E N G L IS H L A N G U A G E S E R IE S

TIT LE N O 4

A Linguistic Guide to English Poetry

 ENGLISH L A N G U A G E SERIES
General Editor: Randolph Quirk

Title no:

INVESTIGATING ENGLISH STYLE

David Crystal and Derek Davy

A LINGUISTIC GUIDE TO ENGLISH POETRY

Geoffrey N. Leech

AN INTRODUCTION TO
MODERN ENGLISH WORD-FORMATION

Valerie Adams

COHESION IN ENGLISH
M. A. K. Halliday and Ruqaiya Hasan

MEANING AND FORM

Dwight Bolinger

DESIGNS IN PROSE
Walter Nash
STYLE IN FICTION
Geoffrey N. Leech and Michael H. Short
THE RHYTHMS OF ENGLISH POETRY
Derek Attridge
THE LANGUAGE OF HUMOUR
Walter Nash

GOOD ENGLISH AND THE GRAMMARIAN

Sidney Greenbaum

RHYTHMIC PHRASING IN ENGLISH VERSE

Richard D. Cureton

THE ENGLISH INFINITIVE

Patrick J. Duffley

CREATING TEXT: AN INTRODUCTION TO

THE STUDY OF COMPOSITION
Walter Nash and David Stacey

ADVERBS AND MODALITY IN ENGLISH

Leo Hoye
A Linguistic Guide to
English Poetry

G E O F FR E Y N . LEECH

Professor o f Linguistics and

M od ern English Language
U n iversity Lancaster

O Routledge
Taylor &. Francis Group
LONDON AND NEW YORK
 First publis hed 1969 by Pearson Education Limited

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Notices
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Foreword

‘ There is not perhaps any Figure o f Speech so pleasing, as t h e m e ta p h o r ’,

wrote the eighteenth-century linguistic thinker, Janies Harris. ‘ ’Tis at
times the Language o f every Individual, but above all is peculiar to the Man
o f Genius* f Although backed b y the testimony o f Aristotle, this statement
is o f less interest to us than the exercise in stylistic comparison, suggestive
o f Queneau, which precedes and occasions it. A vulgar utterance (‘ D on’t
let a lucky Hit slip; i f you do, be-like you mayn’t any more get at i t ’) is set
against an affected one (‘ Opportune Moments are few and fleeting; seize
them w ith avidity, or your Progression w ill be im peded’), and both are
contrasted with Brutus’s expression o f the same idea through his metaphor
o f taking a tide at the flood. Besides having ‘ intrinsic elegance’, says Harris
(ibid., 197), such language as the third flatters the reader by leaving him ‘ to
discover something for himself9.
M ore than metaphor is involved in the study o f poetic language, and
even so outstanding a philologist as Harris was deaf to the poetry o f
Chaucer (‘ so uncouth’, p. 468), but it is nevertheless interesting to see lin­
guistics and criticism, nearly tw o hundred years ago, taking a few modest
steps to ‘ knit hands’. H ow near is this M iltonic figure to a full realization
in our ow n times? The American scholar, Richard Ohmann, tells us scath­
ingly that for all the progress in linguistic theory critics have retained their
old benighted subjective habits: ‘ the most serviceable studies o f style con­
tinue to proceed from the critic’s naked intuition, fortified against the
winds o f ignorance only b y literary sophistication and the tattered gar­
ments o f traditional grammar. Especially damaging is the critic’s inability,
for lack o f a theory, to take into account the deeper structural features o f
language, precisely those which should enter most revealingly into a styl­
istic description.’^

t Philological Inquiries (London, 1781), 186.

i In Word, 20 (1964), 426.
Vi FOREWORD

W e m ay or m ay not think it just that Ohmann should thus berate the

critics, as w e m ay or m ay not agree w ith h o w he assesses the potentiality
o f specific current linguistic theories; w e must surely admit that the critics
have a case in counter-claiming that much o f the recent linguistic w o rk on
literature has been too elementary or trivial or laboriously irrelevant to
merit their serious consideration, and at best too much preoccupied w ith
the style o f the most startlingly idiosyncratic writers. But it is beyond ques­
tion that in recent years linguists have been turning their attention increas­
ingly to literary texts, and in ways that are o f increasing interest to critics,
making possible, as Ohmann says, a *refinement in the practice o f stylistic
analysis*. In these developments Geoffrey Leech has played a notable part,
and for some years now his w ork has been in demand from editors o f sym­
posia in linguistic stylistics. In the present volum e, however, he achieves
something that is beyond what a symposium can by definition even attem pt:
a single mind, sensitive and well-read, applying a single view o f linguistic
structure discursively and in some depth to the analysis o f a wide range o f
English poetry. His book w ill therefore be o f immense value not only to
the students o f English literature for w hom it has primarily been written
but also to more senior readers: the critics w ho wish to see something o f
what linguistics is com ing to offer their discipline; and M r Leech’s fellow
linguists w ho cannot fail to profit from his example.
And so, like his previous successful volum e, this book is greatly to be
welcom ed in the series in which it appears. As our language and literature
have come to be studied more and more on a world-w ide basis, there has
arisen an acute need for more information on the language and the ways
in which it is used. The English Language Series seeks to meet this need
and to play a part in further stimulating the study and teaching o f English
b y providing up-to-date and scholarly treatments o f topics most relevant
to present-day English - including its history and traditions, its sound pat­
terns, its grammar, its lexicology, its rich variety in speech and writing,
and its standards in Britain, the U S A , and the other principal areas where
the language is used.

University College London R A N D O L P H Q U IR K

August, 1968
Preface

This book is designed as an introductory course in stylistics for students o f

English, and is based on m y ow n experience o f teaching the subject to first-
year undergraduates. Although it is ‘ introductory’ in the sense o f ‘ starting
from scratch’, it does not pretend to give a general survey o f current ap­
proaches to the study o f literary style; instead, it aims at developing one
particular approach, from introductory generalities dow n to the practical
details o f textual interpretation. W hat I hope w ill emerge from these pages,
in outline, is a general scheme for the discussion o f the language o f literary
texts, and a fram ework o f reference on linguistic matters for anyone in­
terested in the interpretation o f poetry.
I emphasize that the linguistic and critical aspects o f literary studies are
here regarded as complementary, the first being a tool o f the second. One
o f m y motives for writing this book is an impatience w ith those w ho,
whether as linguists or as critics, have by intolerance or lack o f imagination
fostered the view that the tw o disciplines o f literary criticism and linguis­
tics w o rk against, rather than for, one another. It is m y hope that this book
m ay help to clear away some o f the fog o f misunderstanding, as w ell as
providing for a real teaching need in university English courses.
The first tw o chapters are perhaps noticeably easier than the others; they
cover ground w hich w ill be familiar to many students o f English, but are a
necessary preparation for the more carefully analytic approach o f later
chapters.
Passages o f poetry for further discussion are suggested at the end o f each
chapter. M y intention is that these should be treated quite freely, according
to the needs and temperament o f individual teachers or students. It should
perhaps be pointed out that a thoroughly fruitful discussion o f each ex­
ample requires some knowledge o f the poem ’s background - biographi­
cal, intellectual, social, etc. T h ey cannot, therefore, be compared w ith
textbook exercises for which the textbook itself is a complete preparation.
Ideally, the discussion o f each piece should be preceded b y background ex­
Vl l l PREFACE

position in much greater detail than m y occasional explanatory notes can

provide.
M y debt to Randolph Q uirk is far larger than that w hich a writer con­
ventionally owes to his editor; he has given unfailing encouragement and
guidance on all matters, from the most general issues o f theory to the most
practical points o f presentation and typography. I am also very grateful to
Frank Kermode, head o f m y department, for his interest and advice; to
John Chalker and Frank Fricker for valuable comments from a literary
view point; to Sidney Greenbaum for a thorough reading o f the book in
typescript, and for summarizing for m y benefit an article in Hebrew by
U . Ornan; also to R o g er Fowler for a detailed critique o f Chapter 7; and
to m y father-in-law George Berman for kindly acting as proof-reader.
W hat I ow e to W inifred N ow ottn y through her book The Language Poets
Use w ill be plain from almost every chapter o f this one; but in addition I
have a more personal debt to her, having been under her tutelage as a
student at the University o f London, and having had the unforgettable
pleasure o f attending the lectures upon which she later based her book. T o
other colleagues in the English Department o f University College London
I am grateful for giving me the benefit o f their specialist knowledge on
various points o f literary appreciation.
Finally, I acknowledge, without too much shame, the help o f The Pen­
guin Dictionary o f Quotations by J. M . and M . J. Cohen as a hunting-ground
for suitable illustrations.

University College London gnl

August, 1968
Acknowledgments

W e are grateful to the follow in g for permission to reproduce copyright material: G eorge
Allen & U n w in Ltd and the V ikin g Press Inc for an extract from The Gift o f Tongues b y
M argaret Schlauch, C o p yrigh t 1942, M argaret Schlauch; author and author’s agents for an
extract from Epigram: On His Books b y Hilaire B elloc; T h e B od ley Head and R an dom House
Inc for an extract from ‘ T h e Sirens’ from Ulysses b y James Joyce; Curtis B ro w n Ltd and
Curtis B row n , N e w Y o r k for Letters from Iceland b y W . H. A uden and Louis M acN eice,
C o p yrigh t © 1937 W . H . A uden and Louis M acN eice, renewed 1965 W . H . Auden;
Jonathan Cape Ltd and Harcourt, Brace & W o rld Inc for an extract from ‘ Lessons o f the
W ar: 1. N am in g o f Parts’ fro m ^4 Map O f Verona b y H enry R eed ; J. M . D ent & Sons Ltd and
N e w Directions for extracts from ‘ From L o ve’s First Fever to her Plagu e’ , ‘ Fern H ill’ ,
‘ Cerem on y after a Fireraid’ , ‘ Vision and Prayer’ , ‘ A G rie f A g o ’, ‘ This Bread I B rea k ’ from
Collected Poems b y D ylan Thom as, C o p yrigh t 1939, 1946 b y N e w Directions, 1945 b y
Trustees o f the C opyrigh ts o f D ylan Thom as, and from Under M ilk Wood b y D ylan Thom as,
C o p yrigh t 1954 N e w Directions; Faber & Faber and Harcourt Brace & W o rld Inc for
‘ seeker o f truth’ poem 3 o f 73 Poems and ‘ pity this busy monster, m anunkind’ from Selected
Poems 1923-1958 b y e. e. cumm ings (American title Poems 1923-1934), C o p yrigh t 1944 b y
e. e. cumm ings, and for extracts from ‘ East C o k e r’ , ‘ T h e W aste Lan d’ , ‘ Th e H o llo w M e n ’ ,
‘ M arina’ , ‘ T h e L ove Song o f J. Alfred Prufrock ’ from Collected Poems 1909-1962 b y T . S.
Eliot; Faber & Faber and O xfo rd U niversity Press Inc for ‘ Prayer before Birth* from
Collected Poems o f Louis MacNeice’, Faber & Faber and R an dom House Inc for ‘ Bantams In
P in e-W o o d s’ and ‘ M etaphors o f a M agn ifico’ from The Collected Poems o f Wallace Stevens,
C o p yrigh t 1923, renewed 1951 b y W allace Stevens, for ‘ Th e W an d erer’ and ‘ A Sum m er
N ig h t’ b y W . H . A uden from Collected Shorter Poems 1927-1957; G rove Press Inc for ‘ O read ’
b y H ilda D oolittle from Collected Poems, C o p yrigh t © 1957 b y N orm an Holm es Pearson; The
Trustees o f the H ardy Estate, M acm illan & C o . Ltd and T he M acm illan Companies o f Canada
and N e w Y o r k for ‘ In the Study ’ and ‘ A h , A re you D ig gin g on m y G rave ’ from Collected Poems
o f Thomas Hardy, C o p y righ t 1925 Th e M acm illan C o ; M acm illan & C o . Ltd for ‘ Poem
W ith o u t a M ain V e r b ’ from Weep Before God b y John W ain ; author, author’s agents and the
Estate o f the late M rs Frieda Lawrence and Th e V ikin g Press Inc for an extract from ‘ Snake*
from The Complete Poems o f D . H. Lawrence, Vol. 1 (edited U .S .A b y V ivian D e Sola Pinto
and F. W arren Roberts), C o p yrigh t 1923, 1951 b y Frieda Lawrence; M acG ibbon & K ee and
N e w Directions for ‘ T h e R ig h t o f W a y ’ from Collected Earlier Poems b y W illiam Carlos
W illiam s, C o p yrigh t 1938 W illiam Carlos W illiam s; T h e M arvell Press for ‘ T oad s’ from
The Less Deceived b y Philip Larkin; The Executors o f A lice M eynell for ‘ T h e R a in y Summ er *
b y A lice M eyn ell; H arold O w en , Chatto & W indus Ltd and N e w Directions for an extract
from ‘ Strange M eetin g’ from T h e Collected Poems o f W ilfred O w en , C o p yrigh t © 1963
Chatto & W indus; Th e proprietors o f Punch Publications for a lim erick, © Punch; author,
author’s agents and H olt, Rinehart & W inston Inc for ‘ Grass’ from Cornhuskers b y Carl
Sandburg, C o p y righ t 1918 b y H olt, Rinehart & W inston Inc, 1946 b y C arl Sandburg;
X ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

author, author’s agents and T h e M acm illan C o o f N e w Y o rk for ‘ Easter 1916* C o p yrigh t
1924, The M acm illan C o ., 1952 b y Bertha Georgie Yeats, for ‘ Leda and the S w an ’, C o p yrigh t
1928 b y The M acm illan C o ., 1956 b y G eorgie Yeats, for ‘ A n Irish Airm an Foresees His D ea th ’,
C o p yrigh t 1919 b y T h e M acm illan C o ., 1946 b y Bertha G eorgie Yeats, from The Collected
Poems o f W. B. Yeats.
Contents

Foreword v

Preface vii

In t r o d u c t io n i

o. i The Tang.-lit.’ problem I

0.2 A descriptive rhetoric 3
0.3 Poetic language and ‘ ordinary’ language 5
0.4 A possible misgiving 6
Notes 7

1 P oetry a n d th e Language of P ast and P resent 8

1.1 Varieties o f English usage 8

1.1.1 Dialects 8
1.1.2 Registers: usage according to situation 9
1.2 Linguistic convention in poetry 12
1.2.1 The trend o f conform ity 13
1.2.2 The function o f archaism 14
1.2.3 Poetic language and ‘ poetical’ language 15
1.2.4 Grand, middle, and plain styles 16
1.2.5 The routine licences o f verse composition 17
Examples for discussion 19
Notes 22

2 T he C r e a t iv e U se o f L anguage 23

2.1 The escape from banality 23

2.2 T w o meanings o f ‘ creative’ 24
2.3 The qualities o f prose in poetry 25
2.4 Degrees o f linguistic audacity 29
Examples for discussion 33
Notes 35
xii CONTENTS

3 V arieties of P o e t ic L ic e n c e 36
3.1 Anatom y o f language 37
3.1.1 Three main levels: realization, form, semantics 37
3.1.2 Phonology and graphology 39
3.1.3 Meaning and significance 39
3.1.4 Ancillary branches o f linguistics 40
3.2 Types o f deviation 42
3.2.1 Lexical deviation 42
3.2.2 Grammatical deviation 44
3.2.3 Phonological deviation 46
3.2.4 Graphological deviation 47
3.2.5 Semantic deviation 48
3.2.6 Dialectal deviation 49
3.2.7 Deviation o f register 49
3.2.8 Deviation o f historical period 51
3.3 Conclusion 52
Examples for discussion 53
Notes 54

4 F o r e g r o u n d in g and I n t e r pr e t a tio n 56
4.1 Foregrounding 56
4.1.1 Foregrounding in art and elsewhere 56
4.1.2 A n example 58
4.2 Interpretation 58
4.2.1 The subjectivity o f interpretation 59
4.2.2 The ‘ warranty’ for a deviation 61
4.3 Parallelism 62
4.3.1 Parallelism as foregrounded regularity 62
4.3.2 H ow much regularity? 64
4.3.3 Patterns o f identity and contrast 65
4.3.4 The interpretation o f parallelism 67
Examples for discussion 69
Notes 71

5 V e r b a l R e p e tit io n 73
5.1 Schemes and tropes 74
5.2 Formal repetitions 76
5.2.1 Free verbal repetition 77
5.2.2 Types o f verbal parallelism 79
5.2.3 The functions o f verbal parallelism 84
 CONTENTS Xlll

Examples for discussion 86

Notes 88

6 PATTERNS OF SOUND 89
6.1 Sound patterns within syllables 89
6.2 Sound patterns in relation to stress 91
6.3 'Music' in poetry 93
6.4 The interpretation of sound patterns 95
6·4·1 'Chiming' 95
6.4.2 Onomatopoeia 96
6.4.3 Varieties of onomatopoeia 97
Examples for discussion 100
Notes 102

7 METRE 103
7.1 Rhythm and metre 103
7.2 The rhythm of English 104
7.2.1 The measure: the unit of rhythm 106
7.2.2 Which syllables are stressed? 107
7.2.3 Pauses 107
7.2.4 Syllable length 108
7.3 Metre and the line of verse II I
7.3.1 English metre as rhythmic parallelism III
7.3.2 The 'foot' of traditional prosody II2
7.3.3 Thelineofverse II4
7.3.4 Some numerical aspects of metre II5
7.3.5 Accentual metre II8
7.4 The interaction of rhythm and verse form II9
7.4.1 Defeated expectancy II9
7.4.2 Metrical variation 121
7.5 Grammar and metre 122
7.5.1 Enjambment 123
7.5.2 The 'verse paragraph' 125
For discussion 128
Notes 128

8 THE IRRATIONAL IN POETRY 131

8. I A logical view of meaning 13 1
8.1.1 Some types of semantic oddity 131
8.1.2 Definition and description 134
XXV CONTENTS

8.2 Redundancy in poetry 136

8.2.1 Pleonasm 137
8.2.2 Tautology 137
8.2.3 Periphrasis 138
8.3 Absurdity in poetry 140
8.3.1 O xym oron 140
8.3.2 Paradox 142
8.4 Beyond reason and credibility 143
Examples for discussion 144
Notes 146

9 F ig u r a t iv e L a n g u a g e 147

9.1 Transference o f meaning 148

9.1.1 Synecdoche 150
9.1.2 Metaphor 150
9.1.3 M etonym y 152
9.2 Aspects o f metaphor 153
9.2.1 H ow to analyse a metaphor 153
9.2.2 Simile and metaphor 156
9.2.3 Notional classes o f metaphor 158
9.2.4 Extended metaphor 159
9.2.5 Com pound metaphor and m ixed metaphor 159
9.2.6 Symbolism and allegory 161
Examples for discussion 164
Notes 165

10 H o n e st D e c e p t io n s 166

10.1 Hyperbole and litotes 167

10.1.1 Hyperbole 167
10.1.2 Litotes or rhetorical understatement 168
10.1.3 The uses o f hyperbole and litotes 170
10.2 Irony 171
10.2.1 The mask o f irony 171
10.2.2 Irony and metaphor 173
10.2.3 Innuendo 174
10.2.4 Irony o f tone 176
Examples for discussion 179
Notes 182

11 I m p lic a tio n s o f C o n t e x t 183

11.1 Licences o f situation 184
 C O NT E N T S XV

1 1 .1.1 Rhetorical question 184

11.1.2 Apostrophe 185
11.1.3 Routine licences o f situation 186
11.2 The given situation 187
11.3 The ‘ w orld within the poem * 189
11.3.1 The introduction o f inferred situations 191
11.3.2 W ords o f definite meaning 193
11.3.3 Fact and fiction 195
11.3.4 Impossible situations 197
11.4 Situation and action 199
11.5 Conclusion 201
Examples for discussion 202
Notes 204

12 A m b ig u it y and In d e t e r m in a c y 205

12.1 Kinds o f am biguity 205

12.2 Puns and word-play 209
12.2.1 Technical variations 210
12.2.2 In defence o f the pun 212
12.3 O pen interpretation 214
12.3.1 Sources o f multiple and indeterminate signifi­
cance 215
12.3.2 The analogy o f visual arts 217
12.3.3 Seeking the optimal interpretation 220
Examples for discussion 221
Notes 223

C o n c l u s io n 225
Notes 227

Suggestions for Further Reading 229

General Index 233

Index o f Sources o f Examples fo r Discussion 239

To the Memory of my Mother,
Dorothy Leech
Introduction

As a name for what this book is about, s t y l i s t i c s is perhaps unfortunately

pretentious; but there is no convenient alternative for it. I mean by ‘ stylist­
ics’ simply the study o f literary style, or, to make matters even more ex­
plicit, the study o f the use o f language in literature. W hen w e discuss
‘ style’, w e often have in mind the language o f a particular writer, a parti­
cular period, a particular genre, even a particular poem. M y plan, on the
other hand, is to disregard these limiting factors and to investigate the
general characteristics o f language, and especially the English language, as
a medium o f literary expression.

0.1 T H E ‘ L A N G . - L I T . ’ P R O B L E M

Such a course o f study, one m ay claim, is central to those subjects in a

modern curriculum (‘ English’, ‘ Germ an’, ‘ Latin’, etc.) which have as
their titles the names o f languages. W hat is entailed in these subjects, in the
case o f English almost as much as in the case o f foreign or dead languages,
is the study o f language as a complement and aid to the study o f literature.
W e generally suppose that the literature cannot be examined in any depth
apart from the language, any more than the language can be studied apart
from the literature. In the case o f foreign languages or the English language
o f remote periods, this assumption is not difficult to justify, for it is obvious
that a literary w ork cannot be properly understood without a thorough
knowledge o f the language which is its medium o f expression. But there
is a deeper reliance o f literary studies on linguistic studies than this. Most
critical discussions o f literature revolve, at some stage, round appeal to lin­
guistic evidence - that is, the evidence o f words and sentences which actually
occur on the printed page, in literary texts. The type o f critical activity
know n as ‘ practical criticism’ or ‘ explication de texte’ relies more heavily
on linguistic evidence than others. In addition, much o f the basic vocabu-
2 INTRODUCTION

lary o f literary criticism (‘ metaphor’, ‘ figurative’, ‘ antithesis’, ‘ irony*,

‘ rhythm ’, etc.) cannot be explained without recourse to linguistic notions.
As a meeting-ground o f linguistic and literary studies, stylistics is the field
within which these basic questions lie.
A ll too often it is felt that the studies o f language and literature, in Eng­
lish departments and elsewhere, pursue divergent paths, each under its ow n
momentum, and fail to cohere within a single discipline. The problem o f
integration, which, for short, has been called the ‘ lang.-lit.’ problem, has
been aggravated in m odem times by the decline o f the teaching o f r h e ­
t o r i c , 1 and o f the whole tradition o f education enshrined in the classical
'Art o f Rhetoric’ and 'Art o f Poesy’ . W hat these manuals sought to do was to
teach self-expression and literary composition through precept and the ob­
servation o f the practice o f great orators and writers. T h ey combined a
chief function o f prescription (i.e. telling the student how to perform a task)
w ith a lesser function o f description (i.e. describing how it has been done
successfully in the past). Nowadays, the emphasis has come to fall more
and more on the descriptive aspect o f literary studies - on the detailed ex­
plication o f texts - rather than on the teaching o f composition. Still sur­
viving representatives o f the rhetorical tradition today are the standard
manuals o f literary technique and o f composition. These can be useful as
reference books, but without the support o f some more solid theoretical
foundation and a deeper understanding o f language, they cannot provide
the kind o f insight which the present age requires.
There is an interesting parallel today between the decay o f traditional
rhetoric and the decay o f traditional grammar - both inherited from classic­
al times. Traditional English grammar, as taught in schools, has been
mainly prescriptive, like traditional rhetoric: that is, it has tended to lay
dow n fixed rules as to what is ‘ correct’ and ‘ incorrect’ English. N o w ,
partly through the grow ing influence o f the discipline o f general linguis­
tics, this dogmatism has been broken down, and people have become more
interested in what grammatical usage actually exists, rather than what usage
‘ ought to * exist; in other words, descriptive grammar has been replacing
prescriptive grammar. N one the less, a certain gap is felt in the educational
system, for many schoolteachers w ho have lost confidence in the traditional
grammar have not so far found a teachable replacement for it. In the same
w ay, I believe, a void exists at university level in the study and teaching
o f stylistics. It is true that general linguistics, as a vigorous and developing
field o f study, has roused the interest o f literary scholars, and that students
o f linguistics have been turning their attention more and more to the
study o f language in literature. But there has been much failure o f com ­
 INTRODUCTION 3

munication, and the goals o f literary and linguistic scholars, in approaching

literary works, have often seemed too wide apart for fruitful co-operation.
M oreover, when a traditional body o f theory falls into disrepute, the
subject itself seems to suffer a similar eclipse. Just as many people today see
no point in teaching grammar, so there is a tendency amongst some liter­
ary scholars to underestimate the importance to literary studies o f such sub­
jects as versification and rhetorical figures, and to treat them as matters o f
‘ mere technique’. It is w orth while observing that poets themselves have
generally taken ‘ technique’ very seriously: ‘ Let the neophyte know asson­
ance and alliteration, rhyme immediate and delayed, simple and poly­
phonic, as a musician w ould expect to know harmony and counterpoint
and all the minutiae o f his craft.’ 2 This advice from Ezra Pound to the
would-be creative writer might be addressed with equal fitness to any stu­
dent o f literature.

0.2 A D E S C R I P T I V E R H E T O R I C

It m ay be clear by now that what I am advocating, as one o f the best ser­

vices linguistics can at present pay to literary studies, is a ‘ descriptive rhe­
toric’. B y this I mean a body o f theory and technique devoted to the
analysis o f the characteristic features o f literary language, and to the ex­
planation o f terms in the critic’s vocabulary, where this can be done, using
the linguist’s insights at a level where they become useful to the student o f
literature. The present book, limited as it is in breadth o f scope and depth
o f detail, w ill be, I hope, a step in this direction.
It m ay be helpful, in this light, to discuss tw o much criticized aspects o f
the traditional handbook o f rhetoric. The first o f these is its preservation of,
and seeming reverence for, a vocabulary o f unnecessarily difficult technical
terms. Beside such w ell-know n words as ‘ m etaphor’ and ‘ iro n y’, as names
for rhetorical figures, are many more forbidding Greek labels like ‘ epana-
lepsis’, ‘ hom oioteleuton’ , and ‘ antistrophe’. It w ould be foolish to lay any
store by the mastery o f this cumbersome terminology in an age when the
classical languages and cultures are little studied. H owever, because such
terms have a certain currency in literary scholarship, and serve a real com ­
municative purpose, they cannot be altogether discarded. It w ould be even
more foolish, in the present age, to try to replace the classical terms by a
completely new terminology, as George Puttenham, the Elizabethan liter­
ary theorist, did in his Arte o f English Poesie.3 As a considerable part o f the
present book is concerned with what are traditionally known as ‘rhetorical
4 INTRODUCTION

figures’ or ‘ figures o f speech’,4 it is as well to bear in mind from the start

that the technical names for these figures are not sacrosanct, nor have
their definitions been laid dow n once and for all time. In fact, the defini­
tions o f rhetorical terms have always been notorious for vagueness and in­
consistency. M y main preoccupation w ill be not h ow to define these terms,
but h ow to get at the realities behind them - that is, the basic characteris­
tics o f poetic language.
Connected w ith this is a second weakness o f traditional rhetoric - its cul­
tivation o f what I am tempted to call the ‘ train-spotting ’ or ‘ butterfly-col­
lecting ’ attitude to style. This is the frame o f mind in which the identifica­
tion, classification, and labelling o f specimens o f given stylistic devices
becomes an end in itself, divorced from the higher goal o f enriching one’s
appreciation and critical understanding o f literature. The response con­
veyed b y ‘Aha, there’s an instance o f hysteron proteron is one o f satisfaction
without enlightenment. This train-spotting mentality was particularly pre­
valent in Elizabethan times,5 but its persistence to the present day is shown
in the survival in m odem textbooks o f figures like hendiadys, which w e can
value only as curiosities. Hendiadys (Greek for ‘ one-by-two ’) consists in
the use o f a co-ordinating construction where a structure o f modification
w ould be strictly appropriate: ‘ charmed by bright eyes and a w o m an ’ in­
stead o f ‘ charmed by the bright eyes o f a w o m an ’. It is so rare that I have
found no certain instance o f it in English literature.
There is danger o f train-spotting whenever anyone tries, as I do in this
book, to deal with the general properties o f poetic language, without par­
ticular attention to a given text, a given writer, or a given period. W ith
such a programme, one cannot help (except by avoiding illustrations alto­
gether) quoting short passages, lifted from their contexts, simply as in­
stances o f this or that stylistic feature. The corrective to this use o f labelled
specimens lies in the opposite approach, w hereby a student considers a
characteristic o f language only within the context o f the poem to which it
belongs, as a contribution to its total communicative effect. This is the
method o f ‘ practical criticism’.
However, both these approaches, the isolating and the synthesizing o f
stylistic effects, are necessary roads to the understanding o f language in
literature. W e cannot appreciate how a poem fits together, unless w e have
first found the means to take it to pieces. Detailed exegesis o f poems uses
up more space than this book can accommodate, so I cannot avoid a cer­
tain bias towards specimen-collecting. But in the section called ‘ Examples
for Discussion’ at the end o f each chapter, the student is invited to redress
the balance for himself, b y putting the content o f that chapter and previous
 INTRODUCTION 5

chapters to w ork on the explication o f lengthier passages o f poetry, some­

times o f w hole poems. I therefore stress at this point the importance o f
these exercises, which are indispensable to the plan o f the book.

0.3 P O E T I C L A N G U A G E A N D ‘ O R D I N A R Y ’
LANGUAGE

The investigation o f poetic language cannot proceed very far unless w e

have some notion o f the relation between the kind o f language which
occurs in poetry, and other kinds o f language. Here, i f anywhere, w e
w ould expect linguistics, as the study o f language in general, to help; for
the subject matter o f linguistics is all language - language as used not only
in literary composition, but in everyday gossip, in scientific reports, in
commercial or political persuasion, and in a multitude o f other more or
less mundane functions. The literary critic, on the other hand, concentrates
on that relatively minute, but inordinately precious body o f texts which
are thought w orth y o f preservation as ‘ literature’, to be studied for their
ow n sake, rather than for their extrinsic value as (say) guide books or politi­
cal tracts. B oth the critic and the linguist are to some extent involved in
the same task o f describing and explaining linguistic communications: but
in comparison w ith that o f the critic, the linguist’s perspective is broad and
unspecialized. His approach to literature m ay be in many ways a crude one,
but it results in generalizations and particular observations which could
not easily be made from the critic’s point o f view .
As the position o f poetic language w ith respect to ‘ ordinary’ language
is the subject for discussion in the first and second chapters, I shall merely
anticipate here themes important to this book as a whole b y observing that
the relation between the tw o is not a simple one, and has at least three as­
pects :

1. Poetic language m ay violate or deviate from the generally observed

rules o f the language in many different ways, some obvious, some subtle.
Both the means o f and motives for deviation are w orth careful study.
2. The creative writer, and more particularly the poet, enjoys a unique
freedom, amongst users o f the language, to range over all its communica­
tive resources, without respect to the social or historical contexts to which
they belong. This means, amongst other things, that the poet can draw on
the language o f past ages, or can borrow features belonging to other, non-
literary uses o f language, as Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot, for example, have
6 INTRODUCTION

made use of the English of banal, prosy conversation in some of their

poems.
3. Most of what is considered characteristic ofliterary language (for ex-
ample, the use of tropes like irony and metaphor) nevertheless has its roots
in everyday uses oflanguage, and can best be studied with some reference
to these uses.
Just as there is no firm dividing line between 'poetic' and 'ordinary'
language, so it would be artificial to enforce a clear division between the
language of poetry, considered as verse literature, and that of other literary
kinds. I shall not hesitate to make use of prose illustrations where they are
apposite, but in general the topics to be discussed can be more strikingly
exemplified by verse extracts.

0.4. A POSSIBLE MISGIVING

I shall try now to forestall a misgiving which may arise in the mind of a
reader who thinks of modem intellectual life in terms of the dichotomy of
the 'two cultures', arts and science, with literary scholarship in the one
camp and linguistics in the other. The analytic approach to literature might
appear to such a mind objective and clinical, bent on destroying the sub-
lime mysteries of poetry, and on reducing the study ofliterature to a set of
lifeless mechanical procedures.
To allay that fear, I would firstly suggest that the division between arts
and science, like that between 'lit.' and' lang.', is to be fought rather than
accepted.
Secondly, objectivity for its own sake is by no means a goal of science.
In fact, though objectivity may be a theoretical requirement of science, a
scientist (particularly in linguistics, if that is to be counted a science) in
practice can rely so much on his own intuition for discovery and on his
own judgment for corroboration, that his method of investigation may
prove hardly distinguishable from that, say, of a literary commentator.
Linguistics and literary criticism, to the extent that they are both concerned
with explaining what and how a poem communicates, perform much the
same task, but at a rather different level of abstraction.
Thirdly, insight or understanding is a much more important goal, in any
human endeavour, than being objective. Statements of objective fact (for
example, that there are eighty-two occurrences of the word the in the
fourth canto of the first book of The Faerie Queene) can be as inane in the
domain of style as anywhere else. I am fairly untroubled by the thought
 INTRODUCTION 7

that I m ay be criticized for being unobjective, unscientific, or even un-

linguistic. But i f this book fails to enlighten, and thereby to sharpen appre­
ciation o f poetry, it w ill fail utterly.

Notes

1The earlier history o f poetics and rhetoric( a subject which has often had a much
wider scope than literary technique) can be traced, in so far as they concern Eng­
lish literature, in j. w . h . A t k i n s ’s volumes Literary Criticism in Antiquity, Vols. I
and II, Cambridge, 1934; English Literary Criticism: the Medieval Phase, Cam ­
bridge, 1943; and English Literary Criticism: the Renaissance, London, 1947.
Relatively modem representatives o f the rhetorical tradition are A. b a i n , English
Composition and Rhetoric, London, etc., 1887; and s i r h . g r i e r s o n , Rhetoric and
English Composition, London, 1944. The ‘ rhetoric and composition* type o f
textbook has flourished independently in the U S A up to the present day. See,
for example, c. b r o o k s and r . p . w a r r e n , Fundamentals of Good Writing: a Hand­
book of Modern Rhetoric, London, 1952.
2 e . p o u n d , ‘ Retrospect*, in Modern Poets on Modern Poetry, ed. j. s c u l l y , Fontana
Library, 1966, 33.
3 See g . p u t t e n h a m , Arte of English Poesie, ed. g . d . w i l l c o c k and A. w a l k e r , Cam ­
bridge, 1936. Puttenham coined such homespun terms as cuckoo-spell (for epi-
zeuxis), over-reacher (for hyperbole), and insertour (for parenthesis).
4 ‘ Figures o f speech* is here used in a loose, modern sense. In the past this expres­
sion has been used more narrowly in a sense corresponding to schemes (see §5.1),
and so has excluded devices such as metaphor or hyperbole.
5 Consider, for example, a gloss by the Elizabethan commentator ‘E .K .’ on a pas­
sage from the January Eclogue o f Spenser*s The Shepheardes Calender: ‘ a pretty
Epanorthosis in these tw o verses, and withal a Paronomasia or playing with the
w o r d .. . .*