[lit-ideas] Anacolouthon: A Griceian Approach
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 16 Apr 2012 13:01:26 -0400 (EDT)
To be developed at some time... Some feedback to L. K. Helm. The wiki
assimilates the anacolouthon (surely not an apodoton) with a 'malaprop'.
Davidson discusses malaprop alla Grice in "A nice derangement of epitaphs".
Humpty Dumpty, saying, "There's glory for you" can NOT mean that there's a nice
knockdown argument for Alice. On the other hand, Malaprop CAN mean there is
a nice arrangment of epithets by what she did utter. Etc. -- Cheers,
Speranza
----
From wiki:
"An anacoluthon ( /ænəkəˈluːθɒn/ AN-ə-kə-LOO-thon; from the Greek,
anakolouthon, from an-: 'not' + akolouthos: 'following') is a rhetorical device
that can be loosely defined as a change of syntax within a sentence. More
specifically, anacoluthons (or "anacolutha") are created when a sentence
abruptly changes from one structure to another. Grammatically, anacoluthon is
an error; however, in rhetoric it is a figure that shows excitement,
confusion, or laziness. In poetics it is sometimes used in dramatic monologues
and in verse drama. In prose, anacoluthon is often used in stream of
consciousness writing, such as that of James Joyce, because it is
characteristic
of informal human thought."
"In its most restrictive meaning, anacoluthon requires that the
introductory elements of a sentence lack a proper object or complement. For
example,
if the beginning of a sentence sets up a subject and verb, but then the
sentence changes its structure so that no direct object is given, the result
is anacoluthon. Essentially, it requires a change of subject or verb from the
stated to an implied term. The sentence must be "without completion"
(literally what "anacoluthon" means). A sentence that lacks a head, that
supplies instead the complement or object without subject, is anapodoton."
"As a figure, anacoluthon directs a reader's attention, especially in
poetry, to the syntax itself and highlights the mechanics of the meaning
rather
than the object of the meaning. It can, therefore, be a distancing
technique in some poetry."
EXAMPLES:
Agreements entered into when three states of facts exists – are they to be
maintained regardless of changing conditions? (John George Diefenbaker)
Had ye been there – for what could that have done? (John Milton in Lycidas)
William Shakespeare uses anacoluthon in his history plays such as in this
(Henry V IV iii 346-6):
"Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host, That he which hath no
stomach to this fight, Let him depart."
Additionally, Conrad Aiken's Rimbaud and Verlaine has an extended
anacoluthon as it discusses anacoluthon:
"Discussing, between moves, iamb and spondee Anacoluthon and the open
vowel God the great peacock with his angel peacocks And his dependent peacocks
the bright stars..."
"The word anacoluthon is a transliteration of the Greek ἀνακόλουθον
(anakólouthon), which derives from the privative prefix ἀν- (an-) and the
root adjective ἀκόλουθος (akólouthos), "following". This, incidentally,
is precisely the meaning of the Latin phrase non sequitur in logic. However,
in Classical rhetoric anacoluthon was used both for the logical error of
non sequitur and for the syntactic effect or error of changing an expected
following or completion to a new or improper one."
"The term "anacoluthon" is used primarily within an academic context. It
is most likely to appear in a study of rhetoric or poetry. For example The
King's English, an English style guide written by H.W. Fowler and F.G.
Fowler mentions it as a major grammatical mistake."
"We can hardly conclude even so desultory a survey of grammatical
misdemeanours as this has been without mentioning the most notorious of all.
The
anacoluthon is a failure to follow on, an unconscious departure from the
grammatical scheme with which a sentence was started, the getting switched off,
imperceptibly to the writer, very noticeably to his readers, from one
syntax track to another."
"The term does occasionally appear in popular media as well. The word,
though not the underlying meaning (see malapropism), has been popularized, due
to its use as an imprecation by Captain Haddock in the English
translations of The Adventures of Tintin series of books."
See also
Figure of speech
Rhetoric
Anacoluthon is sometimes (wrongly) confused with anacoloutha, a term that
denotes metaphorical substitutions.
References
Aiken, Conrad. Selected Poems. London: OUP, 2003. 141.
Brown, Huntington and Albert W. Halsall. "Anacoluthon" in Alex Preminger
and T.V.F. Brogan, eds., The New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and
Poetics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993. 67-8.
Smyth, Herbert Weir (1920). Greek Grammar. Cambridge MA: Harvard
University Press. pp. 671–673. ISBN 0-674-36250-0.
[edit] External links
Silva Rhetoricae reference
Categories: Poetics
Rhetoric
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In a message dated 4/16/2012 2:49:33 P.M. UTC-02,
lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx writes:
Back on May 20, 2010 in a fit of frustration over Heidegger’s Nazi
involvement I wrote a little poetic fable called “Tarkegger’s Culpability”:
http://www.lawrencehelm.com/2010/05/tarkeggers-culpability.html
Two days later I wrote “Tarkegger, Heidegger, Foucault, Hayden White, etc.”
:
http://www.lawrencehelm.com/2010/05/tarkegger-heidegger-foucault-hayden.html
At the end of which I wrote “. . . I began wondering what sort of
"trope" White would call "Tarkegger." I rarely consider such things as
tropes, but White would have. Would White call it "irony"? Perhaps, but I
wasn't feeling ironic when I wrote it. But had history developed as
portrayed in "Tarkegger's Culpability," its reflection upon Heidegger's
"infantile
hopes for the future" and "faith in a benign [German] human nature" might
have seemed ironic to the survivors -- although by that time some other
trope might seem more appropriate, something more malign and involving a
ravenous pack of wolves.”
Hayden White read those two articles and commented,
“Tarkegger? It is an anacolouthon.”
I wondered what trope White would apply to Tarkegger the person, but on a
first reading I took White to be applying “anacoluthon” to the fable and
not the person. Given that reading, any fable would be an anacoluthon in
that it isn’t going to follow logically from the concept that gave rise to
it. It will jump into another sphere which will have a connection, hopefully
not too tenuous, to the jumping off place.
On the second reading I took White to be applying “anacoluthon” to both
Tarkegger and Heidegger in the sense that there is no logical connection
between them and the conclusions critics have drawn about them. To draw the
conclusion more clearly he would be saying that there is a disconnect, an
anacoluthon, between the evidence that exists about Heidegger’s Nazi
involvement and the conclusions his critics have drawn. If that is what White
intends then he would be interpreting my fable as I intended.
On a third reading and with the Deconstructionists in mind White might be
saying that there is a disconnect between what Heidegger actually thought
and did and my interpretation of what he thought and did. My fable in this
sense would be an anacoluthon because it didn’t follow from the historical
evidence. I can’t be sure that White didn’t intend this third
interpretation – I hope he didn’t, but if he did I would in my own defense
refer him
to my earlier articles on Heidegger in which I accuse his critics (with
better evidence I will assert) of this very thing.
On a fourth reading I wondered whether White was referring more generally
to the difficulty of interpreting history based upon not-fully-understood
culture. Those who comment upon Heidegger’s Nazi associations make
assumptions about the cultural influences that inspired Heidegger. Some of
those
who assert the worst imagine those cultural influences to be not dissimilar
from those that inspired the Nazis themselves. Those willing to view
Heidegger’s politics as being similar to Thomas Carlyle’s, engage in a more
benign interpretation. All these interpretations whether favorable or
unfavorable are anacoluthons in the sense that there is a disconnect between
the
existing evidence and what is concluded about Heidegger’s character and
politics. The gap is bridged by the prejudices of his critics.
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