Poetic Diction: A Study in Meaning

One who reads Poetic Diction from the vantage of this historical perspective is due for a truly astonishing experience. Barfield seems to anticipate the intellectual history of the more than sixty years which separate his book from us. He has fully synthesized literary and cognitive theory. At a stroke he rejuvenated and educated the romanticism of the early century. He explains how imagination discovers truth and formulates it into valid conceptual structures. He fully realizes that such a formulation implies the building and changing of those structures and accounts for this with “evolution of consciousness.” But the evolving mind in no sense creates the reality it perceives; it rather discovers what is implicit in “spiritual reality” through an act of imagination. The changing of language reflects exactly these shifting structures. Poetry allows us not merely to perceive this evolution abstractly but to relive it through our imaginations. The experience of poetry is not so much the proof of Barfield’s theory as it is the immediate perception of the reality he delineates. What Barfield presents as an essay on poetry is in fact a fully “diachronic” theory of human cognition. His contemporaries could not comprehend what he had done. They could not even perceive the problem he attempted to solve. We can see the problems very clearly indeed, but we as a culture have not fully considered Barfield’s contribution to their solution. Perhaps his voice sounds to us as though it comes from a rather distant and somewhat romantic past; it actually calls from a future of greater maturity and hope than we can recognize through the din of our adolescent loneliness and anger. If Barfield’s theory is correct, then he should expect to gain more listeners as we “mature.” The development of such schools as cognitive science, structuralism, phenomenology and deconstructionism, which all seem strangely consonant with Poetic Diction, is evidence that the times now may be Before the New Criticism: Barfield’s Poetic Diction in Context 29 better attuned than they were in 1928 to appreciate the intricate harmonies of Barfield’s thought.

I would say mythic, poetic diction. Brings together heart and mind ! A wonderful book. But in the words of Melville, “ not for the skimmer of pages” ! Every time I read it Poetic Diction reveals more of it’s depth. For me it will take a life time to attempt to digest this book and I will love every minute of it !

there is a reason Owen Barfield was a member of the Inklings... this book proves his prowess in the theory of Poetic Diction. Who says new is better - in thought this is one of the best texts I have read on the theory of Poetry and why it matters! If you have more than the average interest in poetry this book is a must read... as well as a text every teacher should read (close reading a necessity or you will miss- interpret the author). I know I can hear John Ronald Reuel Tolkien saying "you must have had too much port... but it is true this is probably one of the best theory's of poetry I have read - just to warn you I was excited that I found the Elter Edda sagas and Younger Edda Sagas at a garage sale (translated and edited to English by another Oxford Scholar!

Like Veronica Corningstone I too practice non-regional diction, so I picked up Barfield's book to brush up. Turns out this book is about the study of meaning (right there on the cover). It is an in-depth and scholarly look at the use of poetic diction to essentially transfer old ideas into new understandable language as time passes. The idea that there is nothing new under the sun, we must find better methods of communicating our ideas to one another.

This book is marked used , but looks brand new .

Excellent book, excellent author!!!

One of the reviewers here called Barfield 'a product of his time' and suggested that now he's useful only for practical use, not for contemporary scientists and theorists. I have to disagree, and that's why I'm writing this review.1) Barfield's views on co-evolution of language and consciousness may not be widely accepted today, but surely they're not 'outdated'. His is simply an alternative theory of language history, and 'alternative' doesn't mean 'wrong'. It isn't 'naive' either: he only notes some rules at work in different languages (such as the tendency to greater abstraction), and applies them to poetry. Nowhere does he regard the metahistory of language as linear, and nowhere does he speak of 'primitive' times, or of evolution towards greater complexity in language, etc.2) Barfield's theory of metaphor is very stimulating and not at all discredited today. Maybe the former reviewer read too much Donald Davidson who regards Barfield's theory invalid, but for example Paul Ricoeur often cites Barfield approvingly. So it's all a matter of scientific paradigm one works in.I could go on forever, but it'd be better if you didn't trust anyone and simply read some Barfield. Don't read him with 'a priori' knowledge of his being outdated - simply read and evaluate his every argument for yourself to see if it's valid. Theories come and go, but thoughtful books remain.

This was a challenging read, but worth the effort. Barfield does a good job of showing how meaning is found in poetry. I especially liked his analysis of the word "ruin" as he traced its usage throughout history.