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Thematic Structures in Saint‐John Perse's Amers
Author(s) -
York R. A.
Publication year - 1983
Publication title -
orbis litterarum
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.109
H-Index - 8
eISSN - 1600-0730
pISSN - 0105-7510
DOI - 10.1111/j.1600-0730.1983.tb00813.x
Subject(s) - praise , saint , ambivalence , harmony (color) , poetry , musical , repetition (rhetorical device) , literature , philosophy , aesthetics , psychology , epistemology , psychoanalysis , art , linguistics , art history , visual arts
Amers is characterised by elaborate verbal repetition comparable to musical structure. This both makes clear the fundamental themes of the poem and enriches the sense of particular passages in one of four ways: (i) the passage may be shown to express an attitude considered normal within the work, as with references to praise or purity: such attitudes may be complex or ingenious, as with the ideas of the aubain , the fourbe , the étrille ; (ii) the passage may be shown to express a paradoxical or uncertain sense, as with references to silk or offence; (iii) the passage may illustrate radically ambivalent conceptions, as with references to strangers, the harvest and especially to boundaries; (iv) the passage may articulate the progress of the text towards greater solemnity, towards harmony and concilation, or towards temporal colosure.