诗歌欣赏

Characterisation The method an author uses to acquaint the reader with his characters. An author may use any of all of four different methods of characterization: a, he may describe the character’s physical traits and personality. b, he may show the character’s speech and behavior. c, he may give the opinions and reactions of other characters toward this individual. d, he may show the character’s thoughts and feelings. Conflict 　　Every story, novel or play develops around a struggle or conflict. Sometimes the conflict may be obvious, as in some westerns in which the only conflict is the struggle between the good guys and the bad guys. In a more complicated western, besides the obvious conflict with the villain, the hero may have to struggle with a wild animal or a fierce blizzard or he may have to struggle with his conscience. In other words, he may be involved in several conflicts. 　　Conflicts in literature are of two general types: 　1) external conflict, in which the character or main figure (sometimes an animal or group) struggle against another character, nature or society; and 　2) internal conflict; in which the character struggles against some element of his own personality (his conscience or code of values, for example). Varieties of Suspense and Expectation 　　Stories hold our attention by creating an atmosphere of suspense around the characters and events. We turn the pages because we want to learn what happens next. Suspense creates expectation through the holding back of information; there is a promise of revelation to come. Sometimes the promise is implicit in the situation: the two men are fighting to the death and we read on to see who will win. In other cases, the author may subtly prepare the ground for us through foreshadowing-that is, passing along cues and hints about what will happen. ［Supplementary Reading］ Making contact with fictional world 　　The reading of fiction is at once simpler and more demanding than more other kinds of reading. Reading fiction-as opposed, say to reading works of history or social science-is simpler because the work itself often has a natural appeal; involvement in the subject brings absorption. Fiction is rooted in the writer’s deep desire to seduce, compel, or enchant the reader. The work’s natural terrain in human nature, a subject in which we all have some stake, and its aim is, among other things, to shed some new light on our shared experience. A story or novel may pose difficulties and require our closest attention, but it seldom forces us against the grain of our natural curiosity. If we can open ourselves up, strike a receptive posture, the work will carry us forward. We will read on because we want to know what happens next, or because we sense that we are learning something that my help us to understand our own experience. 　　But reading fiction can also be more challenging, and call for more concentration, than other kinds of reading. The language is often used differently; it asks more of us. We have to pay heed not only to the what of the story but also to the how. Most of the time-when we race through a report in the daily newspaper or work through a chapter in a textbook-we turn the pages for the sake of information. We read words for the denotative value, what might be called their dictionary meaning; we strip off the facts and ideas and move on. We do not expect an article in a news magazine to use ambiguous language or significant kinds of rhythmic variation. 　　But as soon as we look at a more imaginative piece of writing, we meet a new set of requirements. To read literature we must be ready to understand language in both its denotative and connotative-or suggestive-uses. And reading becomes necessarily more demanding. Suddenly we pay attention not only to the meanings of words, but to their associations as well. Moreover, we have to read the author’s tone, looking for clues about how to interpret the actions and speeches of the characters. We watch out for images that might signal deeper thematic meanings. And we listen to the sentences themselves, hearing cues in rhythms and changes of rhythm. Silence and concentration are essential. Imagery 　　Concret details that appeal to the senses. By using specific images, an author establishes mood and arouse emotion in his readers. 　　To make his imaginary world seem real to his readers, an author often makes uses of words and phrases which appeal to the senses. These words and phrases, called images, help the reader mentally see, hear, smell, feel, and taste much of what the characters experience. In this way he becomes involved in the world of the literary selection. Setting 　　The time and place in which the events of a narrative occur. The place may be a region, a city or town, or even a house or room. The time may be a period in history, a particular time of year, or perhaps, a certain time of day. The setting may be specific and detailed, and introduced at the very beginning of the story, or it may be merely suggested through the use of details scattered throughout the story. an author can suggest the setting by references to articles of clothing, famous historical figures, well-known landmarks, or through the dialect and speech patterns of the characters which he created. Not all stories have a setting in which both the time and place are identifiable. In some stories, the setting is vital to the narrative; it may have an effect on the events of the plot, or reveal character, or create a certain atmosphere. in other stories, the setting is relatively unimportant; the story could have happened almost anywhere or at any time. Alliteration 　　Repeated consonant sound occurring at the beginnings of words and within words as well. alliteration is used to create melody, establish mood, call attention to important words, and point out similarities and contrast. 　　Alliteration in poetry give pleasure. The repeated sounds help to create melody, which is pleasant to the ear. But a good poet seldom uses alliteration simply because he thinks his readers will enjoy the repeated sounds. Alexander pope, a respected eighteenth-century english poet, said, “ the sound must be an echo to the sense,” and capable poets follow pope’s rule. How sound can echo sense, or meaning, is demonstrated very clearly in these lines: 　　The moan of doves in immemorial elms,and murmuring of innumerable bees. 　　Here the repeated m sound is an echo of the murmuring of doves and hum of bees. 　　Alliteration can be used to call attention to important words in a poem, it can point out contrasts: 　　He was haughty, she was humble, 　　He was loathed, she was loved. 　　The sounds produced by alliteration can also affect the mood of a poem: 　　She sent the gentle sleep from heaven, 　　That slid into my soul. 　　In these lines, the repeat s sound help create a calm effect. Rhyme 　　The repetition of syllable sound. End words that share a particular sound are called end rhymes. Rhyming words within a line of poetry are called internal rhymes. 　　When used in a poem, end rhymes set up a definite pattern of sounds, a rhyme scheme. you can chart a rhyme scheme with letters of alphabet by using the same letter for end words that rhyme. Theme 　　The underlying meaning of a literary work, a general truth about life and mankind. A theme may be stated or implied. Tone 　　The stated or implied attitude of an author toward his subject in a particular literary work. The author reveals his attitude, whether it is one of anger, sadness, amusement, joy, defiance, or some other emotion or may be a combination of several different emotions , such as anger and pity, through his choice of words and details. Sometimes an author will state directly how he feels about a character, a situation or an idea. Robert Burns 　　The second author we shall briefly examine is robert burns. Robert burns (1759-1796), 苏格兰大诗人，农民出身，在田间劳动了大半生，后为生活所逼做税关职员，曾因同情法国革命受上级传讯。一生经济困难，三十七岁时即于贫病交加中死去。他从小爱好吟哦，稍长用苏格兰方言写诗，1786年诗集Poems, chiefly in the scottish dialect出版，受到苏格兰文坛的普遍称赏。后又长期在业余从事苏格兰民间歌谣的搜集、整理工作，大量将近失传的民歌靠他的努力得以保存，这是robert burns在文学史上的伟大功绩之一。他本人的诗更是开文学史上的新页，最出色的是根据民歌调子写的短诗，其中包括以 “a red, red rose”为代的大量的爱情诗。 　　activity 2中出现的“a red, red rose”是彭斯爱情诗里最有名的一首，作于1794年，发表于1796年。它原来也有几个苏格兰民歌的本子，经过彭斯加工、改写，才去掉它们的芜杂和庸俗，集中它们的精华，成为现在这样的抒情绝唱。它清新，咏美人而无一丝脂粉气；它明白如画，但又有足够的份量与深度，经得起不断玩味、思索；它自然，但又有完整的形式；诗中叠字复句的运用更有无限匠心，尤其第八、九两行—till a’ the seas gang dry—的重复是意味深长的天才之笔，因为这一重复出现在全诗的正中，划分了而又衔接了两个不同的境界：前八行是你我之间的恋爱，只牵涉两人，情调虽热烈而轻快；后八行则将岩石、海洋和太阳都卷了进来，爱情有了一个宇宙背景，不仅空间扩大，时间上也延长了；最后又回到原来的两人，这时爱情深化了，人生经验也丰富了，于是结句—tho’ it were ten thousand mile! ╟ 在我们读者面前展开了一条千里万里的尘土和风雪的旅途，但是行人不论怎样遥远，却一定要回来，会回来，因为经过这样上天入地，爱情是经受得起一切考验了。从一朵红红的玫瑰开始，以通到天涯海角去的大路作结，其间有转折，有深化，显示出对于爱情的高度洞察力，唯有民歌才能供给这样深厚的感情和成熟的智慧作为再创造的基础，唯有天才诗人才能从这基础出发，写出如此新鲜、如此深情的不朽诗篇！（王佐良：《英国文学名篇选注》，p. 638） A red, red rose 　　This is one of burns’ popular love lyrics and is also a good example of how the poet made use of old scottish folk poetry and created immortal lines by revising the old folk material. The extreme simplicity of the language and the charming rhythmic beat of the verse express better than anything else the poet’s true sentiments toward his beloved. 　　The verse is essentially in the metrical form of the ballad stanza, i.E., quatrains with alternate lines of four and three feet and with rimes falling on the second and fourth lines of each stanza. The elements of the drama 　　In drama, as in fiction, the vital elements should include the theme, the setting, the characterization, the plot and the dialogue. Theme 　　The success of a play depends largely upon the subject or theme chosen. The theme is sum total of what a play has to say. It is the basic and informing idea. And this subject must as aristotle tells us, have a certain magnitude and it must have a beginning, a middle, and an end. The theme may sometimes be necessarily not an idea, an abstraction, or a principle, but rather an environment, a social phenomena of one sort or another. Setting 　　The setting of a play may be regarded merely as the place where the action occurs. It is the provision of an environment that will not only be appropriate to the action but also augments imaginatively the total effect of the action. It may be interpreted more broadly to mean the summation of many of the external forces influencing the characters. It may either be the background against which the characters move, in such a way as to explain their natures and their deeds. The chief function of setting is to forward the action to aid in characterization and to supply an appropriate atmosphere. Characterization in drama 　　Characterization in the drama is what people reveal about themselves in what they do, what they allow to happen to themselves, and how they react to other people or to what happens. 　　The dramatist is strictly limited in his means of presenting his characters. He can show them only as they appear to his associates. He can put them before us only by what they say and by what they do; and he cannot explain or extenuate any word or any deed. These things must speak for themselves, since the dramatist is forced to keep himself out of his story and since he is denied all privilege of comment. In spite of this limitation of his methods of presenting character, the dramatist makes a virtue of necessity and brings before us human beings who declare themselves clearly by what they say and by what they do. 　　Characterization may be made through description of the character’s appearance and mannerisms and through the revelation of the character through speech and action, through what the characters say and what he does and does not do. The extent to which the character may reveal himself through what he says is almost infinite. His opinion of himself-whether exalted or humble, excessively subjective and objective, extravagant or accurate is revealed by his speech. The dialogue, in this connection, plays a great part in disclosing what the character thinks of the other characters and how he feels toward them: his opinions of other characters will throw light on his own intelligence, judgment, ethical and cultural demands. This is characterization by opinion. And finally, the character’s speeches provide insight into his scales of values-selfish or altruistic, idealistic or cynical, moral or immoral, religious or irreligious-and reveal what values constitute his life goal, and whether that life goal is materialistic or idealistic, superficial or profound. Plot 　　The plot is the most essential element in a play because it is the hardest to isolate, to see separately, although taken in its widest sense, it is the most distinct and the most final in its effect. 　　The plot is also meant the plan or skeleton framework of incident or detail; it is the growing organism in which all parts have a vital correspondence with each other, and together give the whole its living character. 　　A plot is not a good story unless it is an interpretation of life. ［Supplementary Reading］ Making contact with drama 　　In studying the drama it may be well to observe the relation of the drama with other literary forms-just what characteristics the drama shares with other literary forms. We will then be ready to see precisely wherein it differs from them and how it goes about meeting its own particular problems. 　　The basic distinction between fiction and drama is that fiction is written to be read-silently or aloud-and drama is written to be acted. In fiction we read what characters say and do; in the acted drama, we hear what the characters say and see what they do. 　　To understand further the special ways in which drama works it will do well to compare it with poetry. Drama and poetry are both concerned with presenting situations which will be meaningful. Poetry uses imagery, rhythm, symbols, statements, as the words of the author or of some character, spoken to himself or to someone else. The drama depends almost entirely on what people do and say to each other. 　　Summing up, we find that a vast amount of materials are accessible to fiction and poetry which are not accessible to the drama. We find that in the drama as in both fiction and poetry, there can be none of the direct description-of persons, places, sounds, sights, and smells. The absence of a technique of description will account partly for the fact that, in general, the drama is much less free than fiction in making changes in place. In the drama there can be no direct comments and philosophizing by the author, on the meaning of an action, a situation, an expression, a gesture, and so on. Thus in the drama one whole method of giving clues, of suggesting deeper and richer meaning is out. In the drama there can be little use of action that in purely mental or psychological; some direct mental probing can be done as in shakespeare’s soliloquies but in general this has to be occasional and subordinate. Also in the drama, attention is focused in a relatively small area of human experience and hold there firmly until it has been completely explored. There is restricted action and every stroke must count. Sound and sense in poetry 　　Reading poetry can be an uncanny experience. The sounds and rhythms affect the reader in an almost bodily way; the contents, meanwhile, reach the mental and emotional self. At certain lucky moments, the poet is able to bring sound and meaning into a relation that sends a shiver up the reader’s spine. This is what emily dickinson meant when she said a real poem made her feel as though the top of her head were coming off. This is the reason that a poem cannot be validly summarized-the meaning may be noted, but not the experience of the meaning. 　　The connections between sound and meaning in poetry can be elusive. Sounds can, for example, be combined in ways that stimulate meaning. Read the lines from john keats’s justly celebrated to autumn? 　　Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, 　　Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun; 　　Conspiring with him how to load and bless 　　With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run; 　　To bend with apples the mossd cottage-trees, 　　And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core; 　　To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells 　　With a sweet kernel; to set budding more, 　　And still more, later flowers for the bees, 　　Until they think warm days will never cease, 　　For summer has oer-brimmd their clammy cells. 　　What a feast for the ear! The slow, languorous unfolding of mellow fruitfulness, the density of mossd cottage trees, the sweet explosion of plumg, and the sticky sensation of excess in oer-brimmd their clammy cells. These are not poetic accidents, but the hard-won fruits of the poet’s wrestle with the language. 　　All iteration, assonance, onomatopoeia are all poets tools to make sound function in a poem. 　　Read the following sonnet by william shakespeare and think about the questions following the poem. 　　Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore, 　　So do our minutes hasten to their end; 　　Each changing place with that which goes before, 　　In sequent toil all forwards do contend. 　　Nativity, once in the main of light, 　　Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crownd, 　　Crooked eclipses gainst his glory fight, 　　And time that gave doth now his gift confound. 　　Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth 　　And delves the parallels in beauty brow, 　　Feeds on the rarities of nature’s truth, 　　And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow: 　　And yet to times in hope my verse shall stand, 　　Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand. Questions 1. Find the alliteration in the first two lines and comment upon its connection to the sense of the words. 2. How does the word pebbled in the first line help to enact the sensation appropriate to the description? Substitute the words rocky and ’sandy and explain what difference the word choice makes. 3. What function do the alliteration in lines 6 and 7 have in the sonnet? 4. Comment on the particular appropriateness of the alliteration in line 10. Does it have any visual suggestion? If so, what? How to read drama 　　Everyone enjoys seeing exciting plays. But reading them can be just as pleasurable. all it requires is the active use of your imagination. Like a novel, short story or narrative poem, a play has a tale to tell, but its story is not so much told as shown. Learn to visualize and you have learned how to read a play. 　　Imagine people sitting in the theatre blindfolded. Think how much they would miss. they would never see the stage settings, nor would they see the actors. The costumes, the gestures, the expressions on actors face， any important pantomime-all would be lost. 　　Dont be blindfolded when you read plays. Keep your eyes and ears open to all that is presented. Even when you read silently you can train yourself to see and hear in your imagination. 1. Stage set 　　The curtain goes up and you have a stage set before you. Probably it is the interior of a room. It may be carefully furnished, with an emphasis on realistic detail, or it may be sparsely furnished, more suggestive than explicit. Whatever its style, you look at this stage set and you register impressions, much as you do when you visit any place for the first time. From these impressions you draw certain conclusions about the kind of people who live in this room or the kind of action that might take place there. Sample: A play opens with the following stage directions: 　　The scene is the kitchen in the farmhouse of john wright, a gloomy kitchen, abandoned without having been put in order-the walls covered with a faded wall papar… running along the left wall from the shed door is an old iron sink and sink shelf, in which is set a hand pump and an uncurtained window. Near the window is an old wooded rocker. Center-stage is an unpainted wooden kitchen table with straight chairs on either side. 　　At the very beginning you are presented with a hard-working, practical, cheerless approach to living. You might guess that the people who u