The Cognitive Poetics of Ekphrastic Intervention

Abstract

This thesis presents a cognitive poetic exploration of ekphrasis as a creative writing practice of responding to visual art. The study examines the production and reception of ekphrasis from a new perspective by considering the influence of both an artwork and an ekphrastic text on interpretation. This thesis uses naturalistic and experimental data to investigate the techniques of writing an ekphrastic text alongside participants’ reported experiences of ekphrasis. To examine ekphrastic writing, this thesis employs three collections of contemporary ekphrastic texts published in The Ekphrastic Review. The collections are assembled in response to three paintings: A Blind Girl Reading by Ejnar Nielsen, The Dream by Frida Kahlo, and Roofscape by Gustave Caillebotte. To analyse readerly experience of ekphrasis, this thesis utilises reader-response data generated during the discussions of selected ekphrases by two groups of participants. The resulting findings are consolidated in the model of ekphrastic intervention, which selectively adopts the tools of Text World Theory, visual grammar, the model of narrative interrelation, and the framework of conceptual integration. To examine ekphrastic writing, the model outlines ways of responding to art by focussing on how language potentially can closely or distantly align the representations of an image and a text. To examine ekphrastic reading, the model elicits two cognitive acts involved in interpreting ekphrasis: ekphrastic interrelation and blending. This thesis offers the following contributions. First, ekphrasis is approached from a novel holistic angle, including both visual and verbal into consideration. Second, ekphrasis is framed as a creative writing practice, providing useful tools for enhancing ekphrastic writing skills. Third, the introduced model offers a systematic way of analysing ekphrasis, approaching both readerly interpretations and textual features that may elicit such responses. Finally, the empirical examination of ekphrasis diversifies the tradition of reader response, validating cooperative and resistant behaviours in participants’ reported experiences.