Title: How to Do Things With Poems Performativity in the Poetry of C.P. Cavafy
Abstract: Abstract The theory of the performative – in its initial version by J.L. Austin and in its poststructuralist revisions – allows us to explore speech acts within C.P. Cavafy's poem as well as how his poems themselves can function as performatives. Performativity in these poems functions along four interrelated planes of performance, all of which are central to Cavafy's poetry: the erotic, the theatrical/public, the historical, and the linguistic. Recurring instances of “infelicitous” performatives in Cavafy's poems, especially unkept promises, reveal the critical and creative potential of this infelicity. The repeated failures and communicative gaps in the poems nevertheless work towards a notion of a felicitous poetic event, in which failure is transformed into a critical act and a motivating force for practices of constant revaluation.
Publication Year: 2006
Publication Date: 2006-12-19
Language: en
Type: article
Indexed In: ['crossref']
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Cited By Count: 1
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