POETRY 9: MEANING AND IDEA

I. Meaning--the experience the poem expresses

A. Distinction between "total meaning" and "prose
meaning" illustrated with "Little Jack Horner"
1. "Total Meaning"--the complete experience of the
poem on all levels (chp 1): multidimensional,
involving the whole person--senses, emotion,
imagination--as well as intelligence
2. "Prose Meaning"
a. that part of the poem's that can be formed as a
paraphrase (a restatement of the poem's literal
meaning)
b. the prose meaning is no more the poem than a
plum is a pie or a prune is a plum
c. it may not necessarily be an idea but rather a
(1) story
(2) description
(3) statement of emotion
(4) presentation of human character
(5) combination of these
B. Examples
1. "Porphyria's Lover" (877) tells a story
 2. "The Eagle" by Tennyson is primarily descriptive
3. "The Widow's Lament" (716) is an expression of
emotion
4. "My Last Duchess" is an account of character
C. The Point
1. None of these examples is primarily concerned with
an idea
2. Message hunters beware
II. Value and Worth of a Poem ****
A. The idea of a poem is only a part of the total experience
B. Value and worth of a poem are determined by the total
experience, not by the truth or nobility of the idea
1. This is not to say that the truth of the idea is
unimportant, or that its validity should not be
examined and appraised
2. A good idea alone will not make a poem
3. An idea with which the reader disagrees does not
keep the poem from being considered a good or even
significant one
C. We should be receptive to all kinds of experience, able
to make what Coleridge termed "the willing suspension
of disbelief"
D. The primary value of the poem
 1. does not depend so much on the truth of the idea
presented
2. as on the power with which it is communicated and
on its being made a convincing part of a meaningful
total experience
a. we must feel that the idea has been truly and
deeply felt by the poet, and
b. the poet is doing something more than merely
***moralizing
c. the plum must be made a part of the pie
III Application: distinguishing meaning of idea in a poem from
its value as a poem: "Loveliest of Trees" by A. E Houseman
and "Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening" by
Robert Frost
A. Both poems present ideas
1. "Stopping": when faced with the choice of pursuing
and appreciating beauty or with fulfilling the
responsibilities of life, we must give precedence to
maintaining our obligations
2. "Loveliest": beauty is of such supreme value that the
speaker will make the pursuit of it his lifelong
commitment.
B. We will have to choose which idea is more in concert
with our own personal world view, but we should be
able to enjoy both
 C. Even though we should be able to enjoy both of these
poems, we also should be able to discern that they are
not of equal poetic value
IV Summary: Other things being equal, we tend to, and should,
value more highly the poem whose idea we feel to be more
mature and nearer to the heart of human experience, yet we
should be sensitive that
A. As readers of poetry, we should strive for intellectual
flexibility and tolerance
B. We may often like a poem better whose idea we
disagree with than one whose idea we accept
C. We will not confuse prose meaning with total meaning--
we will not mistake plums for pies.