Sensory Analysis Essay

By Brendan McElroy, Team Sensory Analysis

Sensory Analysis

The goal of the sensory analysis project done for the English 149 class at UCSB was to try and reproduce literary works from written form into a visual medium in order to analyze them in a different way. Due to the fact that reading is a learned behavior the group, by transferring the works into a visual form, was allowing those viewing the work to use a natural source of analysis. They wanted to see how the viewers’ interpretations of, in this case, the theme and tone were changed or stayed the same in the different representations of the works. By stripping the works of their deeper meaning and displaying them based solely on their literal meaning the group was able to see which themes and tones are solidified in the work regardless of the presentation.

The group used asked the viewers what they thought the tone and theme(s) of the works were as well as the general enjoyment of that particular medium. They recorded these responses using a survey after the viewing of each of the two representations. The group chose for their project to use poems, particularly from the early 1900’s. They chose to use poems because they require a large amount thought in their analysis as well as the sizeable amount of imagery and description. The description in the poems made the transference of the works into photographs as the visual medium a good choice for a different analysis. The poems that the group thought worked best for the purposes of their project were Carl Sandburg’s “The Fog”, Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken”, and William Carlos Williams’ “Portrait of a Lady”. The group after deciding on the poems they would use was challenged with their recreation based on the literal descriptions used in the writing. The literal translation of the words into the photos is very different from the way that poems are typically interpreted. Poetry is often examined for the underlying messages that they are trying to convey rather than the literal making this translation difficult for the group capture the depth of poems they chose. In some ways this project defies how poetry is meant to be interpreted and how poets want them to be analyzed. The projects limits can be tested especially when examining poems that deal with a large amount of ambiguity.

For the translations the group had to take photographs of what they believed depicted the literal meanings of the poems using scenes from around the city of Santa Barbara. For Carl Sandburg’s “The Fog” the group had to capture the importance of the meaning of the fog in the poem. The fog can be understood in a multitude of different ways. Through the poem it can be seen that a relation between the fog and the cat exists both having the similar characteristics of things that wander in and out of our lives leaving as quickly as they came. Through the association of the fog and the cat on the same level it suggests that the fog is a wild and animalistic being that is an untamable part of nature. The project highlights the focus that the poem has on these two images through its visuals. The group was able to help those analyzing to clearly see this importance and relation between the two causing one to think more critically about what they represent.

The nomadic presence of the fog and the cat can be related to ones contemplations of life passing in and out of our minds creating a certain state of confusion in ones internal monologue. The visuals in this project involving the fog leads us to further understand how the fog blurs ones clarity in the physical world which in turn bogs their ability to understand it. In this way the fog can be understood as ones fears that cast a blanket over the entirety of their lives, much like the city in the poem. This is an example of the part of an individual’s inner monologue that drifts in and out of focus coming and going as it pleases for moments at a time. In the pictures used by the group convey the idea of the fog as ones fears or negativity through their ominous darkness. Through the examination of the poem itself this same darkness is not displayed quite as concretely which is one way that the project can help to further its understanding or alter ones previous interpretation. In the photo representation the group did not capture the last lines of the poem where the fog “moves on” which, to the viewer, fails to communicate the vanishing of what the fog represents.

Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken”, being considered the most famous of the groups chosen works, is an often-misunderstood poem that can benefit from further analysis through this groups project. The visual component of the project aligns itself with one of the very popular interpretations of the poem dealing with life and the choices one makes, or the roads they travel down. A persons life is often equated to a road that an individual travels influenced by the choices they make and this poem strongly agrees with this idea. It is difficult if not impossible to separate this idea and its relevance to individuals on a global scale. A fork in the road and the choice of which fork to take directly correlates to making major life decisions and having to live with the results. It illuminates the role that free will plays constantly for an individual in even such a simple act as choosing to walk down a certain path. As seen in both the poem and the visuals presented by the group the vague direction of the roads alludes to the uncertainty of the future and our inability to understand the impacts of the choices one makes. The questionable future and the contemplation of its possibilities are highlighted in the group’s photograph of the girl sitting alone thinking of the road that could’ve been taken.

The isolation of the girl in the photograph serves to further the understanding that the speaker’s observations of the future are internal and possibly directed at a future self rather than another individual. At this point we again see, through the interpretation, the relation between life choices and their consequences. In the groups visual representation of Robert Frost’s poem the theme of regret successfully transfers over for the viewer. The theme of regret is not regret in that the wrong choice was made, because there is no “correct” choice in the poem, but the longing for the idea of “what could have been”. This poem, more than the others chosen for the project, loses more than it gains in the translation. Although the project team was able to capture the physical and literal imagery laid out in the poem, as was the goal of the project, the voice of the speaker is not seen which is where the bulk of the material lies.

            The final poem that was featured in the project was William Carlos Williams’ “Portrait of a Lady” which proved to yield an interesting result. Similar to the other works chosen the voice of the subject is an internal conversation that is trying to work through something. However, this work differentiates from the other two because the poem has a back and forth of questioning as if it were two people. The subject of the poem is attempting, with some deal of trouble and frustration, to describe an unidentifiable women. The sensory analysis team was challenged with finding a way to convey these emotions of frustration in the chaotic formation of the poem using only a visual representation. The woman’s attributes are compared to the parts of nature as the speaker struggles to best describe her. With the translation of Williams’ work into a photo the themes of nature as beautiful and feminine transfer with relative ease. The disorder felt in the reading of poem was understood in the chaotic background of the photo, which allows for those viewing to experience visually frenzied stream of consciousness of the speaker.

By using the literal and physical descriptions of what is said in the poem the viewer can further analyze a major area of the description that the work lacks, which is any explanation of the woman’s upper body. This lack of imagery involving some major defining characteristic often goes unnoticed or even considered through the analysis of the poem alone. The project team was able to discover and provide an aspect of poem that was previously hidden to readers helping to further the understanding of the poet’s frustration with the attempt to describe the woman. This lack of a depiction of the woman’s upper body, especially her facial features, suggests that the speaker is attempting to describe her with a degree of unattainable perfection. This perfect woman, in the speaker’s eyes, can only be, to some degree, described through the beauty of the natural world. The inability to describe the woman might also suggest that she may not exist at all. The other way to examine it being that the speaker has seen her before and is attempting to recreate an image of her in his head. The project’s image of the woman sides more with the idea of a fantasy woman through the abstract recreation of the imagery.

            While the group was able to succeed in the creation of the visual representations of the poetry the results were not a polished finished project. The findings regarding the tone and theme of the works collected in the groups survey showed those that carried over in the translation through a word cloud. The sensory analysis project team was able to produce a new way to analyze poetry that could be expanded on with more time dedication and capital. The best to this project could have been improved is simply more time with the images. Not only more time in the editing process but more time for the group to collect a series of photos outside of Santa Barbara that could possibly have been more accurate and true to the poems description. For example Carl Sandburg’s poem needed specific weather criteria in a specific location. If the group had time to capture an image of actual fog blanketing the city and harbor rather than the makeshift Photoshop fog, the images would have had a much more natural feel which could have had an effect on the results of the survey. The project would also have benefited from a team with more background experience in not only photo editing but also general photography skills.

Through the implementation of this projects process and goals to other writing can be analyzed using an individuals natural sensory tools. The project has practical long-term applications for analyses of literary works. That being said the project does have its limits. If it were attempted for longer written works outside of poetry the amount of images needed to convey the literal description could border too closely with the characteristics of film. I think this project for its intended purpose has landed in its perfect niche with poetry. An aspect of the sensory analysis project that was discussed in its early stages was the use of music or some sort of auditory component to accompany the images. Due to the limited time frame and resources that the team had access to this audio component was too ambitious for this class project. If the project were going to be continued outside of the parameters of the course it would be interesting to see how original scores could be created to match the poetry. The addition of an auditory effect would improve the overall translation of the poem and would capture some parts of the poetry that are lost with only the visual interpretation.