THE STRUCTURE OF THE POETIC FUNCTION

Abstract

This paper aims to conduct a reflection on the deep structure of the poetic sign under a semiotic perspective. In order to accomplish that, it is necessary to go back first to some of the fundamental principles of the French semiotics, whose main foundations are present in Ferdinand de Saussure’s Course in General Linguistics and in Louis Hjelmslev’s Prolegomena to a Theory Language, in order to reach the works belonging to Algirdas Greimas, Jean-Marie Floch and Roman Jakobson. These principles and works will be the key to developing a reflection on the nature of the poetic function of language. From the works of these authors, the notions of parallelism between planes of language, linguistic sign and semi-symbolism will be explored; because they seem to be a fruitful way to understand the functioning of the poetic sign and, consequently, to provide some direction to the analysis of texts in which the poetic function of language is prominent.