Iconicity as Power

Abstract

Scholars interested in iconicity in language and/or literature have concernedthemselves with the following questions. Is it valid to define iconicity based on asign’s being similar in quality to its object or referent? Is iconicity arbitrary ormotivated? What iconic aspects are manifested in language structure or languagechange? How does iconicity on various linguistic levels contribute to the aesthet-ics of literature? Instead of continuing these extensively discussed issues, thisstudy investigates how iconicity embodies or transmits what we may call—at leastin terms of its effect—powerful verbal energy or verbal force. Arguing for iconic-ity as transmitting verbal energy, the present article concentrates on three partic-ular issues: (1) accumulative homology (i.e., structural or semantic likeness per-meating various linguistic levels); (2) iconicity as a metalanguage; (3) iconicitycatalysing the release of energy through a “fusion of words and world”. For pur-poses of illustration, this paper uses examples from Wordsworth’s The Preludeand from Zen discourse.

1. Introduction

Wordsworth himself is aware of the power of language, be it positive or nega-tive, as he touches upon the “linguistic incarnation of thought”:

If words be not (recurring to a metaphor before used) an incarnation of the thoughtbut only a clothing for it, then surely will they prove an ill gift; such a one as those poi-soned vestments, read of in the stories of superstitious times, which had the power toconsume and to alienate from his right mind the victim who put them on. Language,if it do not uphold, and feed, and leave in quiet, like the power of gravitation or the airwe breathe, is a counter-spirit, unremittingly and noiselessly at work to derange, tosubvert, to lay waste, to vitiate, and to dissolve. (Wordsworth 1974, 2: 84–85)

Does Wordsworth’s own use of language, then, manifest the power to conveyadequately his vision of reality? Some critics of Wordsworth have brought into

Iconicity as power: Examples from Wordsworth

and Zen discourse1

MING-YU TSENG

JLS 33 (2004), 1–23 0341–7638/04/033– 1© Walter de Gruyter

2 Ming- Yu Tseng

question the power of his poetry. For example, Miller (1985: 112–113) suggeststhat the sign-making power inherent in Wordsworth’s poetry is itself a struggleor a displacement of form and meaning, a struggle between “mimesis and em-blem, between imitative form and creative form”, and between various mean-ings of the same sign (Miller 1985: 77).

Davies (1986: 36–118), on the other hand, highlights the power that accumu-lates through lexical repetition and through the tautology exemplified in Words-worth’s poetry. Supported by his statistical analysis, Davies’s (1986: 84) conten-tion is that “words … could be reinforced and generalized by repetition andassociation with one another, so that they could contribute a special force to pas-sages of reflective and abstract writing, redeeming them from plain abstractness,and revealing the strength of the link between sensuous and mental experienceboth in Wordsworth’s substance and in his style”. Davies implies that the powerthat an appropriate choice of words can lend to verbal texture and cognitive po-tency is that of making thinking less abstract and bringing words and expressioncloser to actual corporeal feelings and emotions.

Textual power can indeed be effected through various linguistic means. In thisstudy, I illustrate how iconicity may be characterized as the well-spring of thepower of language. In order to expand my illustration, I select examples fromWordsworth’s The Prelude and from an Eastern genre unique to Zen/Ch’an2

Buddhism—the koan. Koans are the short, even abrupt, paradoxical verbal ex-changes recorded from ancient Chinese monastic or Ch’an settings. They havebeen used as an aid to lead Zen trainees to enlightenment, to the intuitive graspof the Ultimate Truth as seen and known by the Buddha Shakyamuni. As such,Zen dialogues manifest the power to transform subjectivity and, therefore, meritattention in the study of textual power.

The general nature of the relationship between Wordsworth and Zen was firstexplored by Blyth (1942: 412–424). He quotes a variety of “spiritual moments”in Wordsworth’s poetic experience to illustrate “sparks of Zen” in his poetry. Forexample, he suggests that the spirit of Zen—the essential non-difference and in-terpenetration of inner and outer—is captured and expressed by Wordsworth inthese lines: “… sees the parts/ As parts, but with a feeling of the whole” (ThePrelude, VII, 712–713)3. More than half a century later, employing the scholar-ship of comparative literature, Rudy (1996) offers a detailed intercultural ac-count of Wordsworth’s spirituality and Zen Buddhism. He argues that whatemerges in Wordsworth’s poetry is a consciousness “similar in course and profileto the Zen experience of cosmic influx resulting from its formal procedures ofself-emptying” (Rudy 1996: 16). By contrast, in Tseng (2002a) I approach theWordsworth-Zen connection from a linguistic-semiotic perspective rather thana literary-philosophical viewpoint. I explore how immediacy is represented andconstructed in text and how the speech-writing interplay operates in bothWordsworth and Zen discourse. The present study highlights yet another linguis-

Iconicity as power: Wordsworth and Zen discourse 3

tic-semiotic issue, that of iconicity; however, the focus here is on the textual pow-er of iconicity rather than the link between Wordsworth and Zen discourse.

Scholars interested in iconicity in language and literature have been mostlyconcerned with the following questions. Is it valid to define iconicity based ona sign’s being similar in quality to its object or referent? (Bierman 1962; Good-man 1970; Eco 1976: 189–216). Is iconicity arbitrary or motivated? (Eco 1976:190; Fischer and Nänny 2001). What iconic aspects are manifested in languagestructure or language change? (Jakobson and Waugh 1979; Cooper and Ross1975; Mayerthaler [1981] 1988; Haiman 1985; Bolinger 1975: 218; Nänny andFischer 1999). How might a typology of iconicity in language be formulated?(Haiman 1980; Hiraga 1994; Anderson 1998: 129–313; Fischer and Nänny 1999:xxi–xxvi). How does iconicity on various linguistic levels contribute to the aes-thetics of literature? (Wimsatt 1954; Jakobson [1965] 1971; Graham 1992). In-stead of continuing these extensively discussed issues, this study proposes to in-vestigate what function iconicity serves. However, it is not the aestheticfunction but the affective or performative function that is emphasized here, forsuch a dimension has not received sufficient attention (cf. Davie 1955: 1–95).

Thus, the purpose of this study is mainly twofold. First, it investigates how theiconic use of language embodies verbal energy. Secondly, it analyzes some iconicaspects of The Prelude and Zen dialogues. In order to address the affective, per-formative dimension of iconicity, my analysis focuses on three particular textualaspects: (1) accumulative homology, (2) iconicity as a metalanguage, and (3)iconic energy, or the capacity to fuse, to forge a unity between words and world.

2. Accumulative homology as power

Johansen (1996) argues that literature exhibits a double iconicity. One is whathe calls “first degree iconicity”: “the similarity between the order of words andthe order of events” (Johansen 1996: 49). This type of iconicity is “intersemiot-ic”, for the similarity exists between sign and object. The other is termed “sec-ond degree iconicity”, which is a kind of “intratextual” or “intralingual” simi-larity—a similarity between various linguistic levels, that is, within the signsystem itself (Johansen 1996: 48–50). For example, Caesar’s well-known dictum“Veni, vidi, vici” mirrors the order of the narrated events (Jakobson 1960: 350):this identity of order is first degree iconicity. Furthermore, similarity or identityalso exists in the repetition of initial-consonant /v/ and final vowel /i/ and threedisyllabic verbs (Jakobson 1960: 358). Such identity is an example of second de-gree iconicity (Johansen 1996: 49). First and second degree iconicity respective-ly correspond with exophoric and endophoric iconicity, proposed by Nöth.“The term exophoric reminds us that the verbal sign relates to something be-yond language, while the term endophoric has to do with relations of referencewithin language” (Nöth 2001: 22).

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Intralingual iconicity can be linked with “homology”. To Barthes, ([1964]1973: 65) homology is “a double paradigm”, which reveals itself, for example,when the commutation test is used. The test operates by effecting a change in asignifier of a sentence and observing whether the change results in a corre-sponding change in the plane of content (signified). Through this test, terms ofopposition, of difference or of similarity are called upon and displayed, thus es-tablishing a paradigm for more than one term, more than one choice. The par-adigm is homological in that the terms are subjected to the same paradigmaticconsiderations and belong to the same classification.

As Barthes ([1964] 1973: 66) explains, “[t]he commutation test allows us inprinciple to spot, by degrees, the significant units which together weave the syn-tagm, thus preparing the classification of those units into paradigms”. Barthesutilises the notion of homology in order to illustrate the syntagm and paradigmof a sign system. However, I would add that homology functions on both theparadigmatic plane and the syntagmatic plane. Besides, by relating the conceptof homology to iconicity, we can make explicit how similarity of patterningworks in and beyond text.

By “accumulative homology” I mean structural or semantic likeness or iden-tity permeating various levels. I shall show how such resemblances are relatedto each other and contribute to the meaning expressed. As a result, the distinc-tion between intralingual iconicity and intersemiotic iconicity is blurred; struc-tural and semantic resemblances are operative within the text, and meanwhilethey bridge the gap between the text and the world created and depicted. Thefollowing passage captures the essence of joy and bliss felt when the persona“conversed with things that really are”.

… My seventeenth year was come, 405And, whether from this habit rooted nowSo deeply in my mind, or from excessOf the great social principle of lifeCoercing all things into sympathy,To unorganic natures I transferred 410My own enjoyments, or, the power of truthComing in revelation, I conversedWith things that really are, I at this timeSaw blessings spread around me like a sea.Thus did my days pass on, and now at length 415From Nature and her overflowing soulI had received so much that all my thoughtsWere steeped in feeling. I was only thenContented when with bliss ineffableI felt the sentiment of being spread 420O’er all that moves, and all that seemeth still,O’er all that, lost beyond the reach of thought


And human knowledge, to the human eyeInvisible, yet liveth to the heart,O’er all that leaps, and runs, and shouts, and sings, 425Or beats the gladsome air, o’er all that glidesBeneath the wave, yea, in the wave itselfAnd mighty depth of waters. Wonder notIf such my transports were, for in all thingsI saw one life, and felt that it was joy; 430One song they sang, and it was audible –Most audible then when the fleshly air,O’ercome by grosser prelude of that strain,Forgot its functions and slept undisturbed.

(The Prelude, II, 405–434)

The joy is not just felt but seen “like a sea”. Although the bliss experienced issaid to be “ineffable”, the persona does not stop short of attempting to charac-terize that sense of blessing. Under scrutiny are five linguistic devices that areused iconically in the passage: sentence length, repetition, semantic components,semantic distance, and grading. As will be shown, these devices interrelate andconverge in their contributing to “accumulative homology”. It is through theirinteraction and cooperation with one another (cf. Toolan 1996: 3–26) that iconic-ity works and gains its power.

The quoted passage includes two long sentences. The first one (lines 405–414)introduces “blessings spread” (414). The continuity of the long sentence is analo-gous to the movement of spreading. Another long sentence, running from line 418to 428, continues to encapsulate “the sentiment of being spread”. As Nänny(2001: 159) observes, “[a] long line may serve as an imagic icon of length, distance,duration or, more metaphorically, of vastness, great height, swelling, spreading,stretching and width”. Here, the very length of the sentences may be iconic of boththe substantial extent of the joyful feelings and the movement of “spreading”.The prepositional phrase “o’er all that …” (421, 422, 425, 426) further intensifiesthe movement of the sentiment, of the experience because the preposition “o’er”(“over”) itself indicates movement. Moreover, the repetition of “o’er all that …”can be interpreted as being iconic of the movement and the pervasiveness of thejoy being spread. The intensity is further heightened through the repetition of themental process (Halliday 1994: 112–119) mediated through verbs such as “felt”and “saw”: “I at this time/ Saw blessing spread…” (413–414), “I felt the sentimentof being spread” (420), “I saw one life, and felt that it was joy” (430). The effectachieved is amplification: “affectual meanings are repeated until the appropriatevolume is reached” (Martin 1992: 533). The devices of sentence length and repeti-tion interact and interrelate in building up the verbal energy of iconicity.

The semantic features or components of some words also figure in this chain ofmeaning-making (cf. Goodenough 1956). For example, words like “move” (421),

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“leap”, “run” (425), “beat”, “glide” (426), and “transport” (429) all have the se-mantic feature of +ACTION. This semantic feature corresponds with the circu-larity of the sentiment and thus iconically presents the going-on and operativespreading of great joys. Another semantic feature that contributes to the intensityof perception is +AURAL; the following words contain such a feature: “shout”,“sing” (425), “song” (431), “audible” (431, 432), “ear” (432), “prelude”, “strain”(433). Taken together, these words have an iconic effect of amplifying perception,reinforced by the feature of +VISUAL as exemplified by repeated “saw” (414,430). These semantic features +ACTION, +AURAL, +VISUAL do not functionseparately but cooperate in the rendering of the going-on of inner perception.Moreover, the clustering of semantic features does not function by itself but is in-tegrated with other devices. The semantic feature +VISUAL corresponds to therepetition of the mental verb “saw”. The feature +ACTION is compatible withthe length of the sentences that signifies the “movement” of sentiment.

Like the shared semantic features, semantic opposites also contribute to thepower of accumulative homology. The enormous semantic distance or space(Rips et al. 1973) created by words of contrast also plays an iconic role in therepresentation of ineffable bliss. The following quotations (my emphases) re-veal the all-pervasiveness of the perception: “all that moves” versus “all thatseemeth still” (421) and “O’er all that …beats the gladsome air” (425–426) ver-sus “o’er all that glides/ Beneath the wave” (426–427). The enormous semanticdistance, together with the shared semantic features, reinforces the devices ofrepetition and sentence length in that they all contribute to building up a senseof substantiality and intensity.

Finally, grading is a complex of system of polarity (Sapir 1958). Such linguis-tic resources as intensifiers, comparison, and quantifiers are involved in grad-ing: “I had received so much…” (417), “One song they sang, and it was audible–/ Most audible then when the fleshly ear,/ O’ercome by grosser prelude of thatstrain” (431–433), “in all things/ I saw one life, and felt that it was joy” (429–430; emphases added). These linguistic resources are chosen consistently tohighlight the increase side of the scale. More importantly, they iconically repre-sent the increasing extent and intensity of the felt experience (cf. Downes 2000:111–112). Rather than contributing to moving toward the decrease or less sideof the scale, the linguistic choices from the grading system further reinforce theother devices discussed so far.

These five linguistic devices are a concatenation, a mutual reinforcement andcooperation with one another in the signification process. The similarities of pat-terning—whether it be lexical, phrasal, sentential, semantic, or textual—interre-late and integrate, stretching upwards to the sentence and supra-sentence leveland diving downwards to the lexical level (cf. Hodge and Kress 1988: 263). Thelong sentence mirroring the substantial extent of the joyful feelings is an exampleof intersemiotic iconicity, and so is the semantic distance shown by the words of


contrast or by antonyms. Similarly, the grading system of expressing greater ex-tent or larger quantity is intersemiotic iconicity, as it relates to something beyondlanguage. All three devices reflect the unusual substantiality of Wordsworth’sperceptions. Among the examples of intralingual iconicity are repetition of thesame words or phrases (e.g., “saw”, “felt”, and “o’er all that …”) and semantic fea-tures shared by certain words, for the identity or similarity these two linguistic de-vices respectively exhibit relates to the language itself. However, as we haveseen, the use of such intralingual iconicity also contributes to the depiction of the“great joys”; it emphasizes and re-emphasizes the vast extent and great intensityof the bliss which Wordsworth (or the persona) experiences. The devices them-selves also evince intersemiotic iconicity. Together with the interaction and in-terrelation of the five linguistic devices, the combination and integration of in-tralingual and intersemiotic iconicity lie at the heart of accumulative homology.

According to Peirce (1931–1958: 2.277–2.282), metaphor, together with imageand diagram, is a type of iconicity. Indeed, metaphorical iconicity is woven intothese Wordsworthian lines already laden with iconic codification. In particular,the conceptual metaphor (Lakoff and Turner 1989: 50–51; Lakoff and Johnson1980: 3–9) or, in Goatly’s term, the “root analogy” emotion is liquid comes intoplay (Goatly 1997: 64): “blessings spread … like a sea” (II, 414) and “all mythoughts/ Were steeped in feeling” (II, 417–418; my emphases). There is a differ-ence “between basic conceptual metaphors, which are cognitive in nature, andparticular linguistic expressions of these conceptual metaphors” (Lakoff andTurner 1989: 51). The same conceptual metaphor can be expressed through var-ious unique linguistic expressions. For example, Wordsworth uses the sea imageand the effect of water (by the use of the past participle “steeped”) to conveypervasive blissful experience; another poet might use, for instance, a still lake asa metaphor for a peaceful mental state. Understanding metaphor involves themapping of source-domain schema onto the target-domain schema. The emo-tion-as-liquid metaphor can map the movement and spaciousness of a sea ontothe domain of emotional states. The metaphor thus assists in the progressive in-tensification of euphoria. The metaphorical iconicity joins with accumulativehomology in articulating verbal power. As Lakoff and Turner (1989: 63) pointout, cognitive metaphors possess a persuasive power or influence:

For the same reasons that schemas and metaphors give us power to conceptualize andreason, so they have power over us. Anything that we rely on constantly, unconscious-ly, and automatically is so much part of us that it cannot be easily resisted, in largemeasure because it is barely even noticed. To the extent that we use a conceptual sche-ma or a conceptual metaphor, we accept its validity. Consequently, when someone elseuses it, we are predisposed to accept its validity. For this reason, conventionalizedschemas and metaphors have persuasive power over us. (Original emphasis)

The link between metaphor and iconicity will be further discussed below (seeSection 4).

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3. Iconicity as a metalanguage

Hjelmslev ([1943] 1953: 76–77) views a metalanguage as a higher-level languageused to describe, explain or comment on an object language, that is, first-orderlanguage whose system is directly under scrutiny. Barthes ([1964] 1973: 92) de-velops Hjelmslev’s ideas and thus defines a metalanguage: “there the signifiedsof the second system are constituted by the signs of the first”. What characterizesmetalanguage is that it is “an operation”, as Barthes ([1964] 1973: 92) explains:“an operation is a description founded on the empirical principle, that is to say[,]non-contradictory (coherent), exhaustive and simple, scientific semiotics, ormetalanguage, is an operation” (original emphasis).

Kim (1996: 122–123) further elaborates on metalanguage as an operation:

Metalanguage is an operation because the plane of content itself is a system of signi-fication. Metalanguage takes the denotative meaning system itself as its content (i.e.,content2) and expresses it. Its expression is an operation. However, this operation con-sists of expression for expression, and this is a scientific operation. From this it followsthat metalanguage functions as a language to analyze the expression of denotativemeaning. Furthermore, metalanguage allows one to name signifieds (i.e., content2) de-rived from a denotative discourse as well as to talk about them.

Three aspects of the “operation” function can be derived. First and foremost,the fact that metalanguage employs the denotative language, the first language,as its content (signified) constitutes an “operation”, for signification itself in-volves meaning-making. Secondly, metalanguage serves to analyze or explainthe first-order language. Besides, because of its being a semiological concept,metalanguage enables us to highlight and see clearly the signifieds of a higher-order language that could have been taken for granted or ignored had the im-plicit metalanguage not been brought to conscious attention.

Iconicity is a metalanguage, for the iconic device functions to comment onlanguage. More importantly, seeing iconicity as metalanguage helps to bring tothe fore the signified of a higher order. This section will elucidate multiple ico-nicity as manifested in Zen dialogues and relate it to metalanguage. The discus-sion here concentrates on the pattern of question and answer as used in Zen dis-course. Almost every Zen koan involves the question-answer pattern. Here arethree examples.

(1) A monk asked Chao Chou, “The myriad Dharmas return to one. Wheredoes the one return to?”Chou said, “When I was in Ch’ing Chou, I made a shirt. It weighed sevenchins [i.e., Chinese pounds].”(Piyen chi, The Blue Cliff Record, Case 45; cf. Cleary and Cleary 1992: 270)

(2) A monk asked Pa Ling, “What is the Blown Hair Sword [i.e., a very sharpsword that could cut a hair when it is blown against the sword]?”


Pa Ling said, “Each and every branch of coral supports the moon.”(Piyen chi, The Blue Cliff Record, Case 100; cf. Cleary and Cleary 1992: 554)

(3) A monk asks Shou Shan, “What is Buddha?”Shan said, “A new bride rides a donkey; the mother-in-law drags it.”(Ts’ungjung lu, Book of Serenity, Case 65; cf. Cleary 1988: 273)

Since the questions are concerned with enlightenment, Buddhahood, or the Ul-timate Truth, the answers can be adequately interpreted only in the Zen context.Discourse iconicity finds expression in the very form of question and answer,“question” as indicated by the verb “ask” (wen) and interrogatives such as“where” (hechu) and “what” (juhe) and “answer” because question and answerform an adjacency pair. Three simultaneous iconic qualities are exemplified inthe way language is used in koans (Tseng 1997: 185–190). Firstly, the question-answer pattern itself is analogous to the process of seeking the Way, from puz-zlement and confusion to—ideally or principally—enlightenment. It is the ques-ton-answer pattern, not, for example, complaining-excusing or informing-ac-knowledging, that is foregrounded in koans. We may well ask what might be theextra meaning behind the pattern. Although the “answer” given in each koangenerates more puzzlement than clarification, the question-answer form itselfcannot be taken for granted but can be rendered an iconic interpretation in theZen context. Secondly, the abruptness and seeming irrelevance of answers inmost koan dialogues are analogous to the ineffability of the Ultimate Reality.The Reality cannot be represented in propositional terms and is not thus repre-sented. Instead, it can only be induced to experience this Reality. In other words,saying something amounts to saying nothing and yet some aspects of the Path arestill signified or pointed to.

Take koan (3) for instance: in response to a monk’s question about the Ulti-mate Reality, Master Shou Shan said “A new bride rides a donkey; the mother-in-law drags it.” It is hard to associate the response with the question. What isthe connection between the new bride or the mother-in-law with enlighten-ment? Does riding or dragging a donkey have any special or symbolic meaning?As the monk continued to wrestle with the response, he might “grasp” some-thing about the unspeakable enlightened experience, or he might not. It mightbe possible to understand the Master’s response in this way: it is odd, unaccept-able and wrong, especially in Chinese culture, to have one’s mother-in-law draga donkey while her daughter-in-law (the bride) sits on it, because a bride is sup-posed to serve her mother-in-law, not the other way round. Therefore, somekind of reversal is suggested in the Master’s answer. This understanding is ametaphorical construal. The reversal may suggest that expecting verbal illustra-tion of enlightenment puts one further away from it. Or the reversal may sug-gest negating a commonly held world-view. The inference could go on and on.But one thing is certain: the Master’s “answer” frustrates the monk’s intention

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of seeking direct verbal explanation, which can build up conceptuality ratherthan experience the Ultimate first-hand. The Master’s remark here mayamount to saying “It’s not right to seek the Truth through words or speech!” or“Stop thinking and practise!” or “Zen transcends words!”. However, telling themonk directly “Zen transcends words” is pragmatically and cognitively differ-ent from saying “A new bride rides a donkey; the mother-in-law drags it.” Theformer reinforces our habitual way of using language, which Zen Masters re-ject. The latter has some cognitive force the former lacks—at least arousingdoubt in the mind of a novice.

Thirdly, the difficulty in understanding the verbal exchange is a concomitantof the Zen master’s wholly original, creative response, which intensely stimu-lates the mind of an enlightenment-seeker. Each koan as a whole illustrates theforce of the macro-illocutionary device of arousing doubt and anguish so as toalter the state of consciousness and induce the consciousness aimed at. AsMcPhail (1996: 114) succinctly characterizes koans:

The koan, like postmodernism, is an attempt to challenge and undermine the essen-tializing consequences of rationality, to unmask them as constructions. But the re-wards of the seafarer who attempts to navigate between the Scylla of idealism and theCharybdis of realism, like the rewards of the Zennist, are potentially great: “If thegrueling, frustrating pursuit of the koan is carried on to the end, there comes a break-through to a realm of truth far deeper than, far transcendent of, any intellectual state-ments” explains Winston King (1993: 19–20).

Thus the difficulty of koan dialogues can be construed as iconic of the doubtand anguish required for the maturation of the higher consciousness of Zen.

Considered in the light of metalanguage as an operation, discourse iconicityis not a mere static concept to be identified, but an appropriate dynamic gov-erning the discourse strategy that underlies koan dialogues. It is appropriate,for the metalanguage highlights the signified of koan dialogues: enlightened ex-perience. Besides, the signified is in line with the working of iconicity—“formmiming meaning” (Fischer and Nänny 1999). It is dynamic, for iconicity as ametalanguage serves to signify some aspects of realization of Ultimate Truth ina subtle way and to articulate language more as an operation or a force than asmere representation (cf. Thibault 1998: 411).

Iconicity as a metalanguage of a developed mind is also operative in ThePrelude. Note that the subtitle of the poem is “Growth of a Poet’s Mind”. Thevery pattern of question and answer also functions in the poem. In the openingstanza, a series of questions or rather, reflexive questions appear, questions inwhich speaker and listener are the same:

Now I am free, enfranchised and at large,May fix my habitation where I will. 10What dwelling shall receive me, in what vale


Shall be my harbour, underneath what groveShall I take up my home, and what sweet streamShall with its murmurs lull me to my rest?The earth is all before me—with a heart 15Joyous, nor scared at its own liberty,I looked about, and should the guide I chuseBe nothing better than a wandering cloudI cannot miss my way.

(The Prelude, I, 9–19; my emphases)

It is not until the end of The Prelude that a possible answer is given to the speak-er’s questions concerning where to find a place of harbour. As Wolfson (1986:178) observes, these lines are “the affirmative answers toward which Words-worth has conducted his project of self-inquiry”.

Prophets of Nature, we to them will speakA lasting inspiration, sanctifiedBy reason and by truth; what we have lovedOthers will love, and we may teach them how: 445Instruct them how the mind of man becomesA thousand times more beautiful than the earthOn which he dwells, above this frame of things(Which, ’mid all revolutions in the hopesAnd fears of men, doth still remain unchanged) 450In beauty exalted, as it is itselfOf substance and of fabric more divine.(The Prelude, XIII, 442–452)

The interrogative mind framing the questions is here moving towards an insightas the language assumes a prophetic voice. A new perception of mind is formed;Wordsworth finds Mind in its highest sense to be the destination to which anylife journey that humans embark on should lead. As with koan dialogues, thequestion-answer pattern can be construed as iconic of a progression from un-knowing to knowing, from uncertainty to realization of Truth. The process is re-inforced by the form of reflexive questions. As argued in Tseng (2002a: 186–187), they highlight the process, rather than the result, of an interrogative mind.Compare the two sets of sentences:

How could I tell her the truth?What have I achieved after so many years’ efforts?When on earth shall I be able to finish this essay?

I really don’t think I should tell her the truth.I wonder if I have achieved anything after so many years’ efforts.I doubt when I shall be able to finish this essay.

The questions, when posed by oneself, demonstrate one’s own thinking over thethings that can no longer be taken for granted. The questions bring to the fore

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the process of an inquiring mind at work. By contrast, the declaratives soundmore like the result of reasoning over the activities concerned or more like re-porting the result of one’s thinking to another person. This emphasis on processcorresponds to the operative dimension of metalanguage. Thus, the iconicity ofa metalanguage operates and extends from the beginning to the end of the po-em; the whole work can be seen as a meditation on the question posed at thebeginning, the ending lines supplying an answer.

4. Iconic energy fusing words and world

This section further examines the verbal energy transmitted by iconicity. Theso-called “verbal energy” or “textual power” refers to a writer’s or speaker’spersuasive power over and subsequent influence upon the reader or the hearerthrough language. It is then significant to address the reception as well as theproduction of iconicity.

The sign can be divided into signifier and signified. The signification processor what Peirce (1931–1958: 5.484) calls “semiosis” amounts to the cognitive ef-fect the sign has on its interpreter. That is, the sign enters the human mind, andthe human mind is activated by the sign. As Kim (1996: 76) summarizes, “sem-iosis is a transactional process in which the action of the sign and that of the con-sciousness meet”.

The consciousness is a kind of a screen, or a medium or field where things given in theworld and in the mind can meet together. Ortega y Gasset (1987) put this aspect as fol-lows: “To all appearances, consciousness is the strangest thing in the universe, for, judg-ing by its mode or presentation, it seems to [be] the conjunction, joining, or intimateand perfect bonding of two totally different things; my act of referring-to and that-to-which-I-am-referring” (Ortega y Gasset 1987: 88). The consciousness is a medium forboth the representation and transformation of external realities. (Kim 1997: 77–78)

Sign and consciousness are thus not separate but can be regarded as inter-fusedin semiosis (cf. Merleau-Ponty 1962: 392–409). This view accords with Merrell’s(2001) argument for a nonobjectivist view of sign or, in his own words, “prop-erly minding the sign”. The fusion of mind and signs entails not only a semioticagent or interpreter who engenders meaning but also “a process of interactivebecoming”. “Meaning … requires … something lending itself to the becomingof meaning and to the agent of that becoming, who is herself part of the processof becoming” (Merrell 2001: 107). What lies at the heart of this argument is acall for attention to iconicity and indexicality, which are part of the entire rangeof the semiotic creation of meaning.

Symbols without iconic and indexical dimensions are inert; icons and indices withoutsymbolic form are less than genuine signs. … they [i.e., icons and indices] are an inte-grated part of the whole human interaction. The very existence of explicitly engen-dered symbols is dependent upon icons and indices at implicit (corporeal, felt) levels


of tacit knowability. But icons and indices cannot emerge into the arena of explicitlyarticulated knowledge without their proper symbolic attire. (Merrell 2001: 101)

To put it in another way, meaning as mediated through symbolic signs is basedon our shared human experience such as bodily sensations, images, bodily ori-entation and kinesis, and relations of proximity and of causality, which are con-nected with iconicity and indexicality. The existence of an enormously widerange of human experience engenders the production of symbolic signs whilesymbolic signs in their turn give form and substance to as-yet-inarticulate hu-man experiences. This helps to explain why iconicity is so pervasive in language.

Let us further consider how iconicity figures in semiosis, where sign and con-sciousness meet. Tabakowska (1999: 410) writes:

The basic cognitive assumption that linguistic structures are the reflection of the worldnot as it is, but as it is perceived by a cognizant human being, underlies a definition oficonicity as the conceived similarity between conceptual structure and linguistic form.The relation between reality, cognition and language conditions the process of con-cept formation, where the consecutive stages of perception (reality), conceptualization(cognition) and symbolization (language) represent consecutive phases of abstraction(Nowakowska-Kempna 1995: 109). Forms are paired with concepts, and the motiva-tion for this process might be some kind of similarity. (Tabakowska’s emphasis)

The three consecutive stages of mental activity are compatible with Ortega yGasset’s model of three modalities of consciousness—perceiving, imagining,and mentioning:

We shall refer to those events by which an object is rendered present to us as acts ofperceiving or presentation, [to those in which an object is given to us in the manner ofabsence as acts of representation or imagining,] and to those others in which an objectis given by way of allusion and reference as acts of mentioning or bringing to mind.(Ortega y Gasset 1987: 122, original emphasis; translator’s insertion)

Ortega y Gasset sees consciousness as a dynamic which performs three types ofacts. Perceiving an object right before us corresponds, presumably, to percep-tion. Imagining or recollecting an object to our mind and comparing it with amemory is mediated by cognitive activity, and is therefore better described asan act of conception, although Ortega y Gasset is presumably here not con-cerned with the thoughts which are coupled with the imagining since he doesnot emphasize them. His “mentioning” is tantamount to symbolization in thatboth involve the use of words, concepts and images to convey what is “seen”.

Furthermore, one issue implicit in the accounts of Tabakowska and Ortega yGasset is whose consciousness is involved in producing and recognizing iconic-ity. Some form of conception or pre-conception is imposed on the reader, smug-gled into his mind, by both a writer’s “conceived similarity between conceptualstructure and linguistic form” and the mentioning of an experience or supposed

14 Ming- Yu Tseng

reality. That is, readers or listeners are tacitly invited to engage in some aspectof an experience and are affected by the speaker’s or writer’s ways of saying.Consequently, they will have a strong predisposition to perceive and conceiveof it in the way it is represented and told. The process of how readers and lis-teners identify and interpret iconicity may be different from the way a writeruses iconicity. Tabakowska (1999: 411) points out the difference:

Traditionally, it has been generally assumed that iconic relations are one-way process:from expression to concept. However, if we agree that the ability to recognize a givensimilarity results from the language user’s knowledge of a given culture and language,then we can also reasonably assume that the process may be reversed: via the (linguis-tic) convention, the user of language might associate (by recognizing relevant similar-ities) certain expressions with certain concepts, and in consequence arrive at a certainview, or interpretation, of reality.

That is, the three consecutive phases from perception, conceptualization andsymbolization are reversed when the reader undertakes iconic construals: fromsymbolization through conception to (inner) perception. Namely, languageevokes thoughts or concepts; the concept articulates and predisposes the mindto form a connection between the linguistic form and the object or content re-ferred to. Then a certain reality or perception is created and emerges through orinto the imagination. In developing a meaningful understanding and interpreta-tion, the reader has to actively participate in “recruiting, projecting, and blend-ing additional background knowledge, context, and memories” (Fauconnier andTurner 2002: 166; cf. Holland 1988: 146–153; Gibbs 1994: 263–264).

As such, iconicity catalyses or releases perceptual-cum-verbal energy whichsearches persistently for possible similarities between the language used andthe world, between form and meaning, between verbal expression and reality—either reality as such or subjective reality. Taborsky (2001: 90, 93) uses a meta-phor to characterize the energy that iconicity embodies: An iconic sign has “aninherent Will”, a desire to be something it refers to. Thus it is well suited to thetask of establishing mediate relations as all signs do. More importantly, it hasthe ability not only to represent, but also to copy, to mirror, to body forth or toreflect in the mind an image of the object or the reality concerned as if it werethe object or the reality itself. This is due to qualities or relations becoming es-tablished with words through long association, so that eventually it is as if nosplit existed between the sign and the world.

What is the consequence of the reader’s attempting an iconic interpretation?Tabakowska (1999: 410) remarks that “iconic construals do not [necessarily] re-late to perceptual process per se, but directly reflect conceptual structures” –”the ongoing flow of cognition” (Langacker 1990: 108). For example, an ono-matopoetic word like “ding-dong” reflects the sound of a doorbell; this type oficonicity is clearly perceptually motivated. However, recognizing this iconic


sign and making it meaningful require a conceptual knowledge of “doorbell”.In some examples of iconicity where the sequence of a series of verbs reflectsthe sequence of the actions mentioned, such an iconic interpretation requiresour conception of “sequence” or linear relations without our having to see theevent ourselves. Danesi (1994) reminds us of the power of conceptual struc-tures. “Free from sensory control, conceptual structures gradually come todominate purposeful thinking. The mind’s conceptual cognitive system is a tru-ly powerful one. It can be projected onto the external world of reality to parti-tion it, organize it, classify it, and explain it …” (Danesi 1994: 123). I would addthat conception can even distort or reshape the external world, the world ofsupposed reality. What is effected in the “doubling back” of perception andconception is a subtle influence upon or even an alteration in the consciousnessof one who is fully engaged in the quest for similarities, affinities and/or percep-tual relations.

In order to illustrate how iconicity relates to conception and perception, Ishall analyze the following passage:

… A single tree 90There was, no doubt yet standing there, an ash,With sinuous trunk, boughs exquisitely wreathed:Up from the ground and almost to the topThe trunk and master branches everywhereWere green with ivy, and the lightsome twigs 95And outer spray profusely tipped with seedsThat hung in yellow tassels and festoons,Moving or still—a favourite trimmed outBy Winter for himself, as if in pride,And with outlandish grace. Oft have I stood 100Foot-bound uplooking at this lovely treeBeneath a frosty moon. The hemisphereOf magic fiction, verse of mine perhapsMay never tread, but scarcely Spencer’s selfCould have more tranquil visions in his youth, 105More bright appearances could scarcely seeOf human forms and superhuman powers,Than I beheld standing on winter nightsAlone beneath this fairy work of earth.

(The Prelude, VI, 90–109)

At first glance, this passage describes an ash and the poetic inspiration derivedfrom looking at the tree. Presumably, Wordsworth must have perceived the treein his youth. The images perceived—the ash, its branches, twigs and leaves, theyellow tassels and ivy, etc. (i.e., a composite perception) may well have been re-trieved from his memory (i.e., in an act of conception) before he gave this ex-

16 Ming- Yu Tseng

perience its symbolic form (i.e., symbolization). Moreover, he must have re-flected on this experience and analyzed it (i.e., in a further act of conception)before it was written. His perception (or recollection) of the tree is thus coupledwith his conception or creative re-formulation of his original experience of ob-serving the actual tree.

What similarity may be conceived to exist between the poet’s conception ofreality and the language he uses? First of all, the sequence of the visual objectsmentioned in the poem iconically imitates the movement of the poet’s eye. Thetree unfolds to the reader as the poet saw it. He set his eyes on the tree, approach-ing from some distance to close proximity, as suggested by the deictic or indexi-cal expressions “there” and then “this”: “A single tree … standing there” (VI,90–91, my emphasis), “Oft have I stood/ Foot-bound uplooking at this lovelytree…” (VI, 100–101, my emphasis). The eye also moves “from the ground …tothe top” (VI, 93) and from the general to the specific details: “a single tree” (VI,90), “an ash” (VI, 91), “sinuous trunk”, “boughs exquisitely wreathed” (VI, 93),“lightsome twigs/ And outer spray” (VI, 95–96), “seeds”, (VI, 96), and “yellowtassels and festoons” (VI, 97).

Another iconic quality is subtly manifested in this passage: the coexistence ofcontrasts can be rendered an iconic interpretation—oppositions are resolved(cf. Tseng 2002b: 67–70). An ash “trimmed out by Winter” stands with its trunkand master branches green with ivy everywhere. On winter nights the poet hasclear visions of “human forms and superhuman powers” (107) evoked by thosebranches. An ordinary tree is a “fairy work of earth” (109). The tree is depictedalmost like a human form: “wreathed” (92), “in pride” (99), and “with outland-ish grace” (100) while the poet-spectator, standing there alone “foot-bound”(101) and motionless, is himself almost like a tree. Nevertheless, rather thanheightening the oppositions or separations, these contrasts, striking or subtle,are mingled together in the act of composition. The leaves of the tree are allgone, and yet it is still green with ivy. It is in the moonlit darkness of the nightthat observing the tree is so revealing. Also interfused in the description of thetree are day and night, recollection and standing: the tree beneath which thepoet-spectator stands in the moonlight and the same tree recollected as he seesit in daylight when he can discern the colours “green” (VI, 95) and “yellow”(VI, 97). The poet and the tree are put into relationship in the act of beholdingand through the tree’s “magic” power on the poet; this interrelationship is rein-forced by a parallel: the single tree standing and the poet standing alone. Hart-man (1985: 322) remarks that “contrast in Wordsworth points beyond the activityof pointing”. Furthermore, he sees contrast in Wordsworth as a manifestationof verbal dynamism: “the dynamics of contrast and of blending cooperate, sinceinsight still proceeds from sight, from the blended might of all the oppositions”(Hartman [1964] 1987: 241). Indeed, Hartman’s comment supports an iconicreading of the passage. That the contrasts are interrelated and interfused not


only attests to the workings of Mind in relation to nature but also reflects thepoet’s conceptual reality in which oppositions are blended. What is revealed isthe “blended might” of Mind and external world: “The external World is fittedto the Mind;/ And the creation (by no lower name/ Can it be called) which theywith blended might/ Accomplish …” (“The Recluse”, 821–824, see Words-worth 1940–1949, vol. 5). Yet again, iconicity may be observed in the concoctingof “the blended might”. Thus, the description of the tree (i.e., symbolization)provokes reflection and the reader renders an interpretation (i.e., conceptuali-zation). As readers, we are invited to see the reality, whether inner or outer (i.e.,perception), as Wordsworth sees it—as perception only rather than an ultimate-ly separate reality. This iconic reading of the passage enables us to see how lan-guage tacitly communicates meaning, inviting us to see a certain reality mir-rored and shown by language.

Such a world view of interconnectedness, interpenetration or interdepend-ence is also suggested by koan (4).

(4) As the officer Lu Hsuan was talking with Nan Ch’uan, he said, “Master ofthe Teachings Chao said, ‘Heaven, earth, and I have the same root; myriadthings and I are one body’. This is quite marvelous.”Nan Ch’uan pointed to a flower in the garden. He called to the officer andsaid, “People these days see this flower as [in] a dream.”(Piyen chi, The Blue Cliff Record, Case 40, Cleary and Cleary 1992: 244)

This koan and Wordsworth converge in several respects. First and foremost, theinterrelatedness of man and nature, subject and object, internal and external assuggested by Wordsworth is explicitly articulated by the teaching from MasterChao: “Heaven, earth, and I have the same root; myriad things and I are onebody.” Furthermore, just as Wordsworth’s poetic universe is directed to “thingsof every day” (Coleridge [1817] 1983, 2: 5–6), Zen discourse is characterized byits everydayness. Using whatever object happens to be nearby as a means ofteaching is common in the Zen context, hence the mention of a garden flowerin koan (4). The act of “seeing” is another point of contact. Whether it is Words-worth’s looking at the tree or people’s seeing the flower, the act of seeing pointsbeyond the object being seen, and indeed beyond the act of seeing itself.

The flower-as-in-a-dream metaphor can be interpreted in this way: the qual-ities of the source domain (i.e., the dream) such as being illusory, transient,beautiful, splendid and miraculous are mapped onto the target domain—thesupposed ultimately real “outwardly perceived” flower. The qualities of beingsplendid and miraculous match the remark of the officer Lu Hsuan: “This isquite marvelous.” In other words, Nan Ch’uan seems to be implying that LuHsuan is one of those who see a flower as if in a dream. The Master’s reply couldbe interpreted as refuting Lu Hsuan’s reaction, for he sees the flower not as

18 Ming- Yu Tseng

such but through a dream, something mediated. That is, he wonders at MasterChao’s teachings, but his realization of Chao’s words is not a direct, intuitivegrasp of the Truth. On the other hand, the committed Buddhist is encouragedto contemplate actual life, supposedly “real” life itself, as illusory, imperma-nent, and transient just like a dream. It is only through waking from this dreamthat all sentient beings can come face-to-face with the Ultimate Truth of univer-sal conditionality. All things whatsoever, not excluding words and ideas, are“empty”—interdependent and interrelated. Considered in this light, then, see-ing a flower as in a dream reinforces Master Chao’s dictum. The contrasts evokedby the tenor (“flower”) and by the vehicle (“dream”) are blended in this meta-phor—reality and dream, external and internal, common and miraculous, visi-ble and invisible. Here then, source and target are interfused or commingled,rather than there being a unidirectional mapping from source to target (cf.Hiraga 1999: 465–466; Turner and Fauconnier 1995: 184–187).

More importantly, a metaphor-icon link is manifested in the above analysis.Hiraga (1998) illustrates how metaphor and iconicity interrelate in two ways:“iconicity in metaphor” and “metaphor in icon”. The former refers to “iconicmoments in metaphor”, which are operative in the mapping between sourceand target. They “are mimetic mental representations of sensory perceptions,and constitute imagic iconicity. At the same time, a mental space develops astructure by selecting and schematising the images, namely, an image-schematicstructure, which has a diagrammatic representation of the image content ofmental space” (Hiraga 1998: 155). In other words, any image evoked by a met-aphor is an imagic iconicity; it is iconic in that there exist visual similarities be-tween the sensory perception and the image content triggered by a metaphor.Simultaneously, a middle mental space called “generic space”, which containswhat source and target have in common, maps onto each of them (Fauconnier1997: 149). This is a diagrammatic type of iconicity operating “in the analogybetween the corresponding image-schematic structures of the generic spaceand the input spaces [i.e., source and target]” (Hiraga 1998: 156). Take koan (4)for example. The visual image of a flower evoked in one’s mind is an exampleof imagic iconicity. Diagrammatic iconicity is the correspondence between thegeneric space and the input spaces: the qualities of being splendid, miraculous,and transient. Both types of iconicity illustrate “iconicity in metaphor”.

The other type of metaphor-icon link in language is “metaphor in icon”.“Metaphor in icon also relates to imagic and diagrammatic aspects of the lin-guistic form. Conventional metaphors which conceptualises our everyday expe-riences and reality also conceptualises our understanding of language structureand use. These metaphors navigate the way we interpret the forms of linguisticexpressions” (Hiraga 1998: 159). A metaphor gives an iconic meaning its form;a metaphorical reading of a text may reinforce an iconic meaning and quality inthe text. Take koan (4) for instance. Understanding the flower-as-in-a-dream


metaphor indeed helps spell out the iconic qualities of the koan. First, the formof the metaphor, relating two seemingly unrelated objects to each other in asentence, corresponds with interrelatedness and interdependence suggested byMaster Chao’s dictum. Hence, the form of the metaphor itself can be iconicallyinterpreted. Furthermore, the interrelatedness is further reinforced by theblending of the contrasts respectively triggered by the two input spaces “flow-er” and “dream”. The two types of metaphor-icon link also illustrate “the dy-namic mechanism of metaphorical-iconic mappings” (Hiraga 1998: 161).Prompted by metaphor, the cognitive operations of mental mappings contrib-utes to the verbal energy of iconicity.

5. Conclusion

Although some scholars (e.g., Fischer and Nänny 1999: xv–xxi; Johansen 1996:51; Müller 2001) have considered iconicity as charged with force, their treat-ments leave room for further investigation. For example, Johansen (1996: 51)first attributes to the non-arbitrariness of iconicity its “magical effect”—“pre-tend[ing] that no split between words and world exists”. He then further ex-plains some possible reasons for such an effect:

It may be … that different factors collaborate to this end. First, the surplus coding of thepoetic expression, the strengthening of the intrasystemic relations between phonemes,syllables, words, phrases, etc., is communicated to the denoted universe and to the ele-ments of signification. The palpable and reiterated qualities that make the parts of thetext mirror each other, its self-reflecting capacity, [are] so pervasive that [they] envelopthe semantic differentiation in a haze of similarity and sameness. (Johansen 1996: 51)

However, Johansen mentions this in passing, because his main concern is to de-fine and characterize literary discourse through the concept of iconicity.

This study offers a detailed account of iconicity as power. Rather than takingthe iconic force of language for granted, this study has attempted to trace whatcontribute to the verbal energy transmitted by iconicity. First and foremost, theintegration and interaction of some iconic devices permeating various linguisticlevels of the same text embody a powerful verbal effect, in that the iconic mean-ings are consistently linked and foregrounded and in that the iconic force inten-sifies. Furthermore, that iconicity is a metalanguage adds to the dynamic forcetriggered by iconicity, for metalanguage itself is an operation: it involves mean-ing-making, it analyzes language, and it enables the reader and the writer tobring to the fore the signified of a high-order language. Finally, iconicity catal-yses verbal energy which searches persistently for similarities between wordsand world. By highlighting the qualitative resemblances in the sign-object orsign-reality relationship, iconicity prevents signs from degenerating into feeblemediation or facile representation. In this sense, iconicity elevates signs frombeing mere signs; it enables signs to mimic or reflect reality, which is in the final

20 Ming- Yu Tseng

analysis neither objective nor subjective, neither inner nor outer, but partakesof both. Iconicity shortens the distance between form and meaning, betweenwords and world. As such, it is an appropriate and powerful means for the rev-elation of Wordsworth’s “Way” and for Zen.

National University of Kaohsiung

Notes

1. This article is a revised version of a paper presented at the Third Conference of theInternational Association of Literary Semantics, 7–9 April 2002, University of Bir-mingham, U.K. I am grateful to its participants for comments. Special thanks are dueto Professor Michael Toolan for suggesting some useful references. I would also liketo express my acknowledgement to the National Science Council of the Republic ofChina, Taiwan, for its support for the project (NSC 90-2411-H-390-001).

2. Zen is a Japanese term for Chinese Ch’an, which derives from Sanskrit Dhyana, mean-ing profound contemplation in a state of higher consciousness.

3. All the citations from The Prelude in this study are from the 1805 edition. They arereferred to by the Books where they appear, followed by their line numbers.

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Iconicity as Power

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