A Stylistic Analysis of Dylan Thomas’“This Bread I Break”

刘 升

Abstract:This paper is intended to analyse the stylistic features of “This Bread I Break”written by Dylan Thomas by employing the theory of foregrounding, the result of which is expected to reveal the stylistic beauty of the poem. Furthermore, the theme of the poem will be explored so that the readers will have a better understanding in appreciating the poem.

Key words:stylistic features foregrounding deviation

ⅠIntroduction

This Bread I Break was written by Dylan Thomas, one of the most brilliant poets in the English language. This poem was included in the Twenty-five Poems published in 1936, which contained much of Thomas most introspective writing and outlined his own personal philosophy of religion in which he moved away from conventional Christianity. His words and explosive imagery intrigue his readers and challenge them to explore the depths of his poetry. In this paper, I will try to make an analysis of the stylistic features of his poem "This Bread I Break" by employing the theory of foregrounding.

Before we come to the concept of foregrounding, we must have a good understanding of the relationship between poetic language andordinary language' first. normal uses of languageautomatize' language to such an extent that its speaker no longer see its expressive or aesthetic power; poetry must de-automatize' orforeground' language by breaking the rules of everyday language.

Leech defines foregrounding as this: "As a general rule, anyone who wishes to investigate the significance and value of a work of art must concentrate on the element of interest and surprise, rather than on the automatic pattern. Such deviations from linguistic or other socially accepted norms have been given the special name offoregrounding', which invokes the analogy of a figure seen against a background. The artistic deviationstick out' from its background, the automatic system, like a figure in the foreground of a visual field. The application of this concept to poetry is obvious.The foregrounded figure is the linguistic deviation, and the background is the language-the system taken for granted in any talk ofdeviation'. "Short, in his article "Who is stylistics", explains foregrounding in this way: "When a writer writes he is constantly involved in making linguistic choicesboth inside and outside the language system. Choices outside the languge system are deviant and thus produce foregrounding. Overregularity of a particular choice within the system (e.g. parallelism) also produces foregrounding."

We can see from Short's statement that importance has been attached to the concept of choice. Both of the two types of choices-choice of deviation and choice of overregularity can realize foregrounding.

ⅡPhonological Level

The first impression we get from poetry is usually its beauty of rhythm and sound patterning. Rhythmic language, not only gives the poem the beauty of music, but also strengthens the thematic meaning of the poem. Of course, this poem is of no exception in which sound patterning is a distinctive feature, which contributes to the rhythmatic beauty of the poem. Various observations can be made about the patterning of sound in this poem.

Firstly, we may notice that the dense use of monosyllables in this poem is very obvious. We know that monosyllabic words are short and forceful. Therefore, by using the monosyllabic words intensively together with an exceptional density of consonants the poem gets a rather slow-moving, consonant-congested movement effect.

Secondly, in the final consonant clusters of each stanza Thomas loads the poem with plosive consonants. What's more, over half of the stressed vowels in the poem are followed by post-vocalic plosives such as the /t/, /d/, /p/, /k/ in words oat, bread, snap, break etc. the dense use of plosive consonants is perfect to express "point-actions", actions that are sudden, quick, final, and irreversible. In order to highlight the theme of breaking', the poet uses break (or broke) itself repeatedly for four times and uses the word snap containing a plosive in the end for the same reason.

Thirdly, alliteration and assonance are also two features of sound patterning in this poem. The two alliterations of syllable occur in the title bread---break' and Line 1 of Stanza 1 was---once'. By employing the alliteration the poem is endowed with some beauty of forcefulness. It is also very easy to find the trace of assonance in each stanze--"laid--grape"in Stanza 1, "this--wind" in Stanza 2, “flesh--decked”,“in--this” and “flesh--let”, “make--desolation--vein”, “my--wine” in Stanza 3. The repeated use of assonance adds to the musical and aesthetic appeal of this poem.

Ⅲ Graphological Level

Graphology refers to the encoding of meaning in visual symbols. Graphological deviation can occur in any sub-area of graphology.

The poem is divided into three stanzas, each of which is made up of five lines. But these lines are separated by commas and semi-colons and the full stop is only used at the last line of each stanza. Very interestingly, if we look at the shape of the lines from a bit farther position, we will notice that the whole structure of each stanza looks like a capital letter "K" in the English alphabet or the mathematic symbol "∑”. It seems to me that such an arrangement is by no means accidental and the poet must have some intention to do so. Maybe just like the ‘abruptness effect in using the plosive device, the poet is intended to create a cut-off effect here---from creation to destruction, from happiness to loneliness. In this way, the theme of the poem has been foregrounded skillfully.

Ⅳ Lexical Level

1 Specific and Simple Words

All words the poet uses are specific and simple ones.There may be two reasons: for one thing, it may be related to the content of the poem, which is about the production of the bread and wine. Such kind of production itself is not complicated. For another, it may be related to the religious theme, for This Bread I Break draws on the significance of the bread and wine from the Eucharist, which is simple and holy.

2 Synonymy and Hyponymy

Synonymy and hyponymy are another two lexical devices used in this poem. For instance,the grape's joy'(Line 5, Stanza 1) andThe oat was merry in the wind'(Line 4, Stanza 2) can be viewed as identical in meaning to describe the gaiety of grape and oat.

At the surface level, the whole poem is seemingly talking about the production process of bread and wine, so some hyponymous and synonymous nouns are used. To show the relations between them.

At the deep level, both the words "bread", "wine" and "flesh", "blood" have associative and symbolic meaning. The "bread" and "wine" can be associated with the Eucharist; whereas the “flesh” and “blood” symbolizes the flesh and blood of Christ.

Ⅴ Syntactical Level

1 Parallelism and Repetition

Parallelism and repetition are two prominent stylistic devices to realize foregrounding in this poem. When two or more ideas in a sentence are related in function and purpose, they can and should be phrased in the same grammatical form (words, phrases, clauses, etc.).This method of expressing ideas of equal importance in the same grammatical form is called parallelism. We notice several parallel structures in the poem, such asMan in the day or wind at night', Laid the crops low, broke the grape's joy.',Man broke the sun, pulled the wind down.', This flesh you break, this blood you let' , andMy wine you drink, my bread you snap.' By using the parallelism the symmetrical, musical and rhythmic effect have been achieved and a vivid image is presented before the readers.

One function of repetition is to stess the theme and produce an atmosphere; another is to produce an echoing effect.The phrasesOnce in this'(Line 1, Stanza 2) andOnce in this '(Line 3, Stanza 2) are repeated in the same stanza. By the repetition ofonce' structure the poet conveys to us a sense of regret. When we read this, a sense of melancholy will come up to our mind spontaneously.

2 Ellipsis

Apart from parallel structures and repetition, the poet also exploits ellipsis to realize foregrounding. For instance, in "This wine upon a foreign tree" (Line 2, Stanza 1) the linking verb "was" is omitted. Notice that the word "plunged" in the next line should not be counted as the predicate verb, which only serves as attribute of the preceding noun "tree". By omitting the auxiliary was', the participle plunged' is foregrounded, thus a panorama of rich harvest has spread out before us. This seems to suggest a contrast between the beauty and vitality of the natural world and the destructiveness of mans activity.

Ⅵ Grammatical Level

1.Inverted Order

Inverted structures are also applied for the sake of emphasis in this poem. Remembering the principle of front-focus can help a writer add emphasis to a particular constituent in a clause, consider the following two examples: (1) "This wine upon a foreign tree Plunged in its fruit". In this order "plunged" is emphasized; while in the natural order "This wine plunged in its fruit (was) upon a foreign tree" such effect will be lost. (2) "My wine you drink, my bread you snap." Compared with the natural order "You drink my wine, you snap my bread.", we can see that the two clauses each have marked themes and the focus has been shifted. The natural order focuses onyou', while the inverted one emphasizes the objectmy wine' andmy bread', which are the core of this poem. So, in this way the main theme has been foregrounded. Besides, the balance of the sound pattern is another consideration for this arrangement.

2.Juxtaposition of Past Tense and Present Tense

The juxtaposition of past tense and present tense is also a typical feature of this poem. Generally, time reference in the verbs shifts from the past in Stanzas 1 and 2 to the present in Stanza 3. We can notice that past tense is used in Stanza 1 and Stanza 2. These predicates include "was, (was--omitted in Line 2 of Stanza1), laid, broke" and "knocked, was, broke, pulled". While in Stanza 3 present tense prevails, and there are two present tense clauses and only one past tense clause. The poem ends with a strong sense of the immediate present: My wine you drink, my bread you snap with the predicates "make, drink, snap". Considering this, we may begin to speculate on why the poet juxtaposes past tense with present tense. By the distributional patterns of the two tenses, the poet makes a temporal and spatial comparison between immediacy and non-immediacy. After the comparison the readers will get such a kind of impression: the bread and wine were jaunty in the original state; due to human behavior "they make desolation in the vein" now. Till now, we are not far from the theme of the poem.

Ⅶ About the Theme

In order to understand Thomas poetry, we must understand his religious background first. Thomas believed in Puritanism and Puritanism directed his life and thought. Therefore, religion was part of his poetry and the puritanism was inescapable. In the poem This Bread I Break we can sense the influence of religion. Seemingly the whole poem is talking about the production process of the bread and wine. In fact, some symbolic connotations must have hidden behind it. This poem draws on the significance of the bread and wine from the Eucharist, and introduces the concept of eternal life through Christ. The bread and wine may symbolize the sacred bread and wine. The production of bread and wine involves the destruction of a living organism through harvesting. This poem reflects in a broad sense our own desecration of the earth and suggests we human beings are only granted redemption by Christ after the horror of the crucifixion.

Ⅷ Conclusion

Based on the above stylistic analysis of the poem, a sound conclusion can be drawn as follows: by employing a variety of techniques, such as phonological devices, lexical devices, syntactical devices etc., the writer not only makes his work musical, attractive, vivid, and imaginable, but also constructs meaning skillfully and simultaneously. These, in turn, contribute to the artistic and aesthetic beauty of his poem. Furthurmore, the theme of the poem has also been foregrounded and enhanced.

References:

[1]Leech, G. N. A Linguistic Guide to English Poetry. Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press, Beijing, 2001,(10):5-6. 57.

[2]王守元.英语文体学要略 (Essentials of English Stylistics).济南:山东大学出版社,2000.13.30.

[3]Short, M. H. ‘Who is stylistics. Foreign Languages 5 & 6, 1984.21.

[4]王佐良,丁往道.英语文体学引论.北京:外语教学与研究出版社,2004,6.