April 7

1. April 7 • Revised course schedule • Sample Quiz on QuizStar username/passwords jlil1 • Discuss literary elements related to poetry in chapters 11-16 • HOMEWORK • Select one short poem from the chapter “Poems for Further Reading” to paraphrase. • Read Whitman & Dickinson’s poems on 426-7 and respond to all 6 questions on 427. • Read “Grass” p. 456 and explain the allusions. • Read and think through the writing assignment on 469; a similar activity will be on your Poetry Exam. • REMINDER • No class April 19 – Poetry exam

2. Reading a Poem Chapter 11 • General Notes • More to poetry than meets the eye • Poetry should be read slowly, carefully, and attentively. • Good poems yield more if read twice. • Verse – composition in lines of more or less regular rhythm, often ending in rimes (rhymes) • Poetry appeals to the mind and arouses feelings. • Makes imaginative statements that we value even if incorrect • Effect of a poem – our mental & emotional response to it • Eliot: prose sense useful in keeping our mind “diverted”

3. Reading a Poem Chapter 11 • How to read a poem: • Read once straight through, with no expectations, with an open-mind; don’t dwell on troublesome passages • Second reading, read for exact sense of all words • Paraphrase: put into your own words what you understand the poem to say, the essential ideas; fuller than a summary • Read “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” p. 411 & its paraphrase • Theme vs. Subject • Own interpretations/personal associations • Reading strategies

4. Types of Poems • Lyric Poetry • Earlier meaning: poem made for singing • 500 years+ meaning: short poem expressing the thoughts and feelings of a single speaker • Often 1st person • Might describe an object or recall an experience without the speaker ever brining himself into it • Read “Those Winter Sundays” p. 413 • Narrative Poetry • Purpose is to tell a story • Invites the skills of a fiction writer – character, setting, plot • Read “Out, Out—” p. 416

5. Types of Poems • Dramatic Poetry • Voice of imaginary character speaking directly • Any verse written for the state • Dramatic monologues • Didactic Poetry • More fashionable in former times • Written to state a message or teach a body of knowledge • Explanations • Poems can be written about anything

6. Tone Chapter 12 • General Notes • Conveys an attitude toward the person addressed • May tell us how the speaker feels about himself or herself • Attitude poet takes toward a theme or subject • Is whatever in the poem makes an attitude clear to us • Diction • Details • To determine tone read the poem carefully & pay attention to what suggestions you find in it • Read “My Papa’s Waltz” p. 423

7. Tone Chapter 12 • Satiric Poetry • Kind of comic poetry that generally conveys a message • Usually the poet ridicules some person or persons, examining the victim by the light of certain principles and implying the reader should feel contempt too • A Spectrum of Tones ** • Multiple tones • The Person in the Poem • Ask yourself whose voice is speaking to you • Sometimes it might the poet’s • Other times, it might be a persona, a fictitious character

8. Tone Chapter 12 • Irony • A manner of speaking that implies a discrepancy • Poem says one thing and we sense the poet is in fact saying something else = ironic point of view • Samples of irony p.436 • Sarcasm is conspicuously bitter, mocking verbal irony • Dramatic irony contains an element of contrast, but usually refers to a situation in which a character’s knowledge is limited, but the audience’s is not because we have superior knowledge • Cosmic irony is when fate tricks a human being • Read sample poems p. 438-9 • “Thinking About Tone” Review p. 445

9. Words Chapter 13 • General Notes • “…you can’t make a poem with ideas—you make it with words!” • Most impressive idea in the world will not make a poem, unless its words are selected and arranged with loving art. • Words that are exact and memorable • Diction • Choice of words • Abstract words express ideas or concepts • Concrete words refer to what we can perceive with our senses • “Silence” p. 452

10. Words Chapter 13 • Allusion • Indirect reference to any person, place, or thing—fictitious, historical, or actual • Usually common knowledge • Unfamiliar references – glossed, footnoted, Googled • Word Choice and Order • In neoclassical period – poetic diction – “a system of words” dictated a decorum (propriety) and violations consisted of common, everyday words which were inconsistent with the loftiness of tragedy, epic, ode, and elegy. • Levels of diction – vulgate, colloquial, general English, formal English – ranked in ascending order of formality • Dialect – particular variety of language spoken by an identifiable regional group or social class of people – freshness & authenticity of the language/immediate locale

11. Denotation/Connotation Chapter 14 • Denotation – dictionary definition • Connotation – overtones or suggestions of additional meaning that it gains from all the contexts in which we have met it in the past. • Activity – Read William Blake’s “London” aloud with a partner and read through the meanings of some of Blake’s words. P. 472 • Activity – “Southeast Corner” p. 474 (Group discussion) • “Thinking About Denotation & Connotation” p. 480

12. Imagery Chapter 15 • Word or sequence of words that refer to any sensory experience • Visual imagery • Auditory imagery • Tactile imagery • Single word, a phrase, a sentence or an entire short poem • Some literary critics look for the poem’s meaning in its imagery • Activity: Read the sample student paper on p. 496. Then choose a poem between pages 484-9 & 491-493 and examine the poem’s imagery. Be prepared to share with us the details that evoke the image and their effect on you, the reader.

13. Figures of Speech Chapter 16 • Figuratively = nonliterally • “…may be said to occur whenever a speaker or writer departs from the usual denotations of words.” • “…not devices to state what is demonstrably untrue. Indeed they often state truths that more literal language cannot communicate; they call attention to such truths; they lend them emphasis.” • “The Eagle” p. 501 • Simile • comparison of two things indicated by like, as, than, or resembles. • Expresses a similarity • Must be dissimilar in kind

14. Figures of Speech Chapter 16 • Metaphor • Same as a simile but omits the connective • Statement that one thing is something else • Assumptions lead to implied metaphors – one that uses neither connectives or the verb to be • In general “a simile refers to only one characteristic 2 items may have in common.” • “A metaphor is not plainly limited in the number of resemblances.” • “…metaphors are necessary instruments of understanding.” • Discuss metaphors in Tennyson’s & Blake’s poems p. 504

15. Figures of Speech Chapter 16 • Personification beginning p.508 • Apostrophe • Overstatement/Understatement • Metonymy • Synecdoche • Paradox • Pun