Fixed form verse

                      Free verse

 Scansion (Describing Rhythm)

Meter

 Poetic foot

 Poetic Feet

 iamb

 Poetic Feet

 spondee

 Alliteration

Alliteration is the poetic technique of repeating initial (beginning) consonant or vowel sounds of words, usually within the same line:

The force that through the green fuse drives the flower/ Drives my green age; . . .
--Dylan Thomas

 Enjambment

Enjambment is a technique of continuing the grammatical structure and sense of a line into the next line (with no punctuation halting the flow), sometimes even across stanzas:

None of this cares for us. Nothing shows why
At this unique distance from isolation

It becomes still more difficult to find
Words at once true and kind,
Or not untrue and not unkind. (“Talking in Bed”) –Philip Larkin

 Caesura

A caesura is a pause or break in the rhythmic progress of a line of verse. The pause is indicated by strong punctuation (a semi, a colon, a period, a dash)

“A wind is ruffling the tawny pelt
Of Africa. Kikuyu, quick as flies,
Batten upon the bloodstreams of the veldt.”

--Derek Wolcott “A Cry from Africa”

Note: A comma is a weak pause and does not create a caesura.

 Catalog

 Enlightenment

“Enlightenment” in the 18th

century meant applying scientific theory and modes of

discovery to human affairs

 The “New Science,” born in the 16th

and 17th

centuries, influenced all areas of

philosophy

Novum Organum

heliocentrism

Principia Mathematica

Sir Isaac Newton – Principia Mathematica describes the laws of gravity, the orbits of celestial bodies, and calculus for measuring those orbits

Universals are immutable

truths that do not change, regardless of time or place

Natural laws

unchanging processes or values that govern the universe

►The universe is structured in a discernable order

►The universe is rational – therefore, it can be understood rationally

►The ordered universe is a hierarchy

►The Divinity of Christ

►The possibility of miracles (they violate natural law)

►The omnipresence of God – instead, we have a clockwork universe

Neoclassical Assumptions

 the purpose art is didactic – that is, it seeks to teach and improve humankind

 art should be designed on the principles of utilite et dulce (usefulness and

delight)

 Martin Luther

inaugurates a “protest” against Catholic ideology and practices; he and other “Protestants” separate from the Catholic Church

Protestant Reformation

 Reason is virtuous – Passion is dangerous

 Order is godlike – disorder is evil

 Moderation is virtuous – excess is dangerous

 The Universe is rational, symmetrical, balanced, and hierarchical – it reflects the

orderly mind of God

 The best art is an orderly reflection of the universal natural laws

Voltaire

Voltaire is an Enlightenment philosophe--a french intellectual who believes

• Man is perfectible (not fallen) and has free will
• all religions must be tolerated
• deism is the most palatable understanding of God

Ecrasez l’infame

Crush the infamy!!!

*infamy may include religious intolerance (or organized religion itself); brutal governments, absurd (dangerous) dogmas   -- all impediments to personal an intellectual freedom.

Satire

 a type of didactic literature that seeks to correct human follies by ridiculing them.

* Term derived from Greek “satyr” = l/2 man, l/2 goat. “Satyr plays” were bawdy, humorous plays that followed the series of 3 tragedies performed each day during the Festival of Dionysus (4th and 3rd Centuries BCE)

Utopia

a perfectly realized vision of the ideals often proclaimed but generally violated in the reader’s own world

 conte philosophique – the“philosophical tale

* allows the author to demonstrate philosophical ideas acted out in reality and exaggerated for effect

 Romanctism

A decleration of Independece from:

• Religion
• Political authority
• Class heirarchy
• gender oppression
• Slavery

 Epistemology

study of how we know what we know

 pantheism

God is immanent – present in everything

Realism

Literary technique that strove to capture the world as it is – to record in detail. The idea was to “report” reality – to describe the world without prejudice or assumptions, objectively. 

Features of Realism

•     Objectivity

–    artist must be invisible

–    artist must reflect, but not interpret, reality

•     Inclusivity

–    artist should not “edit” reality

–    ugly and beautiful, boring and exciting have equal claim

•     Anti-Romantic

–    themes often seek to debunk romantic concepts

Song of Myself (from leaves of Grass)

           Individualism

Author: Walt Whitman

Poetic techniques: free verse, colloquial speech, catalogs

Vindication on the rights of Woman

"The Silesian Weaves"

The Chimney Sweeper

"Darkness"

"Christabel"

" The Lady With the Dog" (realism)

"Dover Beach"

"The Story of an hour"

The Origin of Species