Yet exclamation points have been maligned (the second category) for being excessive in poetry and prose. In English: “mark of admiration.”ĭo we admire it in modern literature, though? Not so much, said Rothman-Zecher, who broke down its reception into four categories.ĭialogic was the first: exclamation points may be more acceptable in dialogue, to convey vocal excitement. Alternate theory: during the Renaissance, the Italian poet Iacopo Alpoleio da Urbisaglia rightly or wrongly declared himself the inventor of the exclamation point, which he dubbed punctus admirativus. ![]() Medieval scribes would end certain sentences with the Latin Io, which signals joy or delight but, at some point, the I was mistakenly placed over the o. Some scholars think that “!” began as a slip of a pen. Rothman-Zecher began by pinpointing the point’s origins. ![]() Or as Dickinson might say (in poem F170A): “’Tis so much joy! ’Tis so much joy!” The whole experience was thought-provoking, odd, poignant and just so fun. The participants, for instance, tried swapping shiny exclamation points for dull periods in their own poetry, and posted the results. ![]() He did a Q&A and led several interactive exercises, too. The audience of 150 logged on from around the globe, Philadelphia to Mexico, Wales to Miami, to hear host Moriel Rothman-Zecher, a poet, novelist and essayist, share takeaways from his upcoming article on the subject in the American Poetry Review. The online event mined the meaning behind the mark-which appears in Dickinson’s work roughly 384 times. “The Dickinsonian Exclamation Point” was one of the quirkier offerings at this fall’s Tell It Slant Poetry festival, held by the Emily Dickinson Museum.
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