On the Use of Syntax in Literary analysis

Ala,; Oda, Hussein

	On the Use of Syntax in Literary analysis
Misan Journal of Acodemic Studies
Article 1, Volume 8, Issue 15, 2010, Pages 45-60
Authors
; Hussein Oda
Abstract
IntroductionWalt Whitman is a great revolutionary not only In hie subject matter and attitude to life, but also in hie style, diction and versifica¬tion. He believes that language derives its life and vitality when it springs from the poets own experience and not from books. It must arise out of absorption of the life around, and not from any dictionary. He feels that he wants to speak plainly and clearly to his readers because he has something very important to say, and therefore he requires a poetic medium which should be as simple as possible. SirapL'dht -. the quality of expressing in precise and exact terms what the poet wishes to convey __ is considered by Whitman as the highest quality of great poetry. He condemns old poets because it took so much pains in polishing the style of their writing that the subject matter became obscure under its glittering and dazzling cover, and the readers' attention was diverted by the outward form , •. hich stood in the way of the proper understanding of the matter (Whitman,1982, p.10).Despite this Whitman's poetry suffers from obscurity and difficulties of communication. So, many times the readers fail to catch the themesinvolved in the poems.It is very easy to discover the reasons behind these difficulties. Whitman tried his best to increase the expressive range of his language. For this end, he introduced slangs, vulgar isms and colloqualisms into the language of his poetry»0ften be made free use of words from trades, factories and farms, Sometimes he compounded words freely or freely coined new words. At other times he imported words from foreign languages, and distorted and adapted them to his own uses»Thus in his language there is a curio«s and fantastic mixture of words taken from different levels and contexts. The result is often incongruous, grotesque and comic. Miller (1957:59) writes in this connection "his book (The Leaves of Grass) is America's linguistic melting-pot.in it all the languages of all the people are mixed and stirred into one heady, hearty stew, "Not only this, Whitman’s poetic style is a curious mixture of a number of discordant elements. That is why it has provoked difficult reactions. Whitman himself (1982:247) admits that his poems are indeed a strange and untranslatable voice., Swinburne (quoted in Allen,1955:70) condemned Whitman's style as being "cabined, cribbed, confined, bound in, to limits of a thoroughly unnatural, imitative, historic, and affected style. "The heterogeneity of his style has been necessated by the diverse and often opposite and antagon¬istic philosophies and concepts which he tried to cram into his poetry. He was a poet of the body as well as of the soul, of the physical as well as the spiritual, of the material as well as the transcendental, of the scientific and the mystic.(shyberg,1951:71).

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