Language of Paradox | The Well Wrought Urn by Cleanth Brooks | Summary, Explanation

 

Hello and welcome to the Discourse. Cleanth Brooks was a prominent figure in American literary criticism, particularly known for his contributions to the New Criticism movement. His works emphasize the importance of close reading and the intrinsic qualities of the text itself. He believed that the meaning of a literary work should not be sorted out from the sources which are outside the text such as the historical background in which the text was written or the author’s intention while writing the text. He is mostly known for his book –

The Well Wrought Urn: Studies in the Structure of Poetry (1947):

It is a pivotal work by Cleanth Brooks, published in 1947. This book is considered a cornerstone of the New Criticism movement, which emphasizes close reading and the analysis of literary texts without considering external factors like authorial intent or historical context. The title of the book ‘The Well Wrought Urn’ is an allusion to the fourth stanza of John Donne's poem, "The Canonization", which is the primary subject of the first chapter of the book.

The book is a collection of eleven essays or chapters. In the eleventh chapter, titled The Heresy of Paraphrase, Brooks offers a polemic against the use of paraphrasing in describing and criticizing a poem. 

The first chapter of the book is titled The Language of Paradox. The first chapter and the Eleventh chapter (The Heresy of Paraphrase) offer the key concepts developed by Cleanth Brooks that had a lasting impact on literary studies, shaping how poetry is taught and analyzed in academic settings. It encourages readers to engage deeply with texts, fostering a greater appreciation for the art of poetry.

In these eleven essays, Brooks argues that the structure of a poem is integral to its meaning. He believes that form and content are inseparable, and understanding one requires a deep engagement with the other. The book includes detailed commentaries on several classic poems, allowing readers to see how Brooks applies his critical approach (new criticism). He examines works by poets such as John Donne, William Wordsworth, and John Keats. One of Brooks's central ideas is that poetry creates a unified experience. He explores how various elements of a poem—such as imagery, sound, and rhythm—work together to produce a cohesive emotional and intellectual effect.

The Language of Paradox:

The first essay in The Well Wrought Urn by Cleanth Brooks is titled "The Language of Paradox." In this essay, Brooks explores the use of paradox in poetry, arguing that it is a fundamental aspect of poetic language that enhances meaning and emotional depth.

Brooks defines paradox as a statement that seems contradictory but reveals a deeper truth. He emphasizes that paradox is not merely a rhetorical device but a crucial element that reflects the complexities of human experience.

The essay can be simplified in majorly two major points. Firstly, since we are not going for the meaning of a work from outside the text, there should be something inside the text. William Empson gave the idea of ambiguity within the text. Cleanth Brooks added to it the idea of Paradox. Cleanth Brooks believes that we are supposed to learn or look into the Paradoxes in the verse, to understand the poem better. Secondly, he also differentiates between the language of science and the language of poetry, suggesting that while paradoxes are appropriate and inevitable for poetry, we do not use paradoxes in daily life or scientific statements that rely on facts.

What is Paradox:

A Paradox is simply a self-contradictory statement or situation. It is a statement that contradicts itself, that is, two opposite ideas are put together in the same sentence. For example, if I say that ‘I always lie’, it is a paradox. If I always lie, it is also a lie. Some other examples are –

‘All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” (‘Animal Farm’, George Orwell)

‘Death, though shalt die” (‘Death, be not proud, John Donne)

“Child is the father of the man.” (My Heart Leaps Up’, William Wordsworth)

While these statements appear self-contradictory, there is a deeper, hidden meaning in them.

Cleanth Brooks begins the essay by saying ‘The language of poetry is the language of paradox.’ He then explains that often we try to avoid paradoxes because of our preconceived notions. We believe that ‘Paradox is the language of sophistry, hard, bright, witty, it is hardly the language of the soul.” He elaborates that ‘we regard paradox as an intellectual element rather than emotional, clever rather than profound, rational rather than irrational.’ However, Paradox is appropriate and inevitable for poetry. He says that paradox not only suits poetry, it is inevitable, one cannot take out paradox from poetry.

A poet requires more than language to convey their message and paradox becomes an essential tool to be used in poetry. To prove his point, he offers certain examples.

The very first example he offers is William Wordsworth’s poem ‘Composed Upon Westminster Bridge’. This example is important because Wordsworth always stressed simplicity and focused on the common day life. Brooks says that even though Wordsworth insisted on simplicity, his poems are full of paradoxical situations.

In the poem ‘Composed upon Westminster Bridge’, the poet describes the beauty of the city of London in the poem as he sees while walking through Westminster Bridge. While London is clearly an artificial, man-made city, Wordsworth talks about it as if it naturally occurred, or it is a part of nature. This suggests a paradox, even though the city of London is artificial, Wordsworth talks about it as if it is a natural landscape.

Brooks takes the second example from Wordsworth’s other poem ‘It is a Beauteous evening, calm, and free.’

In the poem, Wordsworth describes the evening with words calm, quiet, and tranquility aligning with breathless, which is a paradox. If the evening is calm, how can it be breathless? Furthermore, the poet begins the poem by expressing himself as a great admirer and worshiper of nature who is touched by the tranquility of the evening. However, he notices that his companion girl, supposedly his nine-year-old daughter Caroline Vallon is not that affected by the tranquility of nature, suggesting that he is filled with nature worship while his daughter is untouched by the magic of nature. However, by the end, he establishes that being a child, Caroline Vallon is closer to nature, much more filled with nature than himself. That children are more natural than the adults. Thus, the poem as a whole offers a paradox.

Brooks also mentioned a poem from the Neo-Classical period, especially mentioning Essay on Man by Alexander Pope, explaining the use of Paradox within the text. Another major example Brooks uses is that of John Donne’s poem The Canonization. Brook says that Donne makes use of a paradox as an underlined metaphor. In the poem, the speaker describes his physical love (sexual urge as saintly). However, saints are supposed to avoid physical love. Yet, the speaker describes the physical love as saintly and asserts that the two lovers are appropriate for the canonization, and to be adorned as saints. So there are love and religion intertwined together, and it is a complex conceit. The speaker claims that the lovers are unworldly because they have lost their world in each other. However, by the end of the poem, it becomes clear that they have not lost the world, rather they have gained each other’s worlds in each other’s eyes, and thus, they are most worldly of all.

Brooks offers a similar paradox from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and then he mentions Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Biographia Literaria in which Coleridge offered his ideas on creative imagination. Brooks says that Coleridge explains the idea of ‘creative imagination’ to his readers by using a series of paradoxes.

Why Do Poets Use Paradoxes or Why Paradoxes cannot be avoided in Poetry?

Brooks says that ‘Paradoxes spring from the very nature of poets language – a language in which connotations are as important as denotations. A poet tries to convey multiple meanings within a few words, and paradox helps in that. In writing poems, the paradox is used as a method by which unlikely comparisons can be drawn and meaning can be extracted from poems both directly and indirectly. There will be a literal meaning and a hidden meaning which the reader will understand through the paradox.

The Language of Poetry and Language of Science

He then offers the differentiation between the language of the poem and the language of science. He says that when one is talking about science, or daily life based on facts, they cannot simply use paradox because it will create confusion. They need to state the facts as they are. Contradictions cannot exist in science of daily routine because contradictions will create confusion and everyone will try to remove those contradictions, that is the purpose of science. Science uses direct language. Science has a tendency to keep words strictly in control and stick to the dictionary meaning. A scientist wishes to avoid and eradicate ambiguity and contradictions.

But when it is poetry and art, paradox is inevitable. Art can never be direct. The terms in poetry modify each other and also violate their dictionary meaning. A Poet constructs his own language, he defines his own rules. So poet has control over language. He is not limited to the denotations of words but instead explores the possible connotations. If a blue litmus becomes red, it is definitely Acid. However, a change to purple or red in poetry may convey anger, shame, enthusiasm, and so many other emotions. Unlike the scientist, who seeks to cleanse his work of all ambiguity, the poet thrives on it because with it he can better express experience.

While New Criticism gained supremacy in the literary arena during the 1960s and 70s, the New Critics also faced harsh criticism. Ronald Crane, one of the Neo-Aristotelian critics belonging to the Chicago School of Literary Criticism was specifically harsh against Cleanth Brooks and his idea of paradox and language of poetry. In his essay "The Critical Monism of Cleanth Brooks," Crane writes that under Brooks's view of a poem's unity being achieved through the irony and paradox of the opposing forces it contains, the world's most perfect example of such an ironic poem would be Albert Einstein's equation E=mc2, which equates matter and energy at a constant rate. He says that Brooks ignores all the other elements of poetry in his analysis and Brooks also ignores the power of paradox in other discourses other than poetry.

So this is it for today. We will continue to discuss literary theory and literary criticism. Please stay connected with the Discourse. Thanks and regards!