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Position:Home>Arts & Humanities> Can disregard for Major English "Rules" diminish a piece's poetic exprQuestion: Can disregard for Major English "Rules" diminish a piece's poetic expression?
Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: Is this because of my wish for punctuation? Well, let me tell you my own humble opinion. I dislike the current trend toward punctuationless and formless poems because it makes it too difficult for me to decipher where one thought ends and another begins. When I can't seperate the thoughts, and devine meaning, the poem is worthless to me because it serves no real purpose. Poetry is a precise style of communication and it is often bastardized in the quest for "poetic freedom." When one looks at the great poets and sonneteers of the past, it is amazing to see the precision with which they expressed thought and feeling. While there is lots of style and grace in, say, free verse, there is no discipline. I can see absolutely no reason to completely disregard punctuation, form, and syntax in a poem. Adding a comma does not diminish the style of the poem. And there are instances where omission of punctuation is absolutely brilliant. For example, John Betjamen's "False Security" I remember the dread with which I at a quarter past four Let go with a bang behind me our house front door And, clutching a present for my dear little hostess tight, Sailed out for the children's party into the night Or rather the gathering night. For still some boys In the near municipal acres were making a noise Shuffling in fallen leaves and shouting and whistling And running past hedges of hawthorn, spiky and bristling. And black in the oncoming darkness stood out the trees And pink shone the ponds in the sunset ready to freeze And all was still and ominous waiting for dark And the keeper was ringing his closing bell in the park And the arc lights started to fizzle and burst into mauve As I climbed West Hill to the great big house in the grove, Where the children's party was and the dear little hostess. But halfway up stood the empty house where the ghost is. I crossed to the other side and under the arc Made a rush for the next kind lamppost out of the dark And so to the next and the next till I reached the top Where the grove branched off to the left. Then ready to drop I ran to the ironwork gateway of number seven Secure at last on the lamp lit fringe of heaven. Oh who can say how subtle and safe one feels Shod in ones children's sandals from Daniel Neal's, Clad in one's party clothes made of stuff from Heal's? And who can still one's thrill at the candle shine On cakes and ices and jelly and blackcurrant wine, And the warm little feel of my hostess's hand in mine? Can I forget my delight at the conjuring show? And wasn't I proud that I was the last to go? Too overexcited and pleased with myself to know That the words I heard my hostess's mother employ To a guest departing, would ever diminish my joy, I WONDER WHERE JULIA FOUND THAT STRANGE, RATHER COMMON LITTLE BOY? In this poem, as it's describing his breathless journey to see the little hostess, there are no commas and this, coupled with all the "ands" makes the reader feel the breathlessness and excitement of the protagonist. This is a good thing, indeed. In most pieces, though, meaning is communicated better with the use of punctuation and "Major English Rules." For example, Ted Hughes' "The Thought Fox." I imagine this midnight moment??s forest: Something else is alive Beside the clock??s loneliness And this blank page where my fingers move. Through the window I see no star: Something more near Though deeper within darkness Is entering the loneliness: Cold, delicately as the dark snow, A fox??s nose touches twig, leaf; Two eyes serve a movement, that now And again now, and now, and now Sets neat prints into the snow Between trees, and warily a lame Shadow lags by stump and in hollow Of a body that is bold to come Across clearings, an eye, A widening deepening greenness, Brilliantly, concentratedly, Coming about its own business Till, with a sudden sharp hot stink of fox It enters the dark hole of the head. The window is starless still; the clock ticks, The page is printed. Notice in this piece how the spacing and punctuation further allow the reader to envision the fox, approaching and fleeing, and the quiet awe felt by the protagonist at the way ideas come and retreat. This is why I think poetry needs punctuation. In order to convey meaning and thought (which is the purpose of all writing), poetry should adhere to the rules of whichever language they're written in because the rules are there to allow for better understanding. |