Building Mental Worlds in Farzana Aqib's Chase: A Cognitive Stylistic Analysis

This study explores how emotional depth and mental experiences are created in the poem Chase by Farzana Aqib (2021) through the lens of Text World Theory. Using a qualitative stylistic approach, the research analyzes the discourse-world, text-world, and multiple sub-worlds such as epistemic, boulomaic, perceptual, and attitudinal worlds. The findings show that the poet skillfully uses language, imagery, and repetition to reflect emotional confusion, longing, and imagined presence. Text World Theory helps reveal how readers mentally build these emotional worlds, showing that poetry is not just about words, but about the shared mental space between writer and reader. This study highlights the value of cognitive stylistics in understanding the deeper meanings of literary texts.