The obvious problem with a student creating their own structure is that they don't know the subject well enough to know if the structure will hold together. Here, already, I've encountered an issue: On Literary Evolution really provides no lens through which to examine any individual work. It is, as the title implies, about how literature evolves, which can only really be observed by examining multiple works in connection with one another.
Tynyanov attempts to construct a more rigorous approach to understanding literature. One with scientific aspirations. He posits that a work of literature must be understood as a system containing various literary elements in relationship with one another. Individual works also exist within greater systems of literature. Tynyanov doesn't say so exactly, but my understanding is also that various literary systems exist adjacent to one another both in space (i.e., the european literary system and the asian literary system) and in time (18th century european literature, and 19th century european literature).
Take a single element of a text. As his example, Tynyanov uses archaic language (Thou, Thee, Heretofore, etc). There are two ways to examine this element. The Syn Function looks at how that element is used within that text. For example, archaic language might be used to mark a character as being old fashioned. The Auto Function looks at how that element is used across all other works within its literary system. For example, some texts might use archaic language to lend a sense of ancient importance to a thing, or it might use archaic language to highlight irony.
A related point Tynyanov makes is that whenever one element of a text is reduced in importance (effaced), it takes on a supporting role for some other function. Specifically his point seems to be that critics can get caught up in the lack of some specific element in a text. (i.e., "this poem doesn't even rhyme!"), and thus miss the more relevant goals which the text is achieving.
On that subject, this passage speaks to a frustration everyone has had when reading a book with "too much description:"
"In a work in which the so-called plot is effaced, the story carries out different functions than in a work in which it is not effaced. The story might be used merely to motivate style, or as a strategy for developing the material. Crudely speaking, from our vantage point in a particular literary system, we would be inclined to reduce nature descriptions in old novels to an auxiliary role, to the role of making transitions or retardation; therefore we would almost ignore them, although from the vantage point of a different literary system we would be forced to consider nature descriptions as the main, dominant element."
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My interest in pursuing Literary Theory as an area of study is largely so I can better extract meaning from the texts encounter in my own life. The novels, movies, and video games I engage with for funsies. Likewise I want to improve my ability to critique work in a professional context, both as a writer and editor of tabletop RPG books.
Yet as a field, Literary Theory seems preoccupied with poetry as its primary experimental subject. It makes sense. Poetry is dense with literary elements not commonly used in other forms, and almost definitionally can only be enjoyed by a reader who wants to work at extracting meaning from it.
The problem, for me, is that I'm only recently trying to engage with poetry, and it is taken for granted that the reader has a more sophisticated understanding of poetic terms than I do. Which makes these texts more difficult to parse.
At the moment I have no particular solution to this. I've got no desire to set this project aside while I git gud at reading poetry. I'm just gonna try to get a better grasp of poetry as I go along.
On that subject, apparently RHYTHM is simply "the pattern of stresses heard within the sounds of words." and METER is just rhythm+line length. So like..."Iambic Pentameter" is just Iambic (1 unstressed followed by 1 stressed. ie: ba DUM) and "Pentameter" as in 5 per line. (ba DUM ba DUM ba DUM ba DUM ba DUM).
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The book I've got lists a bunch of poems as part of the Prufrock series. Some of them don't connect as clearly to me as others, but I'll trust tha book fer now. Once I get through Eliot's Prufrock series I'll see about looking outside his oeuvre.
Aunt Helen
Miss Helen Slingsby was my maiden aunt,
And lived in a small house near a fashionable square
Cared for by servants to the number of four.
Now when she died there was silence in heaven
And silence at her end of the street.
The shutters were drawn and the undertaker wiped his feet—
He was aware that this sort of thing had occurred before.
The dogs were handsomely provided for,
But shortly afterwards the parrot died too.
The Dresden clock continued ticking on the mantelpiece,
And the footman sat upon the dining-table
Holding the second housemaid on his knees—
Who had always been so careful while her mistress lived.
The first thing that strikes me about this poem is that it feels somehow awkward relative to other poems of Eliot's I've read. Like it keeps failing to resolve its...for lack of a correct term, "melody?" And in particular the line "servants to the number of four" seems like the sort of twisted sentence structure non-poets use to achieve a rhyme. Given my assumption that Eliot could have written something that didn't feel this way if he wanted, and my metatextual knowledge that the speaker in the Prufrock poems is a goober, I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Miss Helen Slingsby's nephew is uncomfortable talking about her, her death, and the aftermath of it.
From reading about this poem I learned about Anaphora, using a word or phrase at the start of multiple lines to drill them into your memory by repetition. (The shutters were drawn. The dogs were handsomely provided for. The Dresden clock continued ticking on the mantelpiece.) Also about Enjabment, ending a line in the middle of a sentence to pull the eye down faster. Also Sibilance, a sort of specialist form of alliteration that focuses on soft consontant sounds: s, th, sh, etc.
Other things which stand out to me about this poem: "Silence in Heaven" sounds big, but it's also unclear. Like...they're awed by her arrival there, or they don't give a shit because perhaps she isn't in heaven at all? And to immediately follow it by "silence on her street" is intentionally diminishing her importance, right? Like if you said "There was silence on her street, and silence in heaven," the effect would be hugely different.
"Person dies and clock keeps ticking" is well trodden imagery. Life goes on. But I like the servants fooling around on the dining table. The poors are using the furniture for dirty things! They'd always been careful when Aunt Helen was alive, but now she's dead and we can live a little!
