Rhetoric and Poetry ~ More on Parallelism and the 5 Common Topics

In November, I explored the topic of parallelism here on the blog, and I haven’t stopped thinking about it or finding examples in my reading. The above quote is similar in some ways to the quote I shared in the previous blog post:



I’ve noticed that many of the quotes to which I am drawn employ parallelism in some form. The structure seems to make them more accessible, logical, and memorable. The first word that often comes to my mind is “brilliant!”—so simple and yet incredibly profound. Parallel structure also tends to distill a quote down to the basics and eliminate extraneous or distracting words and ideas. It reinforces the idea that a tight form requires a precision of ideas while counter-intuitively increasing creative thought process (hello, poetry!).

I’ve thought more deeply about these two quotes than almost anything else I’ve read recently.

But not as deeply as I could think about them if I decided to use the 5 Common Topics.

Let’s do that.

Definition

I could spend a whole conversation defining one of these words:

Quarrel

Rhetoric

Poetry

Grammar

Justice

Mercy

[To what broader categories (genus) do these things belong? What are other things (species) in that category? How does each word differ from the other things within the category? What are its parts? Take each word separately, or put them all together. The point is to think about ideas!]

Comparison

[Note: I’ve found a few different versions of the Yeats quote online but here I’ve used the version I found in Greg Wolfe’s book Beauty Will Save the World. For discussion purposes, we’ll use this version specifically.]

How are the two quotes similar in structure? Different?

They both use parallel structure. They are both similar in length. They both contain two independent clauses (the clauses in the first quote are connected by a semicolon, the second quote is expressed in two sentences).

They both use antitheses (contrasting opposite ideas: others/ourselves, rhetoric/poetry and justice/mercy, grammar/poetry).

The first quote uses anaphora (repetition of words at the beginning of phrases, clauses, or sentences: “out of the quarrel”).

The second quote uses epistrophe (repetition of words at the end of phrases, clauses, or sentences: “of things”).

Anaphora and epistrophe are similar (repeating words), and yet opposite (beginning and end).

The first quote contains an action verb (make).

The second quote uses a linking verb (is) to create metaphors.

How are the ideas similar? How are they different?

They both say something about the nature of poetry. The first concerns the origin or impetus of poetry. The second addresses a quality of poetry by use of metaphor?

They both express contrast and relationship of ideas.

[Clearly these questions are more abstract. Answers will vary widely. That’s why I want to sit down and have a conversation over cups of favorite beverages with all of you!!]

Relationship

Both of these quotes are specifically addressing the relationship of things.

How is justice related to mercy?

How is grammar related to poetry?

How is rhetoric related to poetry?

How are we ourselves related to others?

Which came first? Is one dependent upon the other? Does one cause the other?

Circumstance

What was the circumstance or context in which each quote was written?

From the Frederick Buechner Blog:

The following is an excerpt called “Justice” originally published in Whistling in the Dark and later in Beyond Words: 

If you break a good law, justice must be invoked not only for goodness' sake but for the good of your own soul. Justice may consist of paying a price for what you've done or simply of the painful knowledge that you deserve to pay a price, which is payment enough. Without one form of justice or the other, the result is ultimately disorder and grief for you and everybody. Thus justice is itself not unmerciful. 

Justice also does not preclude mercy. It makes mercy possible. Justice is the pitch of the roof and the structure of the walls. Mercy is the patter of rain on the roof and the life sheltered by the walls. Justice is the grammar of things. Mercy is the poetry of things. 

The Cross says something like the same thing on a scale so cosmic and full of mystery that it is hard to grasp. As it represents what one way or another human beings are always doing to each other, the death of that innocent man convicts us as a race and we deserve the grim world that over the centuries we have made for ourselves. As it represents what one way or another we are always doing not so much to God above us somewhere as to God within us and among us everywhere, we deserve the very godlessness we have brought down on our own heads. That is the justice of things. 

But the Cross also represents the fact that goodness is present even in grimness and God even in godlessness. That is why it has become the symbol not of our darkest hopelessness but of our brightest hope. That is the mercy of things. Granted who we are, perhaps we could have seen it no other way.

According to biographies of William Butler Yeats (and here), he seemed to wrestle at great lengths with his ideas about religion at least, and he was an acclaimed poet. The quote is found in “Anima Hominis.” I won’t claim to understand anything about it, but I found the following excerpt from this analysis fascinating.

In "Anima Hominis," Yeats defines the soul/psyche/mind of the creative individual by means of his Anti-self/double/mask theory and then adds a Daimon element. The focus is on artistic creativity, and how it is served by the tension between self and anti-self: "We make out of the quarrel with others, rhetoric, but out of the quarrel with ourselves, poetry" (331). It is to poets that the other "self" comes--not to "practical men who believe in money": "The other self, the anti-self or the antithetical self, as one may choose to name it comes to those who are no longer deceived, whose passion is reality" [reality, in a Platonic sense] (331). This anti-self is demanding, and accepting its strictures is different from passively accepting the mores of society: "If we cannot imagine ourselves as different from what we are, and try to assume that second self, we cannot impose a discipline upon ourselves... Active virtue, as distinguished from the passive acceptance of a code, is therefore theatrical, consciously dramatic, the wearing of a mask..." (334)

What other things were happening or being said about the ideas at the same time?

Authority

What do the authors of the quotes have in common? Differences?

Both men. Both alive in the years 1926-1939. Both acclaimed writers. Both spent time contemplating theological ideas.

Buechner—American novelist and theologian (wrote fiction and non-fiction), Presbyterian minister, born in 1926, still living, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 1981.

Yeats—Irish poet, 1865-1939, awarded Nobel Prize for Literature, born into Irish Protestant family but seemed to wrestle at great lengths with his ideas about religion, eventually joining a new group called "The Esoteric Order of the Golden Dawn" which incorporated astrology and traditional European Cabalistic Magic.

Who else has something to say about justice and mercy?

Psalm 103:6,8
The Lord works vindication and justice for all who are oppressed. The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

[ETA] Micah 6:8
He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.

Rhetoric and poetry?

Aristotle? The author of both Rhetoric and Poetics.

Rhetoric is “the power of discovering the possible means of persuasion in reference to any subject whatever.” 

“Poetry is finer and more philosophical than history; for poetry expresses the universal, and history only the particular.” (More antithesis: poetry/history, universal/particular)

Quintilian?

“I hold that no one can be a true orator unless he is also a good man, and, even if he could be, I would not have it so.”

Saint Augustine?

“Eloquent speakers give pleasure, wise ones salvation.” (Hello again, antithesis…)

N.D. Wilson and Douglas Wilson in The Rhetoric Companion?

“The point of true rhetoric, in all its guises, is to deal with ignorance, bring about like-mindedness, and motivate to action.” (More parallelism.)

T. S. Eliot?

“Poetry is not a turning loose of emotion, but an escape from emotion; it is not the expression of personality, but an escape from personality. But, of course, only those who have personality and emotions know what it means to want to escape from these things.”

Robert Frost?

“Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words.” 

“A poem begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness.”

[Poets have a lot to say about poetry…]

Who or what is popularly considered an authority and why? Do you agree?

::

Now that we’ve reviewed the 5 Common Topics, we’ll move from dialectic to rhetoric in the next post.

Parallelism ~ On the Grammar and Poetry of Things

I haven’t waxed philosophical about The Lost Tools of Writing yet this season, so I’ll try to make up for lost time this month.

In this post I won’t go on and on about the brilliance of the 5 Common Topics of Invention and using The Lost Tools of Writing as a “thinking program.” [They still are and we still do, but there’s more!]

Instead, I’d like to talk about parallelism.

One of the very first tools of style or “elocution” a Lost Tools of Writing student learns to wield is parallelism.

[To wield means “to hold (something, such as a tool or weapon) in your hands so that you are ready to use it.” I love this imagery. It reminds me of the quote “A word after a word after a word is power” by Margaret Atwood. We are teaching our students to be powerful with their words and ideas!]

What is parallelism?

Parallelism, also known as parallel structure or parallel construction, is a balance within one or more sentences of similar phrases or clauses that have the same grammatical structure. Some definitions of parallelism include repeated single parts of speech.

The most common number of repetitions is three. (I believe I have heard Andrew Pudewa say “Thrice, never twice.”)

Two famous examples of parallelism (I apologize, I have ancient history on the brain):

“Friends, Romans, countryman, lend me your ears…” (Shakespeare, Julius Caesar)

“I came; I saw; I conquered” (attributed to Julius Caesar)

The first contains a repetition of three nouns, one after another. The second contains a repetition of three clauses (subject and verb).

Exact words can be repeated within the structure (such as the use of “I” for each clause in “I came; I saw; I conquered” or “a word” in the earlier quote by Margaret Atwood “A word after a word after a word is power”), but it is not necessary.

If you still don’t quite get it, stick with me. I hope the concept will be clearer by the end of the post.

Why parallelism?

Parallelism requires a student to be balanced and clear in the expression of his ideas.

Lost Tools of Writing students learn to write their persuasive essay proofs in parallel structure. This is a natural place for parallelism as the students list three reasons to support their thesis. We desire their reasons to be clear and balanced in order to be more persuasive.

For example, in our persuasive essay for Where the Red Fern Grows, our original thesis and proofs were as follows:

“Billy should have traveled to town alone to get his dogs for three reasons: his good character traits, he was prepared, his actions paved the way for his hunting successes.”

The structures in that list are adjective-adjective-adjective-noun, pronoun-linking verb-adjective, and adjective-noun-transitive verb-adjective-direct object-prepositional phrase. No similar structures. The sentence is clunky.

We changed the thesis and proofs to the following:

“Billy should have traveled to town alone to claim his dogs for three reasons: he possessed positive character traits, he prepared for the journey, and he paved the way for his future hunting success.”

Now, we have three similar clauses. “He” is the subject of all three clauses. We have three strong past-tense action verbs (with alliteration!): possessed, prepared, and paved. And we have a direct object, a prepositional phrase, and a direct object and a prepositional phrase. Not exactly alike, but the main body of each structure (clause with “he” followed by an action verb) is the same and we maintained a certain consistency of ideas. The new sentence sounds more persuasive to the ear.

When we outlined our persuasive essay for A Gathering of Days, we began with:

[Thesis] Catherine should not have left the blanket and food for the “Phantom.”

C. [Enumeration] 3

D. Exposition

1. Dangerous

2. No authority

3. No respect for property

We had to expand on the ideas in order to present them persuasively. In the end, we wrote the following:

“In A Gathering of Days Catherine had good intentions, but she should not have left the blanket and food for the “phantom” for three reasons. Catherine failed to protect herself and others from danger, she failed to obey the authorities over her, and she failed to respect the property of others.”

“Catherine” (or “she”) is the subject of each clause. “Failed” is the transitive verb in each clause. Each clause contains an infinitive (to protect, to obey, to respect) as a direct object. And each infinitive has a direct object with a prepositional phrase (herself/others from danger, authorities over her, property of others). These proofs are very closely parallel, and the ideas sound strong.

Have I lost you?

This may lead us to the next point.

Parallelism requires a certain proficiency of grammar.

Yes, the justice of things. Students need to know how the English language works in order to use it most intentionally and effectively. For some people, grammar (or justice) is not fun. But it is necessary. It gives consistency, clarity, and structure to our thoughts. It allows us to communicate more powerfully.

The wonderful thing about parallelism is that it is also poetry, which leads us to our next point.

Parallelism pleases the ear.

Parallelism lends a certain pleasing rhythm to a sentence or a paragraph. It gives it a musical, poetic quality. It enchants the reader or the hearer.

Literary devices that appeal to the senses (the sense of hearing in particular) are called schemes.

Parallelism leads to more complex literary devices used for a higher degree of rhetorical style.

Once students master the basics of parallel structure, they can use their knowledge and experience to create antithesis, anaphora, asyndeton, symploce, epistrophe, and climax.

Again, these devices give a powerful, poetic quality to writing and speaking.

I love this building process.

In Teaching Writing with Structure and Style from Institute for Excellence in Writing (which Classical Conversations uses for kids ages 9-12 in the Essentials classes), students learn the advanced “decoration” (or style tool) “Triple Extensions” by repeating words, parts of speech, phrases, or clauses. Students (and parents!) in Classical Conversations Essentials classes also receive a firm foundation in English grammar.

With Lost Tools of Writing (used in Challenge A, B, and I? for kids 12 and older), students learn the formal rhetoric terms “elocution,” “scheme,” and “parallelism,” and learn to build parallel structures in their writing.

Then, students use this parallel structure to learn new literary devices.

There’s an intentional purpose and sequence and progression of complexity. It’s beautiful, really.

In Classical Conversations Challenge B, students have just learned to use antithesis in their writing. Antithesis “juxtaposes two contrasting ideas in parallel form… sometimes parts of speech made exactly parallel, sometimes with a looser structure” (mercy!).

There are many, many examples of antitheses in literature and speeches. One benefit of antitheses is that it is memorable. One famous example:

“That’s one small step for man; one giant leap for mankind.” (Neil Armstrong)

This sentence uses parallel phrases. “Small step” is contrasted with “giant leap” and “man” is contrasted with “mankind.”

Our opening quote uses antitheses in its parallel clauses, as well. “Justice” is contrasted with “mercy” and “grammar” is contrasted with “poetry.”

In our recent essay on Where the Red Fern Grows, we wrote:

“While he was pulling away from his parents, he was bonding with his dogs.”

This sentence uses parallel clauses. “Pulling away” contrasts with “bonding” and “from his parents” contrasts with “with his dogs.”

Do you see how that works?

This is just a brief, imperfect introduction. It’s not meant to lead you to mastery. And, certainly, I’m not close to mastery, myself. I am, however, fascinated by words and structure and ideas, and I’ve found playing with parallelism to be great fun. I have also found myself noticing parallel structure in everything I am reading!

I’ll end this introductory post with a small sampling from my recent book stack, from picture books to Paradise Lost.

Examples from Literature

Hamlet, retold by Leon Garfield

The stars glared, the battlements shuddered, and Hamlet’s heart ceased as the terrible word was uttered. [independent clauses: adjective, noun, past-tense verb]

But Hamlet’s strangeness had already troubled the smooth surface of the court, puzzled the smiling King and vaguely distressed the easy Queen. [verb phrases: past-tense verb, adjective/article “the,” adjective, direct object; you’ll notice an added prepositional phrase with the first verb phrase and an -ly adverb with the third]

They wore their paper crowns, clutched their wooden swords, and shrugged their patchwork gowns with a dusty dignity and a seasoning of pride. [verb phrases: past-tense verb, adjective “their,” adjective, direct object]

“Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing,” he hissed; and crept towards the sleeper with a black cloak trailing, like some malignant bat. [noun phrases: noun, adjective—these noun phrases are particularly forceful and poetic with the adjective appearing after the noun]

Crispin: The Cross of Lead by AVI

Above and below the church were our dwelling places, some forty cottages and huts of wattle and daub, thatch and wood, dirt and mud, all in varying shades of brown. [noun phrases, compound objects of the preposition “of”: noun “and” noun]

Stiff in limb, chilled in bone, numb in thought, I shifted about. [adjectival phrases: adjective, preposition “in,” object of the preposition]

Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls

I had the wind of a deer, the muscles of a country boy, a heart full of dog love, and a strong determination. [direct object noun phrases: adjective/article, noun, adjectival prepositional phrase with “of” repeated in each]

The Master Swordsman by Alice Provensen

“How heavy the pails! How endless the wood! How far the well!” [adjectival phrases]

‘“LOOK SHARP!” glugged the jug… “ATTENTION!” clacked the box… “BE ALERT!” creaked the log. “THAT’S THE WAY” wheezed the teapot.’ [clauses: verb, subject]

The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom 

Usually it was fog in January in Holland, dank, chill, and gray. [“Triple Extension” adjectives]

On me—until Betsie caught up with them—hems sagged, stockings tore, and collars twisted. [clauses: subject, verb]

Some great examples of antitheses in The Hiding Place:

Adventure and anguish, horror and heaven were just around the corner, and we did not know. [Nouns: adventure/anguish, horror/heaven… and alliteration as well!]

Young and old, poor and rich, scholarly gentlemen and illiterate servant girls—only to Father did it seem that they were all alike. [Nouns: young/old, poor/rich, scholarly gentlemen/illiterate servant girls]

Here we sat, our backs chilled by the ancient stone, our ears and hearts warmed by the music. [Noun phrases: backs/ears-hearts, chilled/warmed, by the ancient stone/by the music]

Paradise Lost by John Milton

Treble confusion, wrath and vengeance pour’d. [Nouns]

Is this the Region, this the Soil, the Clime, Said then the lost Arch Angel, “this the seat That we must change for Heav’n, this mournful gloom For that celestial light? [Noun phrases with repeated “this”] [We have a little antitheses at the end—”this mournful gloom” is contrasted with “that celestial light.”]

Antithesis:

Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav’n. [Spoken by Satan, by the way.] [Infinitive phrases: reign/serve, Hell/Heav’n]

And one bonus example. Chiasmus is another literary device that employs a parallel structure. It is a repetition of words in reverse:

The mind is its own place, and in itself Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n.

 

I challenge you to discover parallel structure in your own reading.

I’d love it if you shared examples in the comments!