90244 - Forms of Poetic Text (1) (LM)

Learning outcomes

Throughout this class, students are introduced the knowledge of the fundamentals of an analytical approach to the poetic text - meter, rhythm, intonation, and the history of poetic forms - in a comparative perspective, and they become able to apply them as they read authors and poems belonging to various languages and traditions.

Course contents

Main topic:

From meter to rythm. Rhythmic intertextuality in poetry between nineteenth and twentieth century

The course (30 hours, 6 credits) aims to: 1) elaborate a notion of ‘rhythm’ in poetry; 2) describe the changing of the function assumed in the 20th Century by the main rhythmic-syntactic figures belonging to the legacy of Pascoli and D’Annunzio’s poetry (from Aldo Palazzeschi to Guido Gozzano, from Dino Campana to Giuseppe Ungaretti, from Eugenio Montale to Andrea Zanzotto, Amelia Rosselli and Novissimi).

 

This course assumes a minimum of knowledge upon metrics and stylistics, acquired throughout the BA curriculum.

 

Please Note: Since the beginning of the lectures, students will be allowed to enroll in this class via the "Insegnamenti OnLine" web site.

Readings/Bibliography

 1) The notion of "rhythmic-syntactic figure" in poetry will be elaborated through the analysis of Giacomo Leopardi’s L’infinito. Recommended reading:

• É. Benveniste, La nozione di ritmo nella sua espressione linguistica, in ID., Problemi di linguistica generale, Milano, Il Saggiatore, 1971, pp. 390-400 (Teaching material).

• C. Di Girolamo, Gli endecasillabi dell' “Infinito”, in ID.,Teoria e prassi della versificazione, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1976, pp. 169-181 (Teaching material).

2) About the notion of free verse in Italian poetry and the permanence of rhythmic-syntactic figures over time:

• Paolo Giovannetti - Gianfranca Lavezzi, La metrica italiana contemporanea, Roma, Carocci 2010, pp. 11-99 (disponibile presso la Biblioteca del Dipartimento di Filologia Classica e Italianistica, via Zamboni 32).

• Franco Fortini, i saggi: Metrica e libertà (1957); Verso libero e metrica nuova (1958) e Su alcuni paradossi della metrica moderna (1958), raccolti in ID., Saggi ed epigrammi, a cura di L. Lenzini, Milano, Mondadori, 2003, pp. 783-817 (Teaching material).

• F. Carbognin, Linguaggio (1956 – 1969), in N. Lorenzini – S. Colangelo [a cura di], Poesia e Storia, Milano, Bruno Mondadori, 2013 (cap. IV, pp. 195-239) (Teaching material).
  

• F. Carbognin, Retorica e sintassi nella poesia italiana del Novecento, Lecce, Manni, 2020 (Teaching material).

 

Throughout the class, will be read and analyzed, in order to be prepared towards the final oral exam, poems by G. D'Annunzio, G. Pascoli, A. Palazzeschi, G. Gozzano, D. Campana, E. Montale.

Students are also expected to prepare the poems, analyzed in class, of one of the following poets: Antonio Porta, Andrea Zanzotto, Amelia Rosselli.

The texts of all the poems (.pdf) will be available on on the platform "Insegnamenti OnLine" since the beginning of the course. 

A detailed description of the course contents, bibliography and assessment methods will be provided throughout the class. Further information will be provided during office hours.

Teaching methods

Classes with a strong interaction between students and teacher.

 

Timetable

Wednesday, 13:00-15:00 
Aula A, Via Zamboni 34

Thursday, 13.00-15.00
Aula A, Via Zamboni 34

Friday, 13.00-15.00
Aula A, Via Zamboni 34

 

Beginning of lectures

Wednesday, 11 novembre 2020 
(II period)

Assessment methods

The final oral exam is aimed at verifying in each student some argumentative and technical skills related to the theoretical matters and the poetic texts analyzed throughout the class. Students will be required to read and comment some poems or samples, of which they are expected to recognize and to describe the main metrical and rhetorical-syntactic features.

A positive or excellent score (27 to 30/30, even with distinction) corresponds to a full mastering of technical, theoretical, historical tools for the analysis of poetic text, to a strong ability to make connections among any single part of the course contents and to correctly approach textual features with an appropriate language; an average score (23 to 26/30) goes to students who show some lacks in one or more topics or analytical exercises; a low score (18 to 22/30) to students who have severe lacks in one or more topics or exercises, that show improprieties in using notions and approaching textual examples. A negative score is assigned to students who are absolutely not able to manage the general notions and the technical language appropriate to literary analysis, and who cannot recognize the different characteristics (metrical, rhetorical, syntactic, semantic) of a poetic text.

Teaching tools

PC, video projector, overhead projector, slides and digital scans of images and excerpts from poetic and critical texts.

Office hours

See the website of Francesco Carbognin