HTRAP: Ch. 2

Chapter 2: What is Poetry?

“A poem is a fictional, verbally inventive moral statement in which it is the author, rather than the printer or word processor, who decides where the lines should end.” Poetry is not defined by the use of rhyme or meter. I have previously been an ignorant reader of poetry and did not really understand what made it a poem if it did not rhyme. Now I am beginning to realize what makes a poem a poem, is the intension behind each piece of wording and form. Eagleton seems to break poetry into prose and poetry, as if to say that prose are not poetry, though he already said they were? This was confusing to me. For a long time I did not consider prose poetry. I would pretend they were and call them poetry, but I never really understood what made them poems. I am slowly beginning to shift my understanding and I recognize the intensions behind poetry better. Furthermore, I was both confused and intrigued by Eagleton’s comments on poetry’s unique stance on morality through a fictional sense.

--Kelly J.

The quiz on this chapter was interesting. I admit I didn’t feel like I answered confidently to the questions, which was good because it encouraged me to reread the chapter.

Though even after I read it, I still got hung up on the poem, “This is Just to Say,” by William Carlos Williams. I have trouble understanding why he wrote it. What it means? Why he would put such care into words choice only to say nothing important.