Inventing Situations
Pragmatic structure in
John Donne’s „Break of Day“
In “A Linguistic Guide to English Poetry” Geoffrey Leech
distinguishes between the “given situation”, which is the immediate
situation in which any verbal communication takes place, and the “inferred
situation”; this is the imaginary situation the writer creates within
his/her text. This fictive world is produced by the implication of context.
Therefore language is used to create situations in the reader’s head. This can
be achieved by the use of:
A)
Deictic words and expressions: (pointing to a situation)
- Personal pronouns are used to
identify the characters of the inferred situation
“him” (12)
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The fictive speaker is a woman
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“I” (10,11,12) “me” (2)
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Who speaks about her situation
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“thou” (2) him (12) thee (13)
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About and/or with a man
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- Demonstrative pronouns indicate proximity to the fictive speaker
“this” (9)
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Her imagination of the worst case (close)
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“that” (11,12)
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More distance
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“that’s” (14)
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Generally speaking (more distance)
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- Adverbs of place
“hither” (5)
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“hence” (13)
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“rise” (4)
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Someone gets up in the morning (out of the bed)
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- Adverbials of time [eg.:
now, then, tomorrow...]
- Adverbs of manner [eg.: thus, so]
B) Other formal indicators:
- Vocatives: *
“Oh, that’s the worst disease of love” (14)
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- Imperatives: *
*: both can be used as apostrophes (when you address
someone or something that can not hear you) to create a more dramatical
situation and address the reader more directly
- Rhetorical Questions address the reader. The
dramatic effect is given because the questions stay unanswered
C) Other words of definite
meaning:
- Definite article “the” vs. Indefinite article “a”:
“the poor, the foul, the false” (15), “the busied man” (16)
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The article assumes uniqueness, subjectivity and specifies the
person/thing or the group of it
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“a married man” (18)
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Refers to any person/object showing the characteristics of the
named group
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- The past tense refers
to a apecific moment in the past in the mind of the fictive speaker
“Did we lie down, because ‘twas night?” (4) “brought us hither”
(5)
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Referring to ‘last night’
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- The heading and the first
line often specifiy the situation within a poem and let the reader imagine
a preceding verbal context
“Break of Day” (heading)
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Is the only indicator for the reader that the inferred situation
takes place in the morning
It also suggests the inner conflict and suffering of the fictive
speaker (through the word “break”)
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(1,2)
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The first 2 lines of the poem already indicate the most important
action of the poem (that the fictive addressee is leaving)
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- The fictive reader
addressing him- or herself:
(second
paragraph) introduced by the word “him”(12)
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The fictive speaker might addresses these utterances to herself
because she does not want to show her strong feelings to her beloved and the
loss she is feeling when he leaves
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- Fictive Situations: when
poet is not writing about his/her own personal experiences but invents a
situation
The real poet is male but in the poem there is a female fictive
speaker
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“him”(12), 3rd paragraph
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- Impossible situations: when an action would not
be possible in the real world
The poet is using the 3rd person singular to describe the true
inner situation of the fictive speaker
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“If it could speak…”(8,9)
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- Stages of action: in
poems there can be not just static situations but a sequence of events (stanza
1 happens little earlier than stanza 2 which again happens little earlier than
stanza 3)
- Changes of speech situation is used for dramatic implication
It seems that there has been something has been an utterance or an
action before the 1st and in between the paragraphs:
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It can be saaumed that the man brought forward an argument
(followed by line 1, 7, 13)
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Maybe there has been a conversation between fictive speaker and
her beloved about leaving already because it is day
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“’Tis true, ‘tis day…”(1)
(his argument could have been: It’s day. I’m going now.”)
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One could argue, that the fictive speaker is lying in bed, while
he is leaving or has already left, and without having the courage to tell him
her true fears and feelings, she projects them to the “all seeing speaking
light”.
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“Light has no tongue…”(7)
his argument could have been: What would the neighbours say, if I
lied in bed all day?)
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The beginning of this paragraph is contextually disconnected from
those before. This indicates that there must have been a conversation which
has led the fictive speaker to this point. Maybe she has told him her fears
and feelings and his reply was, that he has to (go to) work. Additionally it
could be followed that the beloved therefore only comes back in the evenings
and can not be with her during the day.
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“Must business thee…”(13)
(his argument could have been: OK. If all my arguments do not set
you satisfied I have to say that I have to go to work!)
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Source: Leech, G. A Linguistic
Guide to English Poetry. London, 1976 (5th edition)
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