Article

Name: “Sounds, ellipses, parentheses…”: punctuation marks as expressive means in poetry

Authors: Elena K. Nikolaeva, Elena I. Seliverstova

St. Petersburg State University, St. Petersburg, Russian Federation

In the section Linguistics

Abstract:

The graphic units of the cultural code, such as commas, periods, ellipsis, parenthesis, and others, have clearly defined functions in a language. They allow placing logical accents within a sentence, formatting the grammatical structure of a complex sentence, and expressing the intonational properties of a sentence. In fiction, not only the choice, frequency, and usage of punctuation marks are aesthetically motivated. Also, the actual words denoting these marks become the object of the author’s reflection, with their content merged with the conceptual world of a prosaic or a poetical text. In poetic language, punctuation marks are used to transform concepts into vivid imagery and to re-imagine the customary in a creative manner. The outer form of the punctuation symbols can be variously conceptualized in a text, allowing analogies to be drawn with various objects or even the poetic persona. For instance, a comma can be compared to a fetus in a mother’s womb. Examining various associations of punctuation marks in poetic language shows a wide range of possible interpretations by the poets. These interpretations include: a period is a signal not only of finality and irreversibility but also of hopelessness and even death; brackets stand for inclusion or expulsion, excommunication, incompleteness; an ellipsis is a symbol of something unfinished or unclear but also of hope, perseverance, and perspective. Grammatical, intonational, and semantic functions help forge individual authors’ usage, which is no longer directly connected to the graphic code alone.

Keywords: punctuation marks, dot, ellipsis, comma, brackets, poetic text, image

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