Showing posts with label Annotations. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Annotations. Show all posts

Thursday, March 30, 2017

Literary Excursions with Kerry ~ Annotations

Greetings to all friends and poets. I mentioned in my previous challenge that I would like to give more focus to the skill of using literary devices , with particular interest in those developed during the modern and post-modern time-frame. One of the characteristics of  post-modern authors was to fragment the narrative through various means, such as change of narrative perspective, flashbacks or by breaking the fourth wall. A simple method which also gained popularity was the inclusion of annotations or footnotes, which could be either factual or fictitious reference points. These annotations might be placed in the left or right margin or at the bottom of the page. John Fowles used this device in The French Lieutenant's Woman. Please click on the images for a closer view.



The annotations may perform a purely literary function, as is the case with The Annotated Alice: The Definitive Edition (1960)

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but in other cases, they may be used to tell more of the story or provide insight into character. The Selected Work of T.S. Spivet (2009) by Reif Larsen is a good case in point.

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Poetry lends itself to annotations, purely as a means of analyzing the text.

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Our Challenge is to write a poem and provide annotations to the text, either as margin notes or footnotes. You may write a new poem for the challenge, or use a poem you have previously written which you think might lend itself to this approach. I realize this may cause some logistical problem in terms of formatting but the idea is to be creative rather than restrictive. I look forward to reading the results of this endeavour.