You Can Write Poetry - Jeff Mock [15]
Words Mean More Than They Say: Nuances of Meaning
When I was young, my grandparents had a poodle named Andre. He was a standard poodle, big and bounding, the type originally bred for hunting. He stood twenty-six inches at the shoulder—large, strong, fleet and brimming with energy. As a boy, I brimmed with energy, too, more so than with manners. Mischief occupied my hours. I explored the nooks and crannies of my grandparents' home: the utility room; closets packed with games, books and bric-a-brac; boxes stacked in storage; the workshop with its drills and cutting edges. Everywhere was terra incognita, unexplored land, where trouble could always be found. And my father would find me in the midst of it. Apprehended. No, Grandmother's fine stationery wasn't meant for paper airplanes. Yes, the wooden tiles of Grandfather's Scrabble game floated in the sink, but they weren't battleships. No, one did not practice with the handsaw on the legs of the workshop table.
My father's favorite expression at such times was ornery. He exclaimed it loudly and, when nothing was ruined, with a degree of amusement. Ornery, he boomed, and down the hall, tearing at full speed, a blur of ears and curls, came Andre, tail wagging, tongue lolling out, to sit proudly at my father's feet.
Because Andre mistook my father's ornery for Andre (notice the alliteration, the similar n and r sounds), I was spared a lecture on manners. Andre recognized the amusement in my father's voice and came running. Ornery means "having an ugly disposition; specifically stubborn and mean-spirited," but my father spoke it as a term of affection. His tone of voice reflected his use of the word. He meant mischievous more than he did mean-spirited, playful more than wicked. The distinction between what a word means and what it suggests is the difference between denotation and connotation.
Denotation is the dictionary definition of a word. It's precisely what a word means.
Connotation is the subtle shading of meanings that a word carries along with its dictionary definition. It's what a word suggests.
When we pause in conversation to search for the right word, we're really searching for just the right combination of denotation and connotation. The two go hand in hand, the literal meaning and the suggestion. Should we say, for example, that we're pleased with a meal or satisfied with it? Our choice makes a world of difference to a chef, especially to a temperamental chef. It makes a world of difference to us, too, if we're married to the chef. While the denotation may be fine, if the connotation is off, it'll be hot dogs for the rest of the week. Both pleased and satisfied denote contentment, but satisfied is a neutral word. It connotes a complacent fulfillment of the requirements, nothing special. Pleased, however, connotes delight, a sense of gratification, a glow of happiness. It's better by far to be pleased with a meal.
Because our language is subtler than the strict dictionary definitions of its words, poets pay attention to subtleties, to what words mean and what they suggest. What a word suggests is as important as, and often more important than, what it literally means. As they write, poets consider the numerous combinations of denotation and connotation. Then they select the word that has just the right combination of meaning and suggestion. This process often goes word by word through numerous possibilities: satisfied, content, fulfilled, gratified, pleased. Which should it be? Poets select each word to mean what poems need to say and to suggest what they need to imply.
To see the difference between denotation and connotation more clearly, consider these statements:
• John is firm.
• Catherine is stubborn.
• Frank is pigheaded.
All three statements denote the same thing: John, Catherine and Frank will not change their minds. We cannot sway them. But each statement connotes something quite different. John is firm suggests that John has good reason for not changing his mind. He listened to our arguments and exhortations,