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Word-Order Variation in Biblical Hebrew Poetry: Differentiating Pragmatics and Poetics is unavailable, but you can change that!

This study tackles the neglected subject of word order in biblical Hebrew poetry. The fact that the order of clause constituents frequently differs from that found in prose has often been noted, but no systematic attempt has been offered by way of explanation. Here two separate factors are taken into consideration: that of purely poetic variation (defamiliarisation), and that of pragmatic...

patterns, repetition, rhyme and other sound patterns. Besides these, Watson observes, there is a noticeable scarcity of many elements typical of prose. All these indicators appearing in the poetic text result in what linguists refer to as ‘defamiliarisation’ of the language, a concept first given expression by Victor Shklovsky of the Russian formalist school.5 By the defamiliarisation of the language is meant the device of ‘making it strange and the device of impeded form which augments the difficulty
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