{"id":359,"date":"2009-11-27T21:31:55","date_gmt":"2009-11-28T02:31:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lanternreview.com\/blog\/?p=359"},"modified":"2009-11-27T21:31:55","modified_gmt":"2009-11-28T02:31:55","slug":"weekly-prompt-the-art-of-rhetoric","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/2009\/11\/27\/weekly-prompt-the-art-of-rhetoric\/","title":{"rendered":"Weekly Prompt: The Art of Rhetoric"},"content":{"rendered":"

Note:<\/strong> This prompt was first introduced to me by poet and UW professor Andrew Feld, author of \u00a0Citizen<\/a><\/span> (Harper Collins, 2004).\u00a0\u00a0Because I found it so helpful to my own writing, I have decided to share it with Lantern Review.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Shakespeare<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

The art of rhetoric, one of the ancient arts of discourse, is the art of persuasion and using language effectively.\u00a0 Rhetorical devices and figures can prove tremendously useful to the contemporary poet, in the sense that they offer one a variety of syntactical structures that force tighter form and syntax, quicker turns in language, and\u2014at times\u2014more rigorous thought.<\/p>\n

In my experience, experimenting with \u201crhetorical poetry\u201d can allow a poet\u2019s language to move in unexpected ways, thus enabling them to explore territory they wouldn\u2019t normally breach.\u00a0 Think of rhetoric as a tool than can be applied to language; the use of chiasmus, for example, will structure your thought in such a way that you begin with a word of idea, move to another, and then circle back to the initial one.\u00a0 Consider the rhetorical effect of this particular construction: the sense of venturing out, circling, and returning is created not by description or narrative, but by the language itself.<\/p>\n

The following excerpt from one of my \u201crhetoric\u201d poems is an example of how using a rhetorical device in your writing can lead to some productive experimentation with voice, tone, and syntactical structure:<\/p>\n

Sometime in the nineties, midway through<\/p>\n

Her Southeast Asian exile, she directed the Frenchman at the salon<\/p>\n

To Do Anything<\/em>.\u00a0 Thus began the cropped years.<\/p>\n

She came home and cried.\u00a0 We all cried.<\/p>\n

\n

Here the use of epistrophe is demonstrated in the repeated use of the word \u201ccried\u201d at the end of the two sentences in the final line. \u00a0Ending both sentences on the beat \u201ccried\u201d affects not only the rhythm of the language, but the manner in which the stanza shapes meaning and tone as well.<\/p>\n

To write your own rhetoric poem, refer to this article, entitled\u00a0\u201cShakespeare’s Grammar: Rhetorical Devices<\/a>,\u201d which is a quick glossary of some of the most common rhetorical devices.\u00a0 Select a few (two or three, to begin) devices from the list and incorporate them into your writing by either (1) revising a previously written poem, or (2) tackling some new material.\u00a0 It may be easier to begin with a poem you have already written, although starting on a completely new project may afford you a greater degree of freedom.<\/p>\n

In short, consider the ways in which rhetoric can take pressure off you as a poet.\u00a0 Let syntax do the work of poetry\u2014you may be pleased with the results! \u00a0We would love to see any experimentation that results from your work with rhetoric, so please consider posting your responses on our blog.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Note: This prompt was first introduced to me by poet and UW professor Andrew Feld, author of \u00a0Citizen (Harper Collins, 2004).\u00a0\u00a0Because I found it so helpful to my own writing, I have decided to share it with Lantern Review. The art of rhetoric, one of the ancient arts of discourse, is the art of persuasion […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[13],"tags":[85,82,83,84,62],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=359"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":373,"href":"https:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359\/revisions\/373"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lanternreview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}