Abstract
By focussing on three poems by Emily Dickinson, this paper shows that linguistic analysis based on the compositional interpretation at the level of Logical Form helps us establish a clearer picture of notoriously difficult poetic texts. At the same time, poems which provide us with borderline cases of interpretability help us see clearer the limits of adaptability within the grammatical system. Ambiguity is the field in which both sides meet, as it is used by Dickinson quite systematically in order to present different aspects of the way in which language relates to experience. In » This was a Poet« (J448), for example, two coherent readings created by ambiguity at the level of Logical Form emerge as the result of simultaneously pursuing all strategies of presupposition and anaphora resolution and as the quintessence of the poet-reader relationship described. In »He fumbles at your Soul« (J315), ambiguity of reference and of reinterpretation lead to underspecification of the resulting meaning, which appropriately serves to convey the idea of a speaker narrating an experience that is both general and specific. In »This would be Poetry« (J1247), reinterpretation must occur at the highest level because the poem consists of a sequence of statements that cannot simultaneously be true literally. Each poem is marked by a high degree of linguistic self-awareness and may be regarded as a test case, stretching the limits of what grammar makes possible.
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Bauer, M., Bauer, M., Beck, S. et al. »The Two Coeval Come«: Emily Dickinson and ambiguity. Z Literaturwiss Linguistik 40, 98–124 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03379837
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03379837