E E Cummings
E. E. Cummings, who was born in 1894 and died in 1962, wrote many poems with unconventional punctuation and capitalization, and unusual line, word, and even letter placements - namely, ideograms. Cummings' most difficult form of prose is probably the ideogram; it is extremely terse and it combines both visual and auditory elements. There may be sounds or characters on the page that cannot be verbalized or cannot convey the same message if pronounced and not read. Four of Cummings' poems - l(a, mortals), !blac, and swi( - illustrate the ideogram form quite well. Cummings utilizes unique syntax in these poems in order to convey messages visually as well as verbally. Although one may think of l(a as a poem of sadness and loneliness, Cummings probably did not intend that. This poem is about individuality - oneness (Kid 200-1). The theme of oneness can be derived from the numerous instances and forms of the number '1' throughout the poem. First, 'l(a' contains both the number 1 and the singular indefinite article, 'a'; the second line contains the French singular definite article, 'le'; 'll' on the fifth line represents two
The reader does not simply read and forget Cummings' ideas; instead, he must figure out the hidden meaning himself. The first line, 'swi(' shows that the object the poet sees is moving so rapdly that before he completely utters his first word, he must describe the object, and that it is passing before another object - the sun. " This poem is also concerns the cycle of birth, life, death, and renewal. But a stopping of motion would contradict 'swi/ftly', so Cummings decided to refer to the speed average of the two, 'Swi/mming' (106). 'against' contrasts with 'across', and signifies a halt. The poet writes about the sky and a tree, and then a comma intrudes, which makes the reader pause, and realize the new awareness that the comma indicated - that of a falling leaf (145). The poem mainly tries to convince the reader of the difference between conception, what one sees, and perception, what one knows he is seeing (Mar 105). The shape of the poem can also be seen as the path of a falling leaf; the poem drifts down, flipping and altering pairs of letters like a falling leaf gliding, back and forth, down to the ground. New York: Columbia University Press, 1979.
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