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Visual Effects Created By E.E. Cummings In His Poetry Essay

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Visual Effects Created By E.E. Cummings In His Poetry

Edward Estlin Cummings, commonly referred to as E. E. Cummings, was born on October 14, 1894 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He was a source of vast knowledge and was responsible for many creative works other than his poetry, such as novels, plays, and paintings. He published his first book of poetry Tulips and Chimneys in 1923. Many of his poems are known for the visual effects they create through his unusual placement of words on the page, as well as, his lack of punctuation and capitalization. The manner in which Cummings arranges the words of his poems creates an image in the reader's mind of the topic he is discussing, such as a season or climbing stairs. His visual style also …show more content…

The reader also obtains a visual effect when reading Cummings' "in Just-." In this poem, the main topic is springtime and the various aspects of that season. Cummings creates the words "mud-luscious" and "puddle-wonderful" to provide the reader with images of spring from a child's perspective. Adults would view mud and puddles as a negative aspect of spring, resulting from the melting of snow and the showers that usually occur at that time of the year. However, by creating these words, Cummings brings the reader back to their own childhood when mud and puddles were wonderful aspects of spring.

In this same poem, Cumming also uses spacing to create an image in the reader's mind. For example, he writes:

lame balloonman whistles far and wee (Cummings 21-22.)
The fact that the word "far" is separated from the other words in the line creates an image that the whistling is in the distance. Additionally, he joins the names "eddieandbill" and "bettyandisbel." This illustrates that there is a "togetherness" that is usually found in spring because it is a time when children play outside with their friends. By joining the names, the poet captures the manner in which children, who are excited, speak by running their words together and leaving out syllables. Spring is usually a time when people's

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