Lecture Literary criticism - Lecture 17: Function of poetry

FUNCTION OF POETRY

•

•
•

Wordsworth found some meaning in human life,if human beings
lived in close proximity to nature and allowed it would begin its
influence to sink into their soul.he thought that oral elevation
and spiritual edification of man was not possible in the humdrum
life of towns and cities.
Rustic people lead a life of primal simplicity in constant
communication with nature.
He decided to deal with the lives of cadgers and rustic instead
of politicians and statesmen stupefied with victory and in toxified
with glory and power.He refuses to glorify lives of kings and
princes and men belonging to higher strata of society,because
in their lives he found an artificiality that he despised.


•
•

•

He chose rustic life for poetic treatment in that condition of
life”essential passion of the heart finds a better soil”.
He showed much independence of mind as reflecting the
traditional subjects derived by his predecessors fro the
fashionable social life.

By his own temperament he was prone to be attracted by things
of elemental simplicity and necessary Corollary to the choice of
subjects from the low rural life,he decided to use the language
of common people as the vehicle of poetic expression rejecting
the artificial diction of the 18th century.


•

•

•
•

Wordsworth rejected the “guardian and insane phraseology of
many modern writers”.He insists that his poems contain little
poetic diction and are written in a “selection of the real language
of men in a state of vivid sensation”,
Wordsworth defined the employment of meter in poetry as a
protest against the use of poetic diction”whereas in the matter of
poetic diction,Wordsworth breaks with the orthodox convention
of his days and return to the natural diction of normal men.
In te matter of meter he appeals to the tradition.
The concurring testimony of the ages he says has established
the laws of meter and all reasonable people submit to them and
acknowledge them as superadded charm.


• Wordsworth says that in his poems he has dealt with
great and universal passion of men,the most general

and interesting of their occupations,as the entire
world of nature before him.
• He could have written in prose as well but he decided
to write in meter for the sake of charm.
• Pleasure is clear from the fact that poems written on
humbler subjects and in more naked and simpler
language have continued to give pleasure from
generation to generation.


•
•

•

•

While defining the meter the end of poetry is to produce
excitement to coexistence with an overbalance of pleasure.
This excitement is an unusual state of mind.In that state of
excitement,ideas and feelings do not follow each other in the
usual regular order;the expressions of ideas and feelings
appear to be incoherent.
Again if the words by which this excitement is produced are
powerful,then there is some danger that excitement maybe
carried beyond its proper bounds.
Therefore in order to restrain and temper the ideas and feelings
in the state of excitement meter is essential it restrains the
unusual state of mind.

• There are four stages of process of poetic creation.
(i)observation
(ii)recollection
(iii)contemplation
(iv)imaginative excitement
• The poet observes certain character,situation or phenomenon of
nature.This observation excites in his certain emotions.He does not
give poetic expression to their immediately but carry them in heart for
sometime.
• After the years he recollects these emotions in tranquility,contemplates
upon them and revive his original emotional excitement.
• The emotions thus revived are purged of all that was
accidental,temporary and super flows.
• Finally this emotional excitement is given poetic expression.This is the
process of poetic creation which gives joy both to the poet and the
reader.


THE NATURE OF POETIC
TRUTH


• Aristotle has rightly said that poetry is most
philosophical of all writings.Poetic truth is higher than
the truth of history or philosophy.It’s object is truth not
individual and local but general and operative.
• History deals with the particular and philosophy with
the universal,but poetry deals with both particular and
universal.

• Poetry aims at universal truths and also aim at them
through particular examples.


POETRY AN IMAGE OF MAN &
NATURE
• Wordsworth has stated that poetry is the image of
man and nature.It aims at truth to nature at the
faithful reproduction of reality.
• There are many obstacles in the way of historian and
the philosopher,whereas the poet has to encounter
only one obstacle and that is the necessity of giving
immediate pleasure to a human being.The historian’s
task is difficult because he has to collect facts from
history before interpreting them correctly.


THE END OF POETRY
•

•
•
•

Wordsworth has stated that the end of poetry is to impact
immediate pleasure,This should not be considered as the
degradation of the poet’s art.It should be rather considered as
an acknowledgment of the beauty of the universe and as a
homage paid to the dignity of man.
It should be considered as an act of poet who looks at the world

in the spirit of love.
Pleasure is the ground elementary principle which makes man
feel,live,move and gain knowledge.
We carry sympathy in our heart because through sympathy we
get pleasure.When we sympathize with those who are in pain
and suffering,we get inner pleasure.We endeavor to acquire
knowledge because knowledge gives pleasure.


• The poet studies man in his ordinary life;he studies
elemental nature,instincts and impulses of man.
• He studies man and the external objects that
surround as acting and reacting upon each other and
which produce are infinite complexity of pain and
pleasure.
• He studies man with his complex ideas and
sensations,convictions,institutions and deductions.
• Through his sympathy with the objects of nature i-e
gains the knowledge,which ultimately result in an
“overbalance of enjoyment”.


POETRY & SCIENCE
•
•

•

•
•

Wordsworth states that the poet prompted by the feelings of
pleasure converses with affections and with general nature.
The scientists who work hard in the search for truth also finds
pleasure in truth.The knowledge of both the pot and the man of
science is pleasure.
But the knowledge or truth that the scientist realize is particular
and personal.This truth comes to him slowly and cannot be
shared by mankind in general.
The pleasure which this truth provides is limited to the individual
scientist only.He cherishes and loves it in solitude.
The poet on the other hand sings a song in which all human
being join him.His poetic truth is universal.


THE EFFECT OF THE POETIC TRUTH
• Wordsworth believed in the poetic truth.He does not
wish to separate poetry and science entirely.
• He opposes poetry to what he regarded as the
scientific mode of apprehension.
• Scientific knowledge he thought was “remote” from
human interests and feelings.
• By contrast the impact of poetic truth was
immediate”not standing upon external testimony but
carried alive into the heart by passion”and conveyed
in an “atmosphere of sensation”.


WORDSWORTH ON SCIENCE
• Wordsworth praised science”that raised the mind to

contemplation of God”,but he despised”all science
which was a bare collection of facts for their own
sake.”
• In Wordsworth’s judgment,such science”waged was
with and wished to extinguish imagination in the mind
of man.”
• His chief aim was therefore,to preserve the
independence of imaginative power,to keep it free
from the tyranny of naked fact.


SUPERIORITY OF POETRY
• Wordsworth believed that the knowledge provided by
science is superficial and intellectual.The scientist
study only the appearance of things.He murders to
dissect.
• The poet on the other hand,studies the inner reality of
man-the soul of man.
• The inner reality of man that he discovers is charged
with feelings and emotions.Wordsworth sees organic
unity between man and nature.Both man and nature
are part and parcel of God.The realization of this
universal truth gives pleasure to heart and mind.


SUBJECT MATTER OF POETRY
• Wordsworth considered that man is the most suitable
and fit subject for poetic composition and he felt that
if a poet did not leave behind a proud record of
creative work dealing with the human life he was not

worthy to be ranked among the first rate poets.
• So far his poetic inspiration he turned to man.Few
modern poets have embodied in their work,whether
by statement or by implication,so firm a sense of the
dignity or worth of the common individual man


• Wordsworth realized that essential passion of human
heart exist in a greater state of simplicity in the
humble and rustic condition as compared to the
sophisticated city life.
• The elementary human feelings are more accurately
contemplated and more forcefully.
• Communicated in humble and rustic conditions of life.
• In the scenario the essential passions and
elementary feelings of man existed in a condition of
free association.


• Wordsworth argues that the manners f the rustic life
which originate from the elementary feelings are
more durable and can be easily comprehended.
• In rustic condition the human passions are
associated with beautiful and permanent form of
nature and as such are nobler and lasting as
compared to the passions of men belonging to the
sophisticated societies.
• Without this inexhaustible source of objective beauty
in the conditions of life,no beauty of language or
thought can develop.

• Wordsworth has used language and situations from
low and rustic life because in low and rustic life man
is more simple,more direct,nearer to his elemental
passions and less affected and artificial in the way he
expresses his passion.
• Poetry does not require specifically poetic subjects.It
does not deal with the grand and the dignified or the
sensational,but with permanent enduring interests of
the human heart.


• Nature exists in the pure and elemental state in the
midst of nature.Man is at his best when he lives a life
of primal simplicity in constant communion with
nature.The farther travels from nature,the more
miserable he becomes.