Attention, Agility and Poetic Effects
The idea of cognition being a process where an "executive function" determines how
attention will be deployed isn't new. Here are two descriptions
"Bialystok (1990, 1994), in her classic discussion of
cognitive development describes learning in terms of two cognitive
processing components - analysis and control. Analysis changes the way knowledge
is represented in the mind of the learner. Through the process of analysis, language knowledge changes from implicit
knowledge organised at the level of meanings, to explicit knowledge
organised at the level of formal or symbolic knowledge.
Control involves a development in the learner's ability to selectively
focus on relevant and appropriate information. Control, in this sense,
means the process of allocating attention to specific representations of
knowledge and the ability to move between representations (or particular
aspects of these representations) in a manner which allows the fluent
completion of the task" (condensed from Hanauer).
"Miller and Cohen draw explicitly upon an earlier theory of visual attention
which conceptualises perception of visual scenes in terms of competition among
multiple representations - such as colors, individuals, or objects.
Selective visual attention acts to 'bias' this competition in favour of certain
selected features or representations. ... According to
Miller and Cohen, this selective attention mechanism is in fact just a special
case of cognitive control - one in which the biasing occurs in the sensory
domain. ... Within their approach, thus, the term 'cognitive control' is applied to
any situation where a biasing signal is used to promote task-appropriate
responding, and control thus becomes a crucial component of a wide range of
psychological constructs such as selective attention, error monitoring,
decision-making, memory inhibition and response inhibition" (from Wikipedia)
Hanauer has applied this theory to literature. As proposed by Graves (1996), the study of expert
and novice readers of literature is a useful methodology for investigating
the workings of the literary system. Hanauer summarise the empirical
studies as follows
Experts analyse the literary text on multiple levels and integrate this
information into their interpretations; novices relate to the local level
of the text.- Experts analyse the communicative context of the literary
text and the function of various literary patterns within this context;
novices follow the narrative and dialogue structure of the literary text. - Experts manipulate and focus on specific information in the text in
order to produce literary interpretations; novices were very influenced by
the local level of the text. - Experts can explicitly discuss the role of
formal schematic and textual features in the construction of an
interpretation; novices paraphrase the meaning of the text.
I'm going to look more
closely at the "levels" aspect of these conclusions, incorporating the factor of speed.
Stratified Literary Features
A literary work has many features, some of which might be
considered as "layers". For example, Roman Ingarden developed
Aristotle's concept that a literary work of art has at least 4 layers,
starting with sound, then sense. Perceived properties (like beauty,
difficulty, etc) can slide from one level to another. In an experiment by Song
and Schwarz where people were shown
recipes in different fonts, a recipe in a font that's hard to read was
thought to be harder to execute than the same recipe in an easy font.
Similarly, speed of reading (controlled by layout) can affect the perceived
speed of the narrated events, and a surprising layout can be synchronised
with a narrative surprise. I suspect that experts are more aware of the transference of
such characteristics. In the "recipe" experiment the effect
disappeared if the experimenter apologised to the subject for the readability
of the font. An expert reader might not have needed such an apology in order
to compensate.
Upper layers can have emergent features absent from lower ones (emotions
only exist at higher levels) or can have effects that contradict those of
lower layers (a story full of jokes can be sad).
Interpretation is not a straightforward progression from lowest to highest level. A higher level interpretation can provoke a re-interpretation
of a lower level. Years ago there was a "Truth to Materials" credo in
sculpture - a belief that wooden sculpture should exploit knots and the
grain rather than try to gloss them over. Many poems seem not to
acknowledge the "graininess" of language - the lower levels (the choice of font, color, etc)are soon ignored. Low-level features are more likely to "show through"
palimpsestically in poetry than in prose, though many prose examples exists. Some examples:
- If in a hand-written letter one reads
"this is written with my blood", the physical medium becomes significant again. - When reading handwriting one might reinterpret letters after having failed
to deduce a satisfactory meaning.
"Janet likes John" is a simple enough sentence. The interpretation of "Janet likes John" is slightly different.- "love's sore return" - The letters painlessly form into words that in turn combine to form a
sentence. When appended by "(4)" and seen as a cryptic crossword clue
however, words are broken down into letters, and the meaning of the apostrophe changes.
"Flower: exploding star in retreat" - An imagist poem? No, another clue.
An exploding star is a
nova, which reversed spells the solution, which is "Avon" - something that flows and
hence is a 'flower'. In this case we need to regress back to the
"letters" level and re-create an alternative sound and meaning for 'flower'
In the table
below I attempt to describe the effects of some layered poetic features on
attention.
The up/down directions mentioned below pertain to the hierarchy formed by
letters, words/sound, localized meaning, and general meaning. The in/out
direction is relative to the text. I also consider the narrowness of the attention.
| Effect | In/Out | Up/Down | Intensity/Focus |
|---|---|---|---|
| Meter | In | Down to sound | Wide |
| Rhyme | In | Down to sound | Medium |
| Acrostic | In | Down to letters | Medium |
| Internal reference | In | Same level | Narrow |
| Intertextual reference | Out (text) | Same level | Narrow |
| Nouns | Out (World) | Up out of language | Medium |
| Proper nouns | Out (World) | Up out of language | Narrow |
I hope these entries are not far from
your subjective impressions. Meter, for example, is a field effect, a
wide dissipated awareness of sound emerging from below. End-rhyme has a more
local affect. On the other hand if someone
called James Lawson was reading a poem that said "James Lawson is a
prat", attention would be narrowly focussed away from the poem and away from
language. Wherever the attention is dragged, sensations like "difficulty"
might be carried along too.
Some points to note
- The fewer "in" effects, the more transparent the text appears to be (the
fewer layers it seems to have) - Something like a proper noun that can distract attention from the text
can be anchored to the text by making it rhyme, etc.
Rather than use the analogy of layers, this situation might be described in terms of processes with feedback.
In this document I'll stick with the "layer" metaphor for the sake of argument
(and because it helps with the "palimpsest" metaphor).
Layer confusion and compression
The layers are not always clearly distinguished. For example,
- Cryptic crossword clues conflate the layers
- Phrases like "love is a four letter world" make readers change depth
- Finnegan's Wake exhibits layer instability, as do poems like 'What's in a Homophone' (Josephine Abbott, Staple 25) which begins
How can I bare it?
My idle,
My bridle partner
Left me last weak
For a made.
What a waist
Of ours
And ours.
Gérard Genette used the term 'metalepsis' for when boundaries between layers are crossed by characters or other textual
elements. For example, in Coleman Dowell's novel "Island People" a low level framed story becomes the top level, taking over the narrative, creating a kind of Mobius band.
Sometimes, especially during reading, the concept of layers is ignored;
layers are merged together. This is also done in Cartography, in painting
(perspective), and in Photoshop (to save storage space). It's often done to
"fix" the interpretation from a particular viewpoint. The disadvantage
is that the process is irreversable and makes alternative interpretations
difficult. Making the reader do this might be the intent of the author, lulling the reader into a false
sense of security.
Time
Within a layer each new element
can suggest meanings or eliminate possibilities (for example, consider the
effect of each new fact in a whodunit). There can be an association with other
phrases in the same layer or with elements in other layers. E.g.
- 2 ambiguous phrases taken together can produces an unambiguous result.
- A line-break (a lower layer feature) can change the interpretation of a phrase.
Reading often doesn't proceed linearly through the text. Even in prose there's
typically 10% of saccades (eye-movements) backwards. In poetry this percentage
is likely to be higher. In particular ambiguity and confusion will
provoke backtracking or regression to lower layers. The amount of backtracking needed will influence the
reading strategy. Options include
- serial processing (if readers pick the wrong alternative they
backtrack to the last fork - usually on the same layer) - parallel processing (keeping all options open - multi-tasking)
- minimal commitment (choosing an option but accepting that the chosen
option is provisional - using peripheral vision)
Chapter-ends and poetic line-breaks tend to force a decision/resolution. The
sentence above in the 'layer confusion' section works better with line-breaks
love is
a four letter
world
Rather than just using the emergent meaning one can have a richer reading
experience by retaining the lower-level meaning too, leaving that up/down dimension open for traversal.
End-rhymes force an awareness of the lower level of sound, though it's only
one of many poetic effects that do this.
In general, the path through the text is less linear for the poetry reader
than for the prose reader. Poetry readers are more likely to bob between layers
and move backwards and forwards in the text - they're more agile, and they
might read prose in a similarly agile way.
Mental Agility
When it's said that someone lacks mental agility, what is meant? Clearly
it's something to do with speed (which hasn't yet been mentioned) as well as
movement. I think the movements alluded to fall into 3 main types
- Moving forwards and backwards in the text
- Changing between 2 modes of attention (for example, from visual effects
to
plot-following, or seeing an issue from others'
viewpoints) - Zooming in/out while staying in the same mode.
Control of this movement is the role of what's often called the "central
executive function". A related notion to this movement is multi-tasking (or dual tasking). There's quite a lot of
research about this so although it's not strictly relevant, it's worth
considering the material because it too involves task-switching. There are
situations where we perform multi-tasking - when a task is automated
(e.g. driving), or when the tasks
can be clumped into a fewer
activities (a pianist doesn't have to worry about each finger or hand in
isolation) but as Earl Miller has shown,
we really only focus on one or two items at a time. Multitasking is essentially
delegation or fast task-switching. Autistic people tend to lack this ability.
It's harder when the tasks are similar, or use the same part of the brain;
easier when the tasks are easily interruptable.
Expert readers have fewer difficulties
- Expert readers are likely to use more parts of their brain because
they look for more features - Expert readers have more opportunies to clump, putting less load on
working memory.
Plus points
This mixture of tightening
and loosening the reader's attention, of turning their attention inward, upward,
then outward, of rocking them backwards and forwards through rhyme, can be
choreographed by the poet, and presents a challenge to readers with inflexible
attention strategies, resulting in simplifications and tunnel vision.
In some poems inflexibility isn't important because there's a uniformity of effect. For example
- With Dada "sound poetry" attention is always "down to sound"
- A list poem (of regions used in BBC weather forecasts, for example) predominantly
uses one effect - Confessional poetry has a narrow focus
During reading, some people resist the movement between layers.
They become stuck in a layer, trying to read Finnegan's Wake as if it were
a poorly spelt straight story. They lose the possibility of seeing how the 2 movements
(forwards and backwards; up and down) interact. It's as if an archaeologist
ignored the depth at which artifacts were found. For this reason (and because they
notice peripheral clues) agile readers might be less prone to whodunnit
punchlines.
At other times (e.g when reading an ironic text),
not only is flexibility required
but speed is too. Using a cinema analogy,
what's required is not only a good editor to combine the viewpoints afterwards, but
a good director too, otherwise important data may not be
collected in the first place. An effective director might perform an
initial scan through the modes to see if anything stands out (much as one
might scan the horizon or flick through TV channels, or size up a poem) - a
shallow, wide search. In a live TV show a director needs to be an editor
too. They may have a bank of
screens showing the output from various cameras, and like a reader will
choose which to prioritise whilst retaining a periperal awareness of
happenings on other screens. This is analogous to the situation a poetry
listener is in - speed of control and task-switching become important.
Once interesting
features are identified, attention might be centred on those modes that
recognise the features. To be effective, people require
- quick processing (so
the director can decide quickly where to focus attention next) - sufficient working memory storage so that a task can be continued from where it
was left off when task-switching.
With a good director, the person can still emulate someone without agility
(they can narrowly focus on a single task), but they can also rapidly
juxtapose 2 viewpoints (hence produce comedy, insight, dramatic irony, etc)
producing responses that
are hard for non-agile readers to appreciate (like not getting a joke)
Minus Points
Uncontrolled flitting can be a problem. It can
look like
- inappropriate detachment - withdrawal; lack of response
- multiple personality
- confusion
- attention deficiency
- shallowness
- dilution of the poem's impact by considering too many types
of features.
By breaking "agility" down, problems and diagnoses can be more
accurately diagnosed. A fast director (an imprecise one especially) can increase the workload for
the "editor" stage. Continuing the film analogy
- If a good director has few cameras they'll be good at a few tasks,
but they'll have blindspots - If a good director has bad cameras they'll not miss the obvious (common sense
rather than insight) - If a bad
director has good cameras someone else can use their work. it might be saved
by a good editor
What can be taught?
Both speed of task-switching and range of tasks can be increased by
training. Readers can practise switching, superimposition, etc against the
clock, and they can become more sensitive to issues like Form, Implied
Addressee, etc.
According to Hanauer both implicit (theory) and explicit (examples) teaching methods
should be used. The former allows the development of individual literary
patterns and the latter widens the options of types of literary pattern
that can be considered.
An Example
Going Down
Cycles cluck past, two boys walk with each girl,
And upstairs James, not Jim, strums his sitar,
Making words tadpole in your desklamp's pool,
Breaking the concentration of the hour.
...
Rather than analysing a single factor in any depth, an expert reader will
briefly
consider layout, sound, the title and the first few lines of a poem to see
which
tools might be most appropriate for the task and genre. This pieces look like a sonnet,
so the reader's attention might be attracted towards sound - particularly line-endings.
Later there
are enough references for the reader to realise the poems about Oxbridge
life. Once they've finished a first reading, the title might be revisited ("Going
Down" means leaving University). But the title's also a clue that the
poem's an acrostic, a realisation that leads the reader to re-visit the lower
levels.
Readers need to go backwards and forwards as well as up and down. They can't
afford to forget about a layer once it's been interpreted.
fancifully) here's a trajectory through the poem. The reader begins at
the title (1) and perhaps guesses a theme, then does a low-level scan of
the whole piece (2 to 3) then returns to a fairly high level (4) to
read the piece, their attention draw back and down to the sounds of
previous end-rhymes. At the end (5) there's another dip into lower levels (6)
to read the initial letters of the lines, then finally (7) a high-level
conclusion. A similar graph of a prose reader's journey would be a
near-horizontal line.
References
- Bialystok, E. (1990), "Communication Strategies: A Psychological Analysis of
Second-Language Use". Oxford: Basil Blackwell Inc. - Bialystok, E. (1994), "Analysis and control in the development of second language
proficiency". Studies in Second Language Acquisition 23, 157-68. - Graves, B. (1996). "The study of literary expertise as a research strategy". Poetics 23, 385-403.
- Hanauer, D. (1999), "Attention and Literary Education: A Model
of Literary Knowledge Development". Language Awareness, 8 (1), 15-29.
(online) - Miller, E.K. and Cohen, J.D. (2001), "An
integrative theory of prefrontal cortex function". Annual Review of Neuroscience 24,
167-202. - Song, H. and Schwarz, N. (2010), "If it's easy to read, it's easy to
do, pretty, good, and true", The Psychologist, V23, February 2010
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