| Abstract [eng] |
Word and Image: Ekphrasis in "Pictures from Brueghel" by William Carlos Williams The interrelationship between the verbal and visual arts has a long and complicated history surpassing our times. Since the high antiquity they were regarded both as the Sister Arts sharing the same representational grounds and the different discourses in a paragonal struggle for dominance. This Master’s thesis Word and Image: Ekphrasis in “Pictures from Brueghel” by William Carlos Williams focuses on the relationship between the verbal and visual arts through the lens of ekphrasis. Ekphrasis itself is a problematic concept that originated in the antiquity and that has changed significantly throughout the years. Thus, nowadays this concept embodies various different meanings. This thesis builds on the prevailing definition suggested by James A. W. Heffernan and William J. T. Mitchell who describe ekphrasis as a “verbal representation of a visual representation”. Ekphrasis indicates a constant dialogue between the word and the image. The ekphrastic poem, for instance, by presenting itself it represents another work of art which itself is a representation. Thus, the ekphrastic poem becomes a secondary representation, an interpretation of an interpretation. The aim of this Master’s thesis is to demonstrate the strategy that Williams uses in Pictures from Brueghel to create an effect of image-ness, i.e. both the imagery and the visuality of the poem. The selected poems by Williams and the corresponding paintings by Brueghel are analysed applying the semiotics of the visual arts by Felix Thürlemann and the levels of iconographic/iconological analysis by Erwin Panofsky. The thesis proves that by looking at the paintings and interpreting them Williams creates poetic descriptions (ekphrastic interpretations) that present themselves as semiotic. |
