E. E. Cummings effectively uses his unique style of linguistics to enhance his poetry. His use of stylistics―techniques that give additional meaning, ideas, or feelings towards writing―is beneficial because of their ability to illustrate individual components of a work that are otherwise easy to pass over unintentionally. In fact, a poem’s linguistic aspects are straightforwardly linked to the work’s abstract meaning (ElShickh et al. 111). One type of device Cummings uses as part of his signature style to enhance his writing is unorthodox spelling, capitalization, and punctuation. Bethany K. Dumas writes in E. E. Cummings: A Remembrance of Miracles that “some devices, such as the use of lowercase letters at the beginnings of lines...allow a
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The visual aspects of his poetry are also part of Cummings’ experimentation with writing (E. E. Cummings Poetry Foundation). Eventually, Cummings established his own distinctive style and maintained it through the end of his career, despite criticism he received (“E. E. Cummings - Poet”). The reader is hit with his style the first time they read his writing (ElShickh et al. 104). For instance, the poem "O sweet spontaneous" demonstrates Cummings' commons use of the free verse visual stanza pattern. The ninth and eleventh lines show the poet's experimentation with punctuation―especially the lines that have commas in the beginning and periods set apart from the last word of the sentence―which regulate the rate at which the reader encounters the words. The last line of "O sweet spontaneous" stresses the spacing of words through the way Cummings placed the word "spring" apart from the other words of the poem in the middle of the page. This idiosyncratic mannerism is another technique Cummings' frequented in his career as a writer. This technique is part of his aesthetic as a poet and can be found up to his earliest works (Held …show more content…
One type of work he produced was sonnets, which are poems with 14 traditional lines and a recognizable rhyme scheme. Though some of his most popular poems don’t have any odd typography/punctuation, they still possess his distinctive technique (E. E. Cummings New World Encyclopedia). Poetry Foundation explains the nature of a typical Cummings poem as “spare and precise, employing a few keywords eccentrically placed on the page” (E. E. Cummings Poetry Foundation). He adjusted grammar and language guidelines to satisfy and appeal to his own ideas; for example, he uses “if,” “am,” and “because” as nouns and assigns new meanings for words as he desires (E. E. Cummings Poetry Foundation). Richard P. Blackmur wrote in The Double Agent: Essays in Craft and
The visual aspects of his poetry are also part of Cummings’ experimentation with writing (E. E. Cummings Poetry Foundation). Eventually, Cummings established his own distinctive style and maintained it through the end of his career, despite criticism he received (“E. E. Cummings - Poet”). The reader is hit with his style the first time they read his writing (ElShickh et al. 104). For instance, the poem "O sweet spontaneous" demonstrates Cummings' commons use of the free verse visual stanza pattern. The ninth and eleventh lines show the poet's experimentation with punctuation―especially the lines that have commas in the beginning and periods set apart from the last word of the sentence―which regulate the rate at which the reader encounters the words. The last line of "O sweet spontaneous" stresses the spacing of words through the way Cummings placed the word "spring" apart from the other words of the poem in the middle of the page. This idiosyncratic mannerism is another technique Cummings' frequented in his career as a writer. This technique is part of his aesthetic as a poet and can be found up to his earliest works (Held …show more content…
One type of work he produced was sonnets, which are poems with 14 traditional lines and a recognizable rhyme scheme. Though some of his most popular poems don’t have any odd typography/punctuation, they still possess his distinctive technique (E. E. Cummings New World Encyclopedia). Poetry Foundation explains the nature of a typical Cummings poem as “spare and precise, employing a few keywords eccentrically placed on the page” (E. E. Cummings Poetry Foundation). He adjusted grammar and language guidelines to satisfy and appeal to his own ideas; for example, he uses “if,” “am,” and “because” as nouns and assigns new meanings for words as he desires (E. E. Cummings Poetry Foundation). Richard P. Blackmur wrote in The Double Agent: Essays in Craft and