Echoing Ideas in Discourse on Poetics: From Lowth's parallelismus membrorum to Porthan's rhythmus sensus (original) (raw)
Related papers
Word upon a Word": Parallelism, Meaning, and Emergent Structure in Kalevala-meter Poetry
Oral Tradition, 2017
Henrik Gabriel Porthan, the Professor of Eloquence at the Academy of Turku in Finland, was one of the first scholars to describe the nature and effect of parallelism in Finnish vernacular poetry. In 1766 he designated these poems sung in a meter used widely in Baltic-Finnic languages as Runis nostris ("our poems") (Porthan 1867:320). The appropriation of this multiethnic poetic tradition culminated in the publication of Elias Lönnrot's Kalevala (1835 and 1849), the national epic of Finland that he created by using the Runis nostris, or oral poems collected in Finland, Karelia, and Ingria, as his sources. Since Lönnrot, the meter became known, somewhat anachronistically, as the Kalevala-meter. Porthan (1867:323) described parallelism as rhythmus sensus, a harmonious structuring of meaning, or of "thoughts and notions" in poetry. This harmonious configuration which he called rime du sens ("rhyme of sense") had an impact on the aesthetics and expressive efficacy of the poem (323) It lent these poems "a kind of sumptuousness, and altogether splendid vigor. The mind of the reader or listener is certainly affected more intensely, when it is as if hammered repeatedly" (320). 1 Adding to this performative and affective momentum, parallelism results in a cumulative string of ideas that is simultaneously precise and verbose (320): [A]n idea is not only expressed with a simple clause but also presented and highlighted with two or, if needed, even more lines, so that the phrasing in each is different [. .. ]. And when the idea of the first line is finalized by repetition, it is linked to another, which is similarly repeated, and so on. As Porthan noted (325), each line must contain a "complete idea or part of a clause"-"The idea may never end otherwise than together with the line, and a word belonging to the idea cannot be transferred to the next line." Because enjambment was undesirable, it was the flexible patterning of parallelism that made the poem a cohesive continuum, binding the lines to each other and eventually into a longer sequence. The serial structure only appears to be mechanical (Porthan Oral Tradition, 31/2 (2017): 259-292 1 The English translations by the present author are based on a comparative reading of two Finnish translations (Porthan 1904 and 1983) with the original in Latin (originally 1766-78, reprinted in Porthan 1867). References refer to the 1867 edition in Latin. Although Porthan uses the word rhythmus (literally, "rhythm") he is not talking about rhythm in the modern sense of the word.
On the Nature of Poetry, Parallelism, and Methods: A Response to Ernst Wendland
Journal of Translation, 2024
This article is a response to Ernst Wendland's article-also in this issue of Journal of Translation-which interacts with my cognitive approach to biblical Hebrew poetry, especially my recent monograph, Unparalleled Poetry (2023). In this article, I set my work within the broader context of biblical poetry studies and explain how it draws from literary and cognitive research to provide a robust framework for the concept of the poetic line-a contribution to not only biblical studies, but also broader poetry studies. The poetic line gets to the heart of the nature of poetry: the line is central to not just poetic structure (up to the level of the whole poem), but also poetry's potential for rhythm and effects and construction of meaning. My view of the centrality of the line affects how I address various issues related to parallelism. I close by discussing the role and limits of method in regard to both poetic lineation and reading of poems.
Parallelism and Beyond: The Relationship between Targum Psalms and Rabbinic Literature
Aramaic Studies , 2021
This study examines six manners in which rabbinic literature and Targum Psalms interact. 1. An earlier rabbinic tradition provides the backdrop against which the Targum's translation must be understood. 2. The Targum applies a tradition it uses to translate one part of a psalm towards translating another verse in that same psalm. 3. The Targum revises earlier rabbinic traditions to suit its own ideological and literary concerns. 4. The Targum adapts interpretations that were originally generated well beyond the confines of the psalm being translated and even the Psalter as a whole. 5. The Targum inserts itself into popular late antique exegetical discourses of particular psalms. 6. It rejects a widespread interpretive trend attested to in rabbinic literature. Overall, by moving beyond the mere notation of parallelism, we gain a clearer portrait of the translator's relationship with rabbinic literature, his working methods, and the ideologies that impelled his creative endeavours.
ROBERT LOWTH, PARALLELISM, AND BIBLICAL POETRY
opens his "Translator's Preface" to Robert Lowth's Lectures on the Sacred Poetry of the Hebrews with the following statement: "It may not be improper to apprize the public, that although the following Lectures be entitled Lectures on the Hebrew Poetry, their utility is by no means confined to that single object. They embrace all THE GREAT PRINCIPLES OF GENERAL CRITICISM." 1 Recent scholarship on Lowth has been intent on reclaiming Gregory's perspective, believing that Lowth's broader intellectual impact beyond the study of biblical poetry has been too little appreciated. 2 S. Prickett is emblematic of this new accent when he 1
In Parallelism in Verbal Art and Performance: Pre-Print Papers of the Seminar-Workshop, 26th–27th May 2014. Ed. Frog. Folkloristiikan toimite 21. Helsinki: Folklore Studies, University of Helsinki. Pp. 7-28 , 2014
Parallelism may indeed be fundamental to poetic discourse, but the very degree to which it appears fundamental makes the concept as a whole challenging to pin down. This is an introduction to the pre-print of working papers for the seminar-workshop Parallelism in Verbal Art and Performance (26-27 May 2014, Helsinki, Finland). After introducing the event, it prefaces the working papers of this event with a review of some of the topics and themes that are found across them, as well as some of the significant questions concerning parallelism that connect and relate the different papers to one another. This preliminary survey and discussion has two primary intentions as a prelude and introduction to Parallelism in Verbal Art and Performance. The first is to survey some of the basic ground that is covered or addressed in individual papers and discussions as a preliminary frame in which the papers can be approached and deliberated. The second is to stimulate thinking about parallelism and ways to relate perspectives from the different approaches offered by different materials and produced by focus on parallelism of different types.
An Analysis of Types and Functions of Parallelism in Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible
Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on English Language and Teaching (ICOELT-8 2020)
This paper aims at describing and analyzing the types and functions of parallelism used by Matthew Henry in his bible commentary. Parallelism is defined as the correspondence of one verse or line with another. Thus, parallelism in this sense is not limited to the parallel form of grammatical construction but covers also the parallel sense or idea of an expression. By referring to Lowth's types of parallelism, this study classifies the types of parallelism into synthetic, antithetic, and synonymous. In writing his bible commentary, Matthew Henry frequently made use of rhetorical devices and parallelism is one of them. The data of this study were collected from the commentary of the Gospel of Matthew that has been translated into Indonesian. The researchers will identify all parallel forms in the commentary of the Gospel of Matthew and classify them based on their types and functions. Each type and function of parallelism will be analyzed in terms of its construction and/or its meaning.