Parataxis

(above) who, according to Plutarch, paratactically said "veni, vidi, vici" ("I came, I saw, I conquered"). Parataxis (from , "act of placing side by side"; from παρα, para "beside" + τάξις, táxis "arrangement") is a literary technique in writing or speaking that favors short, simple sentences without conjunctions, or sentences coordinated without the use of subordinating conjunctions. Its antonym is hypotaxis. It is also used to describe a technique in poetry in which two images or fragments, usually starkly dissimilar images or fragments, are juxtaposed without a clear connection. Readers are then left to make their own connections implied by the paratactic syntax. Ezra Pound, in his adaptation of Chinese and Japanese poetry, made the stark juxtaposition of images an important part of English-language poetry.

(above) who, according to Plutarch, paratactically said "veni, vidi, vici" ("I came, I saw, I conquered").]] Parataxis (from , "act of placing side by side"; from παρα, para "beside" + τάξις, táxis "arrangement") is a literary technique in writing or speaking that favors short, simple sentences without conjunctions, or sentences coordinated without the use of subordinating conjunctions. Its antonym is hypotaxis. It is also used to describe a technique in poetry in which two images or fragments, usually starkly dissimilar images or fragments, are juxtaposed without a clear connection. Readers are then left to make their own connections implied by the paratactic syntax. Ezra Pound, in his adaptation of Chinese and Japanese poetry, made the stark juxtaposition of images an important part of English-language poetry.

Etymology

Parataxis comes from the Greek noun parataxis ( ; "a placing side by side") from Greek verb paratasso ( ; "to place side by side") ultimately deriving from the prefix para- ( ; "beside") and tasso ( "to arrange, put in order"). Edward Parmelee Morris wrote in 1901 that the term was introduced into linguistics by Friedrich Thiersch in his Greek Grammar (1831). The term has remained unchanged, but the concept of parataxis has expanded.

Examples

Literature

An example of parataxis is Mr. Jingle's speech in Chapter 2 of The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens: "Come along, then," said he of the green coat, lugging Mr. Pickwick after him by main force, and talking the whole way. "Here, No. 924, take your fare, and take yourself off—respectable gentleman—know him well—none of your nonsense—this way, sir—where's your friends?—all a mistake, I see—never mind—accidents will happen—best regulated families—never say die—down upon your luck—Pull him UP—Put that in his pipe—like the flavour—damned rascals." And with a lengthened string of similar broken sentences, delivered with extraordinary volubility, the stranger led the way to the traveller's waiting-room, whither he was closely followed by Mr. Pickwick and his disciples. Samuel Beckett's opening to his monologue "Not I" is another example: Mouth: out ... into this world ... this world ... tiny little thing ... before its time ... in a godfor– ... what? girl? yes ... tiny little girl ... into this ... out into this ... before her time ... godforsaken hole called ... called ... no matter ... parents unknown ... unheard of ... he having vanished ... thin air ... no sooner buttoned up his breeches ... she similarly ... eight months later ... almost to the tick ... so no love ... spared that ... no love such as normally vented on the ... speechless infant ... in the home ... no ... nor indeed for that matter any of any kind ... no love of any kind ... at any subsequent stage ... Hilaire Belloc's paratactically speaks to a woman in the "Sun" inn in The Path to Rome while trying to order wine— he reports his language as a "brutal way of speaking," but admitting its success in getting the woman to give her his drink: Bring the wine. Set it here. See me drink it. Charge me your due. Molly Bloom's soliloquy in James Joyce's Ulysses, one of the longest known examples of a run on sentence in English literature, is another famous example of this technique.

Greek

In What Is Called Thinking?, Martin Heidegger addresses the paratactic nature of Classical Greek texts. Through analyzing a fragment from Parmenides (typically translated "One should both say and think that Being is") Heidegger argues that modern syntactic translations of paratactic Greek texts often leave the meaning obscured. He suggests multiple translations of the fragment that may more closely resemble the paratactic Greek original. These include "needful : the saying also thinking too : being : to be," and "Useful is the letting lie before us, the taking-to-heart, too: beings in Being." Heidegger points to a modern linguistic bias that places paratactic language beneath syntactic language; paratactic language is often viewed as "child-like" or "primitive". He argues that a paratactic sentence a child might say, such as "dog, woof-woof, bad" is not inherently less meaningful than its syntactic equivalent, like "dogs bark and can be dangerous."

In visual arts

The term parataxis has been used by some cultural theorists to describe certain works of art or "cultural texts" in which a series of scenes or elements are presented side by side in no particular order or hierarchy. Examples range from the collages of the dadaists and Robert Rauschenberg to many contemporary music videos. The traditional polyptych constitutes another example.

Notes

Text derived from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1377881187 under CC BY-SA 4.0; modifications have been made.