Making worlds out of silence: A text-world analysis of the unspoken in ‘Not an Ending’ by Andrew Waterhouse

McLoughlin, Nigel F ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0382-6831 (2021) Making worlds out of silence: A text-world analysis of the unspoken in ‘Not an Ending’ by Andrew Waterhouse. In: Breaking the Silence. Routledge, London. ISBN 9780367467630

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Abstract

The essay that follows will use a cognitive stylistic framework to analyse how what remains unsaid can be evoked in a poem and recovered by a reader. Andrew Waterhouse’s poem ‘Not an Ending’ (Waterhouse 2000: 16) presents the reader with a report of one side of an interaction. The poem exhibits strategic use of ‘disnarration’ and ‘non-narration’ (Prince 1988; Lambrou 2019: 19). Disnarration is defined as telling of events that didn’t happen, by marking them specifically through negation or as hypothetical. This manifests in the poem as a report of a series of denials. The non-narration in the poem is marked by leaving significant gaps in what is told. The poem is silent with regard to the actual situation, the other participant’s role in the interaction, and what it is they say. The reader is left to judge what might have happened. The poem is left open to the reader, and the mechanisms, used by the poet to create both openness, through the use of gaps and silences, and to allude to what has happened, and the part played by the character whose speech is reported, are elegantly deployed.

Item Type:	Book Section
Additional Information:	Chapter 8.
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Andrew Waterhouse; poetry
Subjects:	P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) > PN0080 Criticism P Language and Literature > PR English literature P Language and Literature > PR English literature > PR500 Poetry
Divisions:	Schools and Research Institutes > School of Creative Arts
Research Priority Areas:	Culture, Continuity, and Transformation
Depositing User:	Anne Pengelly
Date Deposited:	22 Oct 2020 11:39
Last Modified:	28 May 2025 16:00
URI:	https://eprints.glos.ac.uk/id/eprint/8912

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