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1. Think, in this battered Caravanserai
Whose Portals are alternate Night and Day,
How Sultán after Sultán with his Pomp
Abode his destined Hour, and went his way.2. Think, in this battered Caravanserai
Whose Portals are alternate Night and Day,
How Sultán after Sultán did sojourn,
And went his way then never to return.
3. Think, in this battered Caravanserai
Whose Portals are alternate Night and Day,
How Sultán after Sultán came to stay,
Abode his destined Hour, and went his way.
Excerpt 1 (aaba) is one of Omar Khayyám's Rubáiyáths,
in Edward Fitzgerald's English version, excerpts 2 (aabb) and
3 (aaaa) are versions of it, with its rhyme-pattern
manipulated.
The respective perceptual organizations of the three
versions can be accounted for in terms of two Gestalt
principles, the "Law of Good Continuation",
and the "Law of Return". According to the
former, "a shape or pattern will, other things
being equal, tend to be continued in its initial mode
of operation" (Meyer, 1956: 92). The "Law
of Return", on the other hand, states "that,
other things being equal, it is better to return to
any starting point whatsoever than not to return"
(Meyer, 1956: 151). These two laws impose different
characteristics upon different strophic organizations.
The first couplet of excerpt 1 actualizes the "Law of Good
Continuation": the end of line 2 continues the
sound pattern initiated at the end of line 1. The rest
of the quatrain actualizes the "Law of Return":
its third line deviates from the rhyme established
in the first two lines; the fourth line returns to
it. Excerpt 2 actualizes the "Law of Good Continuation".
The first couplet constitutes a "strong"
symmetrical shape with a single rhyme, and may be described
by a single structural principle (the second line rhymes
with the first). The couplet-pattern "perpetuates"
itself, recurring in the next two lines as well; and
had the poem contained ten, or twenty, or one hundred
lines, the same "Good Continuation" would
have gone on, indefinitely.
The simplicity of the couplets is considerable in excerpt 2;
what is more, they constitute a larger unit, divided
into two parts with identical structures; as a result,
they clearly stand out in perception as two semi-independent
units. This is not so in excerpt 1. Here, the smallest unit
that may recur with regularity is the whole stanza.
The third line, that is not part of any rhyme, is perceived
in the quatrain as one that weakens the simplicity
of the parts, and so increases their dependence on
the whole. Consequently, there is a feeling that the
quatrain constitutes a single unit that is closed with
a sharp "click", that is, has strong poetic
closure. In excerpt 2, the quatrain tends to separate into
two couplets; and if it can be said to close with a
"click", it is each one of the two couplets
that closes with such a "click". This effect
depends on the degree of simplicity of the whole as
compared with the degree of simplicity of the parts.
Greater simplicity of the whole makes for greater unity.
The simpler the parts, when compared to the whole,
the more clearly they tend to stand out as independent
entities.
When we compare excerpt 3 to 2, we find that the aabb version
is symmetrical, and well articulated into two equal
parts; it displays good continuation both on the specific
and on a more abstract level. The aaaa version has
a less good Gestalt: it displays good continuation
on the specific (but not on the abstract) level, and
can be divided into two identical halves, though this
division is projective, and not controlled by poetic
structure as in the aabb version.
The source of unity in excerpts 1 and 3 is of different kinds.
One may distinguish between them in terms of grouping
and differentiation. The unchanging sequence of one
rhyme in four or more lines is perceived as a homogeneous
sequence, that lacks sufficient differentiation. This
kind of unity is relatively unstructured, its effect
is mainly through accumulation. The original Rubáiyáth,
with the initial symmetrical couplet-pattern, followed
by the third, "deviant" line, and the fourth
line "returning" to the rhyme established
at the beginning, constitutes a coherent structure,
imposing unity upon the sequence.
We hypothesized that the aesthetic qualities of the
text would be related to the degree of perceived closure.
Thus, the more "closed" the text is, it is
perceived as more tense, interesting and dynamic. In
this respect, closure is a dynamic principle. As Kreitler
& Kreitler (1972: 91) suggest, "we may expect
that people will sometimes prefer gestalts which are
not maximally good and regular, precisely because they
arouse tension". These three versions of the Rubáiyáth
were employed in two empirical studies investigating
the relationship between aesthetic qualities and perceptual
organization. We assumed that the perceived effects
of poetry are a function of the degree of perceptual
organization that is inherent in, or can be imposed
on, the poetic text. In addition to poetic structure,
the reader has to be receptive to such effects in order
to experience them. The trait of absorption which may
be defined as the propensity to adopt an experiential
set, that is, "a state of receptivity or openness
to undergo whatever experiential events, sensory or
imaginal, that may occur, with a tendency to dwell
on, rather than go beyond, the experiences themselves
and the objects they represent" (Tellegen, 1981:
222) should be predictive here.
Sudy 1
Method
Questionnaire Each subject was given a questionnaire to complete in his/her own free time. The three versions of the Rubáiyáth were printed on separate pages. The subject was asked to read the texts carefully, and evaluate each version along seven 7-point scales, anchored by the following terms: TENSE~RELAXED, BORING~INERESTING, STATIC~DYNAMIC, UNEMOTIONAL~EMOTIONAL, UNPLEASANT~PLEASANT, COMPLEX~SIMPLE, OPEN~CLOSED. Similar scales have previously been employed in the rating of poetry (Hasenfus, Martindale & Birnbaum, 1983). Order of presentation of both the texts and the scales was counterbalanced across subjects. The subjects were requested to read the questionnaire, and reply to the questions therein in order, and to refrain from "correcting" or referring back to earlier sections of the questionnaire. All subjects then completed the Absorption Scale, taken from the Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire (Tellegen, 1982).
Sudy 2
Method
Questionnaire Each subject was given a questionnaire to complete in his/her own free time. The three versions of the Rubáiyáth appeared side-by-side on one page. The subject was instructed to read the texts carefully, to compare them one to the other, and then evaluate each version along the 7-point scales. Each set of seven scales was printed immediately beneath each text, and a comparative rating was required along each scale. Order of presentation of both the texts and the scales was counterbalanced. The subject then completed the Absorption scale.
Apart from the scale UNPLEASANT~PLEASANT, the same quadratic trend was found for the other scales (where an effect is found). For all of these, the version aabb is judged to be more active/energetic (i.e., interesting, or tense) than the other two versions. Furthermore, language of the text does not make a difference here. In order to ascertain whether subjects studying literature (n = 20) differed from those not studying literature (n = 34) in their evaluation of the texts, two groups were formed. A series of 2x3 ANOVAs with supplementary trend analysis was conducted, as before. The quadratic component of the version x group interaction was found to be significant for the scales UNEMOTIONAL~EMOTIONAL, andBORING~INERESTING. In addition, all previously found effects were robust. Figure 2 presents the respective means for the two version x group interactions revealed by this series of analyses. As can be seen from figure 2, when group interacts with version, one obtains a more pronounced quadratic trend for students of literature than for the other subjects.
Figure 2. Mean Ratings along Scales as a Function of Group and Version
Overall, then, the version aabb is judged by these subjects to be more dynamic, more closed, more interesting and more tense than the other versions. In addition, for the students of literature, this version is judged to be relatively more emotional. In contrast, when the three versions are judged for pleasantness, the aabb version is rated midway between the version aaaa and aaba.
Discussion
In study 2 we found distinct U-shaped curves relating
aesthetic qualities to regularity for 5 scales: STATIC~DYNAMIC, OPEN~CLOSED, BORING~INERESTING, TENSE~RELAXED, UNEMOTIONAL~EMOTIONAL. The more closed the text is
perceived to be, the more dynamic, interesting, tense,
and emotional it is judged to be. The more open the
text is perceived to be, the more static, boring, relaxed
and unemotional it is judged to be. Of course, these
are all relative judgments, and the size of the effect
is low. The trends, however, are consistent, and lend
support to the Gestalt-approach to empirical aesthetics
that we have adopted here. Closure has an aesthetic
effect on these readers, revealed in such dynamic-energetic
scales. These relationships are not affected by the
language of the text or by the field of study of the
reader, at least as far as our student-subjects are
concerned. This latter finding is an important one,
because it highlights the structural factor of the
rhyme-scheme (i.e., Gestalt) in determining aesthetic
judgment.
Note that it is the aabb version which is viewed in
this study to be more closed than the (original) aaba
version, rather than the opposite case, as we had hypothesized.
Thus, a major contribution of the second study is in
highlighting the aesthetic qualities associated with
such a good Gestalt in its literary use. It is symmetrical
and is well-articulated into two equal parts; and it
displays good continuation, that creates good closure.
The aaba version, on the other hand, is perceived by
these subjects as a "bad" version of both
the aabb and the aaaa ones. Thus, within this intuitive
scheme, the aaba version may receive similar ratings
to that of the aaaa one. Accordingly, differences in
the versions will be eliminated by either leveling
or sharpening. Sharpening, according to Arnheim (1957:
57), refers to the "changing ... [of] a figure
in which two structural patterns compete for dominance
into another that shows clear dominance of one of them".
"Leveling" attempts to minimize or even eliminate
(under conditions that keep the stimulus control weak
enough to leave the observer with a margin of freedom)
the unfitting detail. Thus, when the reader notes the
deviating "b"-line in the aaba version, its
significance may be minimized, in comparison with the
aaaa version. The two versions will then receive similar
ratings. On the other hand, the weight of this deviant
"b"-line may be exaggerated (sharpened).
Thus, the aaba structure is double-edged. Double-edgedness
is the phenomenon, that a certain literary device or
structure may have different, or even opposite, effects
in varying contexts or performances. There is a wide
range of double-edged phenomena in literature (cf.
Tsur, 1985). The aaba version, for instance, may be
perceived as having a weak shape in which two structural
principles compete for dominance. Thus it will be rated
low on the UNPLEASANT~PLEASANT scale; or there may
be a (frustrated) attempt to "level out"
the deviating line, in which case the rating will be
again low on the same scale; or there may be a (successful)
attempt to sharpen the disturbance of the deviating
line, followed by a highly gratifying return to the
initial rhyme-pattern, in which case the rating of
pleasantness will be high. The ratings of closure,
too, will tend to be low in the first two cases, and
high in the last.
Figure 2 reveals another illuminating finding. On the
two dimensions in which the two groups of our student-population
differed from one another, the students of literature
sharpened the contrast between the preferred version
and the rest, whereas the others appear to have attempted
to level it. This may indicate that our students of
literature did have recourse to sharpening, but instead
of using it to "impose" structure upon the
aaba form, they used it to "impose" structure
upon the set of three versions presented to them. This
may explain certain differences between the results
of our two experiments. In the second experiment, subjects
were explicitly instructed to compare them before rating,
whereas in the first one subjects were explicitly requested
not to refer back to preceding pages when answering
the questions. That is probably the reason why subjects
in the second experiment tended to regard the three
versions as constituting one Gestalt, and thus certain
effects that were conspicuous in the first experiment
may have been blocked in the second one.
In our first study we found that for this group of readers
absorption interacted with the critical scale of OPEN~CLOSED; low-absorption subjects judged the aaaa and
aaba versions to be much more closed than the aabb
one, whereas high-absorption subjects judged these
versions to be much more open. High-absorption persons
are expected to be more tolerant of weak, ambiguous
shapes than low-absorption persons. In the aaaa version
the stimulus control is weak enough to leave the low-absorption
observer with a margin of freedom to impose arbitrary
closure on the poem. Whereas in the aaba version there
are legitimate cues for sharpening the deviating "b"-line,
so as to achieve an exceptionally strong closure.
When we began the evaluation of our findings, we first tended to regard the afore-mentioned experimental results as the failure of some of our respondents to recognize the "true" structure of the poem. In the light of the present analysis, however, we had to restructure the problem, and to regard the weak shape of the aaba version in which two structural principles compete for dominance, as the one that underlies all the responses recorded hitherto; one that (vainly) attempts to level discrepancies and one that (successfully) sharpens them into a good perceptual organization. Paraphrasing Arnheim (1957: 55), the foregoing analysis gives sufficient evidence that the realization of a poem involves the solution of a problem--namely, the creation of an organized whole. "Organized whole", then, is not a given fact, but rather an achievement gained by deploying certain cognitive strategies such as leveling and sharpening. Thus, the cognitive mechanism leveling-and-sharpening appears to be one of our major resources of literary performance, allowing us to account, in a systematic and principled way, for significant differences in literary response.
References
Glicksohn, J., Tsur, R., & Goodblatt C. (1989) Perceptual
organization and esthetic qualities of poetry. Submitted
for publication.
Hasenfus, N., Martindale, C., Birnbaum D. (1983). Psychological
reality and cross-media artistic styles. Journal of
Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance.
9 (6): 841-863.
Herrnstein Smith B. (1968). Poetic Closure: A Study
of How Poems End. Chicago: Chicago UP.
Kreitler H., & Kreitler S. (1972). Psychology of
the Arts. Durham NC: Duke UP.
Meyer, L.B. (1956). Emotion and Emotional Qualities
in Music. Chicago: Chicago UP.
Tellegen, A. (1981). Practicing the two disciplines
for relaxation and enlightenment: Comment on "Role
of the feedback signal in electromyographic biofeedback:
the relevance of attention" by Qualls and Sheehan.
Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 110: 217-226.
Tellegen, A. (1982). Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire.
University of Minnesota.
Tsur, R. (1985). Contrast, ambiguity, double-edgedness.
Poetics Today, 6: 417-445.
Tsur, R. (1988). Hebrew Hypnotic Poetry. Tel Aviv: The
Katz Research Institute for Hebrew Literature (in Hebrew).
Tsur, R., Glicksohn, J., & Goodblatt, C. (1991) Gestalt Qualities in Poetry and the Reader's Absorption Style. Journal of Pragmatics 16/4: 193-206.
Published as:
Tsur, R., Glicksohn, J., & Goodblatt, C. (1990) Perceptual Organization, Absorption and Aesthetic Qualities of Poetry. Halász László (ed.), Proceedings of the 11th International Congress on Empirical Aesthetics. Budapest: Institute for Psychology of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. 301-304.
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