Question about registry usage/shift in poems&literature

[Chris]

Hello everybody,

I am studying for my exams in English Literature, and I have bit of a
trouble to understand fully the registry usage. Reading through the
"Ways of Reading", by M. Montgomery (Surely a known book for English
Literature students out there) I can't say that I find much explanations.

The examples shown are rather simple. I mean, I do understand that it's
one kind of register to use "scientific" language and another to use
"commerce" language, for example. But when we have a poem ("One perfect
rose", by Dorothy Parker, for instance, that is included as an activity
in the 1992 print of "Ways of reading") then it gets bit complicated, as
I really have hard time to realize when a register shifts.

Another interesting example. Searching through the internet, I found the
following haiku poem:
"winter
in a world of one color
the taste of peaches"
In the commentary accompanying it, it was mentioned that from the first
2 lines to the 3d, there is "a register shift from seeing to taste,
winter to summer, white to peach, external to internal"
I do more or less comprehend what the commentary implies, but in this
case, isn't it so that practically every poem we know has a register
shift every 2-3 lines? I mean, it can't be called a register shift the
slightest variation, right?

My question. Can you recommend any site in the internet in which I could
find more information about register usage? I really need to start from
the basics, it seems.

Thank you in advance,
Chris

[credoquaabsurdum]

No clue on Internet help. However, you should be aware that it is a
proven fact that men have more problems in understanding appropriate
register than women, according to David Crystal.

Haiku poetry written in English is notorious for attracting admirers
who like to produce oodles of commentary that basically tries to
justify a literary form that should go gently into that good night.
English Haiku has much in common with white-boy-written gangsta rap
that way.

My own first degree is in English Literature and I don't think I have
ever read a book or an article written by M. Montgomery. I think I've
heard of _Ways of Reading_, but the titles just kind of blend into each
other after a while.

Last point: Worry less about register and more about syntax, or you'll
get murdered in your exams.

[david...@yahoo.com]

Poetry, music and the Mormon Faith prove that if you ever find a
constant, hold on (or let go) for dear life. The register metaphore is
badly chosen -- rather like adopting French cuisine for a McD
clientale. Violinists could build a family on the concept of register
alone. But in poery, the sags are too much to bear.

And you left out the magic trump card ... semantics. That's syntax with
an atittude you can discern. Sound's cake till you lob the job off to
some binary junkyard. "Up to now, the best substition for a human
brain in business is a computer programmed by a negro." --George
Wallace.

[Leisha]

I agree. The register exercise, applied to poetry, seems contrived. I
think the professor is trying to give you an opportunity to be clever.

Leisha

[Dale Houstman]

Or he's one of those professors who think coming up with new "ideas"
that aren't necessary somehow makes them seem smarter. I had an art
professor who once asked us to turn in a "portfolio concept" by the end
of the quarter. When I asked him if he just meant that we should turn in
a portfolio, he said yes. But the word "concept" made it seem so much
hipper!

dmh

[Leisha]

> hipper!
>
> dmh

Funny. I am going back to school, with trepidation. I am going to get
my feet wet with a poetry workshop, if they'll let me. The professor is
Dorriane Laux!

Leisha

[Dim Witte]

I'm a new lurker at this news group, so will only respond to this one
of your cross-post targets.

I think the issue about "registers" you raise, if I understand, is
interesting and relevant in terms of communications, where they get
into analyzing many ways it goes on. We seem to need this kind of
broader definition of teaching "communications," instead of teaching
English, what ever that is.

Won't try to spell it all out, but it seems that a model of
communications could look at how it sorts out as a diagram. For
instance, a radio model could look at sender and receiver, analyzing
what who are sender and receiver(s), what is the medium, what is the
channel and frequency, what is the message, and many other factors
such as "noise" that changes interpretation. Do that for a poem, for
instance, and you can proceed to "feedback" between sender (poet) and
receiver (audience), plus what is defined in a conversation, back and
forth.

I like the abstract model of communications, because it seems to
reflect all the sense inputs we normally use as "animals in the
forest," and we do seem to have ability to "read" pauses, intention,
emotion, feeling, honesty, etc..

Was a very influential book out by Marshall McCluhan, titled *The
Medium is the Massage^(sic), evidently a mistake/pun on "message." But
it does raise questions about communication, intended or not.

Hope you do okay on your exams,
Regards, bookburn