Literature and Poetry Analysis

Seminar Structure

• Three sessions on literature and literary studies
• Poetry: key concepts
• Midterm exam (terminology)
• Christmas break
• AI-poetry & social media
• Poetry forms
• Wrap-up
• Final exam (poem analysis)
• Four sessions on different levels of poetry analysis

Key Concepts

• What is literature? Defining features of literature
• Function of language (Jakobson) dominant in literature
• What is genre? Different genres
• Literary canon
• Literary interpretation
• Methodology for studying poetry in the class and reasoning

"The Lamb" - Blake (1789)

• Little Lamb, who made thee?
• Dost thou know who made thee?
• Gave thee life & bid thee feed, By the stream & o'er the mead;
• Gave thee clothing of delight, Gave thee clothing wooly bright;
• Gave thee such a tender voice, Making all the vales rejoice!

Fundamental Features of Poetry

• Relative brevity
• Compression, condensation, and reduction of subject-matter
• Increased subjectivity
• Musicality and lyricism (proximity to songs)
• Structural and phonological complexity
• Morphological and syntactic complexity
• Deviation from everyday language + increased artificiality
• Increased aesthetic self-referentiality

Communication Model for Poetry

• Extratextual level: production and reception
• Intratextual level: literary text/poem
• Addresser: real (historical) author
• Fictive speaker: lyric persona (lyric 'I')
• Subject-matter of speech
• Fictive addressee: 'lyric thou'
• Addressee: real reader

Communicative Situation in the Poem

• Describes how a poem communicates
• Answers wh-questions: who, what, whom, when, where, why
• Speaker motivation
• Remember: addressee and speaker can be implicit or explicit

Level of the Enounced vs. Level of Enunciation

• Level of the enounced = content of the poem (what is said)
• Level of enunciation = form of the poem (how it is said)
• Analyzing literature usually involves both content and form

Starter-Pack Poetry Terminology

• Stanza: group of lines
• Verse: line of verse (poetic composition in metre)
• Metre: basic rhythmic structure
• Rhyme scheme: patterns of rhyming words
  • Rhyming couplets (Aa bb cc),
  • Alternate/cross rhyme (Abab cdcd)
  • Embracing rhyme (ABBA cddc)
  • Chain/interlocking rhyme (Aba beb ede)
  • Tail rhyme (Aab ccb)
• Couplet: 2 line stanza
• Tercet, triplet: 3 line stanza
• Quatrain: 4 line stanza
• Sestet: 6 line stanza
• Octet/octave: 8 line stanza

Petrarchan/Italian Sonnets

• Named after Petrarch (14th century)
• Developed by Renaissance poets
• Il Canzoniere: collection of poems often addressed to beloved Laura
• Standardized structure: octave + sestet (e.g., abbaabba cdecde/cdcdcd)
• Strict Italian sonnets usually don't end with a couplet
• Octave introduces conflict; quatrain explains problem/provides exposition
• Sestet begins with a volta (turn)

"Sonnets from the Portuguese 43" - Browning

• How do I love thee? Describes different aspects of love: with passion, faith, old griefs, and childhood's faith.

English/Shakespearean Sonnets

• Continuation of the sonnet tradition
• Shakespeare often deviates or mocks Petrarchan conventions
• His quarto with 154 sonnets published in 1609
• Three quatrains + rhyming couplet (abab cdcd efef gg)
• Volta after third quatrain
• Rhyming couplet concludes/resolves the poem
• Topics: passage of time, love, infidelity, jealousy, beauty, mortality
• First 126 addressed to a young man; last 28 to a woman (or she is referred to)

Tasks in Class

• Close read Shakespeare's Sonnet 130
• Describe communicative situation (who, what, to whom, when, where, why)
• Consider levels of enounced (what is said) and enunciation (how it's said)
• Analyze how form and content contribute to meaning

### Additional Analysis

• Different stanza forms described and examples provided
• Communication model explained (Addresser, subject-matter, Fictive Addressee, Addressee)
• Poem analysis in more detail provided.

This quiz covers essential concepts in literature and poetry, including key features, genres, and methodologies for literary interpretation. It also focuses on a detailed analysis of William Blake's poem, 'The Lamb', emphasizing the fundamental characteristics of poetry. Prepare to test your knowledge and understanding of the topics discussed throughout the seminar.