Page 67 - Studio International - July August 1975

indefinite in number, only to a small figures of rhetoric. analysis not simply in terms of the
degree do they assume their meaning in As is well known, the possibilities of complexity of its undertaking but in
paradigmatic opposition to the other visual metaphor were of considerable terms of its validity ? Todorov has met
images that could have appeared at the interest in the early Russian cinema, not this objection. No science, he has
same point along the filmic chain. In this least to Eisenstein. It was however the pointed out, is required to give account
last respect again they differ less from literary wing of the Russian avant-garde of the ontological status of its
statements than from words, since words which provided the most extensive theoretical concepts so long as they have
are always more or less embedded in indications that parts of ancient rhetoric operational value. Terms such as
paradigmatic networks of meaning'.53 may serve as expressive forms and tools `temperature' and 'volume' are useful
`Still' photographic practice is at of textual analysis. Todorov has to physics quite independently of the
present quite arbitrarily grounded in an observed that the Russian Formalist fact that the phenomena to which they
ideology of the image. This Image Victor Shklovski, in analysing War and refer may not be isolated from each other,
functions at once as a metaphorical Peace, ' . . reveals, for example, the nor from a complex of other phenomena
representation of creative individuality, antithesis formed by pairs of characters : like 'mass' and 'resistance'. By the same
singular and set apart, and an aesthetic "1. Napoleon-Kbutouzov; z. Pierre token we do not need to isolate a pure
mystification. In fact, the technical Bezoukov-André Bolkonski and at the `description' or a pure 'action' or a pure
means of production of photography same time Nicolos Rostov who serves as `figure' in order to use the concepts of
readily offers a plurality of images. The point of reference for both pairs." description, action, and figure.
Image therefore represents a contingent Gradation is also found; several members Todorov's remarks are applicable,
repression of latent practices : it is in of a family exhibit the same character mutatis mutandis, to the semiotic analysis
this that it is ideological. By way of traits but to different degrees. Thus in of visual images : few of the codes
counterbalancing the great weight of Anna Karenina "Stiva is situated on a identified in the course of analysis will be
attention devoted to the 'indivisible' lower echelon in relation to his sister." ' manifested in isolation, but this does not
image, we might do well to consider the Having noted these and other of itself invalidate the analysis.
function of montage in the photographic constructions in Shklovski's analysis, The possibility of an approach to still
production of meaning. Todorov remarks : 'But parallelism, photography modelled on rhetorical
antithesis, gradation, and repetition are analysis was first suggested by Barthes
only rhetorical devices. One can then in Rhetoric of the Image. 'This rhetoric',
The phenomenon of 'third effect' has formulate the thesis implicit in he remarked, 'can only be constituted on
long been familiar, certainly since Shklovski's remarks. There are devices the basis of a fairly broad inventory, but
Kuleshov's experiments with the actor in the récit which are projections of even at this stage we can foresee that
Mozhukhin in the early 'twenties: 'We rhetorical devices'.55 we will find in this rhetoric several of the
had a particular dispute with a certain Shklovski demonstrated that literary figures collected in former times by the
famous actor to whom we said : Imagine forms may be seen as projections of Ancients and the Classics.' 58
this scene: a man, sitting in jail for a long rhetorical forms. Todorov has sought to In a series of articles written in 1965 "
time, is starving because he is not given demonstrate that these rhetorical forms Jean-Louis Swiners has seen in the
anything to eat: he is brought a plate of may in turn be reduced to linguistic rhetorical figure a tool for the analysis of
soup, is delighted by it, and gulps it down. forms. For example he has identified the photo-journalistic mise en page.
`Imagine another scene: a man in jail syllepsis as one of a number of rhetorical Swiners opposed the conception of
is given food, fed well, full to capacity, figures based on polysemy. In Racine's photography as a 'means of saying
but he longs for his freedom, for the sight expression 'I suffer . . . burning with more something' to the 'traditional pictorial
of sunlight, houses, clouds. A door is fire than I could kindle', the single term conception of photography'. Compared
opened for him. He is led out on to the `fire' figures in two propositions : 'The with a painting, he observed, the
street, and he sees birds, clouds, the sun fire of the first proposition is imaginary; photograph may be found lacking, but
and houses and is extremely pleased by it burns the soul of the person, while as a means of communication it can be
the sight. And so, we asked the actor: the fire of the second proposition incomparable. The best extant
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Will the face reacting to the soup and the corresponds to real flames'.5 communicative use of photography
face reacting to the sun appear the same Todorov finds that syllepsis is widely Swiners found to be the type of photo-
on film or not ? He answers us used in the récit. In one example he journalism developed by Life magazine.
disdainfully: It is clear to anyone that gives this description of a novella by Such magazine picture-stories are
the reaction to the soup and the Boccaccio: Peronnella receives her particularly suitable to a linguistic type
reaction to freedom will be totally lover while her husband, a poor mason, is of analysis. A syntagmatic plane is
different. absent. But one day he comes home early. clearly established in the turning of the
`Then we shot these two sequences, and Peronnella hides the lover in a cask; when pages and the left-to-right reading of a
regardless of how I transposed these the husband comes in, she tells him that double-page spread. A paradigmatic
shots and how they were examined, no somebody wanted to buy the cask and plane is present in the top-to-bottom
one was able to perceive any difference that this somebody is now in the process distribution of pictures on a page. In the
in the face of this actor, in spite of the of examining it. The husband believes case of the picture-story these two planes
fact that his performance in each shot her and is delighted with the sale. The correspond to, respectively, the
was absolutely different. With proper lover pays and leaves with the cask'. " diachronic and synchronic axes of the
montage, even if one takes the Here, a single state of affairs, the man's story. Swiners went on to observe:
performance of an actor directed at being inside the barrel, acquires two `It can easily be verified:
something quite different it will still interpretations : the man is hiding from (a) that certain rhetorical figures (as, for
reach the viewer in the way intended by his mistress's husband/the man is example, metaphor, simile, antonomasia,
the editor, because the viewer himself examining a prospective purchase. asyndeton, paranomasia, synecdoche,
will complete the sequence and see what Todorov remarks 'It is not a question of etc . . .) have . . . their visual equivalents.
is suggested to him by the montage'. 54 a different action here but of a different (b) that certain other figures of rhetoric
Kuleshov's reminiscence concerns an perception of the same action'. Similarly, (chiasmus, zeugma, etc . . .) though not
exemplary case of practical semiotics; in language, a single term may carry yet having been visually transmitted,
it also administers a firm rebuff to the more than one sense. The English term may easily be so and thus allow us to
naturalist tendency to consider `bank' may signify a place where money envisage a finer structuring of
photographic portraits as 'mirrors of the is kept or the ground at a river's edge. photographic "discourse" and a renewal
soul'. But to return to the question of We may object, to return to the of the aesthetics of the lay-out."°
montage in 'stills' : Beyond the basic example from Racine, that although we
proven fact of 'third effect' may we can recognize the operation of syllepsis VI
postulate the existence of more here we must also admit the operation A more extensive and systematic
extensive signifying structures than of metaphor in the first proposition. Does treatment of rhetoric in a discussion of
that expressed in the formula t +t =3 ? the inseparability of figures from each photography is given by Jacques Durand
One response to this question has taken other and from such other literary facts in an article of 1970". This article, which
the form of a consideration of the as 'description', pose a problem for takes the advertising image as its visual
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