Publications

Publication details [#8382]

Nuessel, Frank H. 1990. Review of 'More Than Cool Reason: A Field Guide to Poetic Metaphor' by George Lakoff and Mark Turner. 1989. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, xii + 230 pages, $11.95 (paper), $22.95 (cloth). Bakhtiniana: Revista de Estudos do Discurso 5 (4) : 251–254.
Publication type
Review/summary
Publication language
English

Abstract

Metaphor began its return to prominence as topic of research in the 1970s (Nuessel, 1988, p. 9). Its continuation as a focal point of scholarly endeavor in the 1980s, no one would deny, owes a significant debt to Lakoff and his occasional associates (cf. Lakoff & Johnson, 1980, and Lakoff and Turner, 1989, in the volume under review). The current book may be seen as a capstone to a decade of intensive research into the realm of metaphor by Lakoff, whose valuable contributions have appeared in 'Metaphor and Symbolic Activity' no fewer than five times (once in collaboration with Mark Johnson). Lakoff launched his innovative research program at the beginning of the last decade with the publication of his collaborative, groundbreaking essay on metaphor (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980). This effort was followed by his exhaustive theoretical treatment of the topic in 1987 (see Lakoff, 1987) that Honeck (1989, p. 284) recently labeled "a masterpiece." The present volume constitutes an application of Lakoff's fully elaborated model to poetic expression. Lakoff and Turner (an assistant professor of English at the University of Chicago) have joined forces to produce a manual designed to help comprehend poetic metaphor. (Frank Nuessel)