meaning: A Passage from Lycidas and a Poem by Blake
    • 8. The Locus of the Literary Work

  • Part Three. Principles for Interpreting Meaning

    • 9. Principles Governing Semantic Parallels
    • 10. Some Points in the Analysis of Keats’s Ode on a Grecian Urn
    • 11. Two Views of Poetic Language and Meaning: The Poem as Cryptogram and as Example of Deviant Grammar
    • 12. Figurative Structure and Meaning: Two Poems by Emily Dickinson

  • Notes
  • Index
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