In readings of Susan Howe's Pythagorean Silence (from The Europe of Trusts, 1990), the authors detected more radical effects of space, shape and pattern, with associated consequences for interpretative strategies and aesthetic responses. The second technique studied was the break from linear into postlinear poetry, as an initially lineated sequence shifts to pages of dispersed text. Referring to a poem from Geoffrey Hill's Canaan (1996), the authors show that such use of space may serve to articulate syntactical structures, but may also promote richer interpretation by encouraging cross-linear semantic connections.

The first group of poems studied were lineated, with extended spaces within lines and displacement of lines from the left margin.

After referring to some historical and theoretical contexts for these issues, the article analyses the results of experiments using eye-tracking, manipulations of text, memory tests and readers' recorded responses and interpretations.

It discusses the semantic and expressive effects of space and pattern in innovative forms of contemporary British and American poetry. This article derives from two interdisciplinary research projects funded by the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council, involving the application of psychological experimental techniques to the study of poetic form and reader response.

Howes visual composer download