Frances,
In 25 words or less: a phrase or passage is presentational when it uses
_imitation_ to convey an idea.  Presentation is a stylistic effect.  The
effect might not depend upon "sentence structure" although very often it
does. It depends upon what idea is being imidated. Other traits of a
'presentational style' might be the lack of connecting words, the use of
present tense verbs or no verb at all, or even a series of images whose
relationship to one another is implicit and is not explained.
"Presentation" often derives its effects just as much from what is left out
as what is put in, so to speak.

Here are some examples of what I mean:

Dark blood flowed in the fosse,
Souls out of Erebus, cadaverous dead, of brides
Of youths and of the old who had borne much;
Souls stained with recent tears, girls tender,
Men many, mauled with bronze lance heads,
Battle spoil, bearing yet dreory arms,
These many crowded about me; with shouting ...  (from Canto 1)


One of the ideas in this passage is the sense of multitude. The poet wants
to convey a sense of being crowded by the souls of the dead who appear in
response to the act of blood sacrifice. As the blood flows they press upon
the scene.  Look at the syntax.  There is no verb ordering the progress of
the clause.  We have instead a sort of tumultuous list:

Souls... cadaverious dead.... brides.... youths.... the old..... girls
tender.... men many.... these many

Repetition contributes to the tumult:

        of brides/Of youths  and of the old
         men many....these many....

One would have to do some editorial sleuthing to verify authorial
intent--but the lack of punctuation at the line-break between "of brides/Of
Youths" also contributes a little to the effect of the pressing crowd. These
souls follow hard upon one another. We also have an abrupt switching of
clauses, and the parataxis conveys a sense of disorientation, a
being-overwhelmed:

.... cadaverous dead , of brides

and

... crowded about me; with shouting


Here is another example from Canto 2:

...
And, out of nothing, a breathing, hot breath on my ankles,
Beasts like shadows in glass, a furred tail upon nothingness.
Lynx-purr, a heathery smell of beasts, where tar smell had been,
Sniff and pad-foot of beasts, eye-glitter out of black air.
The sky overshot, dry, with no tempest,
Sniff and pad-foot of beasts, fur brushing my knee-skin,
Rustle of airy sheaths, dry forms in aether.


So, Frances, do you get the idea?
Tim Romano
www.aimsdata.com/tim












You wrote:

I read something in the NY book review speaking of Ezra Pound's advice
to poets.  I understand the difference between definition and description,
but this "presentation vs description" I find difficult to visualize in
sentence structure.  I would like to see two paragraph examples of how words
are layed out to comply with this strategy.