Roman Jakobson stands alone in his semiotic theory of poetic analysis which combines semiotics
linguistics and structuralist poetics. This groundbreaking book proposes methods for developing
Jakobson's theories of communication and poetic function. It provides an extensive range of
examples of the kinds of Formalist praxis that have been neglected in recent years developing
them for the analysis of all poetry but especially the poetry of our urban future. Throughout
the book the parameters of a city poetic genre are proposed and established the book also
develops the theory of the function of shifters and deixis with special reference to women as
narrators. It also instantiates an experimental poetic praxis based on the work of one of
Jakobson's great influences Charles Sanders Peirce. Steadfastly adhering to the text in itself
this volume reveals the often surprising hitherto unconsidered structural and semiotic
patterns within poems as a whole.
