Rhetorical text description is aimed at exposing the persuasive strategies employed in a text. It entails a description of the selection of topic, but in particular a stylistic analysis. In this article the researcher explores the necessity of interpreting iconic signification in poetry as a rhetorical strategy, mainly on the grounds of the ‘poetic faith' aroused in the reader by the code-orientated or demonstrative nature of poetry. The icon, the most ‘seductive' of sign types on account of its resemblant relation to the denotated object, is seen to function as a ‘hidden persuader' in poetic communication, valorizing the message of the poetic utterance. After analysing two short Afrikaans poems (Ernst van Heerden's "Vo?lverskrikker" and T.T. Cloete's "God die digter") within this theoretical framework, the researcher concludes that iconicity, at the core of the poetic function in its aspiration towards minimizing the arbitrariness of signification, must be seen as a rhetorical strategy.
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