Aposiopesis "In-Real-Life"

Ah, aposiopesis. Have you heard of it?

No? Yeah, it’s not a very commonly used term. We’ve all interacted with it, though. Perhaps the most common is “Do this, or else…!” The common response is, “Or else what?” Indeed, or else what. That’s aposiopesis. Having been overcome with such surprise, passion, umbrage or the like, the speaker or writer simply cannot finish their sentence or idea. In that example, the resulting circumstances will be so grave or shameful that the communicative expertise to describe the “or else” is simply nonexistent.

At times, that’s all it communicates. A lack of linguistic skills. End a sentence with an ellipsis (…) or em rule (—) and let the reader do the rest of the work.

However, at times, it’s incredibly appropriate. It’s not a lack of linguistic skills, it’s simply a matter of subjective imagination. Each reader or observer is left to their own devices to imagine the best or worst or otherwise (depending on the context). In literature, a most powerful example is found in the Hebrew Bible. In Psalm 27, verse 13 is translated in the New Revised Standard Version as, “I believe that I shall see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.” However, according to Robert Alter’s translation and commentary, the verse is better translated as saying, “If I but trust to see the Lord’s goodness, in the land of the living—.” As Alter writes, “This sentence, at least in the textual form passed down to us, seems to be an ellipsis.” This is to say, the author cannot (or perhaps will not) attempt to imagine what he would do without faith in Yahweh.

Such instances occur in real-time, as well. Perhaps you can remember a time when you were so surprised, disgusted or in awe of something, you simply didn’t have words to describe it. Or, as is more often my case, what words you do have devote little justice to the way you actually feel. I often feel this when I witness the beauty or astonishing realities in nature. If you sit me in front of the BBC’s Earth, I may have my jaw dropped throughout most of the legendary nature special’s duration. I’m simply in awe of the way the world, the way that nature, operates. Such order and beauty, all from the chaos of a pre-Big Bang abyss. I simply do not have the linguistic skills, despite my communications background, to adequately describe how I feel.

In a less light-hearted sense, I feel the same when describing a tragedy. Today marks the 18th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City. The politics and bigotry and religion and whatever else often associated with the fallout and legacy of 9/11 fall to the wayside when you hear the personal stories of those most affected. Those families that lost relatives, those people who boarded their plane, those people who missed their flights, those who stayed home sick that day, those who didn’t, and more. This morning, while listening to WAMU’s 1A on NPR, callers were sharing harrowing stories and experiences, all of whom remember that day better than I do (I was 6 years old at the time). The experiences felt by many that day are slowly slipping away. Despite our pledges to “Never Forget,” 9/11 is becoming an arcane remembrance. The generations born after these attacks don’t have a “where I was” story. Tragedies, and many like it, leave many with an ellipsis; that is to say, unable to continue their thought, perhaps scared of where such a thought will lead.

Aposiopesis, whether in our minds or in our literature, is an interesting and meditative concept. At times, the prospect of not finishing a thought for the sake of peace and simplicity is a comforting one. In another case, it’s, at best, horrifying, that such a reality could exist or tragedy occur that we couldn’t process our experience verbally. Often times, so much of what we think and feel stands beyond what we feel we can control. In “Why Buddhism Is True: The Science and Philosophy of Mediation and Enlightenment,” Robert Wright argues that “…this absence of <said> control is part, though by no means all, of what the Buddha has in mind when he emphasized the importance of grasping not-self.” (Note: on “not-self,” see anatta) Simultaneously, it’s not exclusively spiritual or self-contained; experiencing aposiopesis is not either a matter of a seemingly spiritual experience with something greater than one can grasp or an adherence to a doctrine that denounces the existence of a permanent essence or soul. Aposiopesis (and the assumed lack of control over ones thoughts or feelings) can be interpreted as a spiritual experience, as described in Psalm 27, or a purely “self” experience, that is as something absent of spirituality and existing within one’s physical self, or perhaps (seemingly paradoxical) as both. The result of the experience is the same. Grasping this key aspect of humanity is itself experiential; that is to say, it’s hard to explain (or understand) without having experienced it. Surely, though, by a young age, we all have.