Word-Choice and Meaning

Abstract

The choice of vocabulary (sometimes called ‘diction’) for a poet has probably never been wider than in the twentieth century. While there has been a recurrent pattern in English poetry of writers rejecting the old-fashioned, restricted vocabulary items of their predecessors, this century has seen an unprecedented use of vocabulary from areas of life not traditionally recognised as poetic. We have already seen, in chapter 2, how the spoken language has influenced vocabulary choice in poetry, introducing more dialect words, taboo words and colloquial language than ever before. Modern poetry has also broken down barriers against scientific and technical language as Adrienne Rich demonstrates in the opening of her poem, Waking in the Dark: The thing that arrests me is how we are composed of molecules …