Original Research

Unity-in-multiplicity as structural framework in the poetry of T.T. Cloete, with emphasis on volume construction

Bernardus J. Odendaal
Literator | Vol 34, No 1 | a398 | DOI: https://doi.org/10.4102/lit.v34i1.398 | © 2013 Bernardus J. Odendaal | This work is licensed under CC Attribution 4.0
Submitted: 05 October 2012 | Published: 31 May 2013

About the author(s)

Bernardus J. Odendaal, School of Languages, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, South Africa

Abstract

Close-knitted coherence or iconic ‘co-communicativity’ is an outstanding characteristic of 20th–century poetry, and the oeuvre of Afrikaans poet T.T. Cloete. This characteristic, which has also become a dominant literary reading convention, is not only manifested on the micro- and intermediate textual levels, but also on the macrotextual (on the level of poetry volume construction). In Afrikaans, compared to what has happened in a language like Dutch, relatively vibrant and profound theorising on poetry volume construction has occurred. Raidt’s 1962 dissertation and Strydom’s 1976 thesis serve as two of the landmarks in the Afrikaans literary field in this regard. T.T. Cloete, apparently, has played a mediating role in this theorising process. In this article, an overview was given of the manifestation of ‘co-communicativity’ on the micro-, intermediate and macro-textual levels of Cloete’s own poetry oeuvre. It is viewed as a poetic iconisation of the way in which God makes himself known through the phenomenon of dynamic earthly and cosmic unityin- diversity (as perceived by Cloete). The focus was on characteristic ways of poetry volume construction by Cloete. It is concluded that his poetry oeuvre primarily takes on a series construction character, and that it is provisionally to be divided into three groups of three volumes each – but which, seen as a three-deckered whole, also showed a certain cyclic nature because of the ‘narrative’ it thereby embodies.

Keywords

Cloete T.T.; Iconicity; Poetry

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