Time and Poetic Speech: A Philosophical Investigation

ISBN-13: 9783031124570 / Angielski / Miękka / 2023

Kwok Kui Wong

Opis

This book analyzes the relation between the flow time and poetic speech in drama and rhetoric. It begins with the classical understanding of time as flux, and its problems and paradoxes entailing from Aristotle, Augustine, Kant and Husserl. The reader will see how these problems unfold and find resolutions through dramatic speech and rhetoric which has an essential relation to the flow of time. It covers elements in poetic speech such as affect, rhythm, metaphor, and syntax. It uses examples from classical rhetorical theories by Aristotle, Cicero, Quintilian, dramatic speeches from Shakespeare, as well as other modern dramatic texts by Chekhov, Beckett, Jelinek and Sarah Kane. This book appeals to students and academic researchers working in the philosophical fields of aesthetics and phenomenology as well those working in theater and the performing arts.

Spis treści

Introduction

Chapter 1: The Flux of Time

(i) From Heraclitus to Aristotle

(ii) Augustine’s esse

(iii) Kant on flux

(iv) Husserl’s stream

(v) The unmoving “I”

(vi) Bergson on pure duration

(vii) Time, Affect and Language

(viii) Example: Richard II’s soliloquy

Chapter 2: Movement of the Soul, Affect and Language

(i) Movement of the soul: Plato

(ii) Time and Speech: Plato again

(iii) Pathos, affect, emotion

(iv) Theory of affected time

(v) Origin of language from affect: Herder

(vi) Language as articulation: Humboldt

(vii) Conclusion

Chapter 3: Rhythm

(i) Introduction

(ii) The Schopenhauer question

(iii) Rhetoric and rhythm

(iv) Rhythm as painting: Diderot 

(v) Beyond divided time: Hegel

(vi) Rhythm and symbolic expression: Schlegel

(vii) Actio in distans: Nietzsche’s theory of rhythm

(viii) Theory of continuum of affect

(ix) Semantic sphere: Schopenhauer

(x) Rhythm and analogies of experience: Kant

(xi) Rhythm and resonance: Bergson

(xii) Example: King Lear

Chapter 4: Metaphor

(i) Introduction

(ii) Metaphor and affect

(iii) Ricoeur’s theory of metaphor

(iv) Metaphoric of change 

(v) Word and sentence

(vi) Metaphor and modernity

Chapter 5: Syntax

(i) Rhyme and sentence

(ii) Syntax in classical rhetoric: Cicero

(iii) Cassirer on syntax

(iv) Syntax in lyric

(v) Subject and substance

(vi) Delivery: Hamlet’s instruction

(vii) Challenges from modern theatre

(viii) Rhythm and figuration in life

O autorze

Dr. Wong Kwok Kui is Associate Professor at the Department of Humanities and Creative Writing, Baptist University of Hong Kong. He received his Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Tübingen, Germany, under the supervision of Prof. Günter Figal. His research interests include Nietzsche, Schelling, hermeneutics, the problem of time and poetics, and theatre aesthetics. His latest publications include: Nietzsche: from Dionysus to Übermensch (in Chinese), and articles such as “Rhythm and the Symbolic Process in Nietzsche’s The Birth of Tragedy” (New Nietzsche Studies), “Schelling’s Understanding of Laozi”, (Dao: Journal of Comparative Philosophy), “Hegel’s Criticism of Laozi and Its Implications” (Philosophy East and West), and “Schelling’s Criticism of Kant’s Theory of Time” (Idealistic Studies). Wong is also an award-winning playwright and has staged more than fifteen plays in such cities and countries as Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, Edinburgh, South Korea and Poland.