SO enjoyable hearing your reading of this poem (as in all your readings). This time I intentionally listened to your reading of the poem without actually looking at the text of the poem while listening.
And that is because it brings a question to mind that may be inappropriate for this sort of site where the entries are primarily about particular works of art and music and literature. For my question, I guess, is more about poetry -- and this sort of poetry -- in general, with this poem being but a specific example for a more general question. And if so that's ok if it is not the sort of thing for Word and Song and would be too distracting from its purposes.
But if not, this is my question that I would love to hear your thoughts on. Suppose the poem were not printed in "lines of poetry" but were instead simply written out continuously as prose. Would your reading of it be any different and to different effect?
For as far as I can tell, there is not particular "regular" meter and no general rhyme scheme (or rhymes at all, I think). And (again, to my slow ears) no particular emphatic alliteration or assonance mid-lines and such that might enhance a "poetic feel". I suppose it would be referred to as an example of free verse (as opposed to blank verse)?
And if so, can (or even should?) a listener "hear" it as poetry, as opposed to a reading of text, however pleasing the imagery and style might be? Or might it be that there IS a distinct "advantage" to seeing the poem written out in lines, whether to read to one self or while listening to it being read aloud (as you have so delightfully done here)?
In other words, do the lines and their separation from each other offer and contribute to a "poetic" quality of a work (and of course this one in particular as an example)? Is there anything useful and helpful to be said here, or am I destined to be a clod-hopping dense literary wannabe for life? :-)
Note: I hope it is clear that I don't ask this in mockery or disdain at all -- rather, I'm perfectly serious and would like to be enlightened about anything I might be missing that would give me even greater joy in such things than I already have some degree of.
In other words, I love the work for what I can enjoy hearing of it, but I wonder if there is more for me to be "hearing" as an example of "poetry" read aloud -- as opposed to listening to prose read aloud (an equally enjoyable activity) -- and from both ends as reader or listener. For that was nearly a daily activity in my 38 years of marriage to my wife Angelee, as a matter of fact, something I dearly miss now that she is gone.
So hearing your recordings of things read aloud here on Word and Song is, for me, a distinct pleasure and a fond and longing memory of those reading aloud times in front of the fireplace on a rainy day.
From social commentator Douglas Murray: “Everybody has their own Christmas traditions. One of mine is listening to Olivier Messiaen’s great organ cycle “La Nativité du Seigneur—the cycle is dark and knotty
in places, which makes the final explosion of joy even more astounding. The other is reading T.S. Eliot’s “The Journey of the Magi.”
Let's have "A Song for Simeon" also. It is also one of my favorites.
SO enjoyable hearing your reading of this poem (as in all your readings). This time I intentionally listened to your reading of the poem without actually looking at the text of the poem while listening.
And that is because it brings a question to mind that may be inappropriate for this sort of site where the entries are primarily about particular works of art and music and literature. For my question, I guess, is more about poetry -- and this sort of poetry -- in general, with this poem being but a specific example for a more general question. And if so that's ok if it is not the sort of thing for Word and Song and would be too distracting from its purposes.
But if not, this is my question that I would love to hear your thoughts on. Suppose the poem were not printed in "lines of poetry" but were instead simply written out continuously as prose. Would your reading of it be any different and to different effect?
For as far as I can tell, there is not particular "regular" meter and no general rhyme scheme (or rhymes at all, I think). And (again, to my slow ears) no particular emphatic alliteration or assonance mid-lines and such that might enhance a "poetic feel". I suppose it would be referred to as an example of free verse (as opposed to blank verse)?
And if so, can (or even should?) a listener "hear" it as poetry, as opposed to a reading of text, however pleasing the imagery and style might be? Or might it be that there IS a distinct "advantage" to seeing the poem written out in lines, whether to read to one self or while listening to it being read aloud (as you have so delightfully done here)?
In other words, do the lines and their separation from each other offer and contribute to a "poetic" quality of a work (and of course this one in particular as an example)? Is there anything useful and helpful to be said here, or am I destined to be a clod-hopping dense literary wannabe for life? :-)
Note: I hope it is clear that I don't ask this in mockery or disdain at all -- rather, I'm perfectly serious and would like to be enlightened about anything I might be missing that would give me even greater joy in such things than I already have some degree of.
In other words, I love the work for what I can enjoy hearing of it, but I wonder if there is more for me to be "hearing" as an example of "poetry" read aloud -- as opposed to listening to prose read aloud (an equally enjoyable activity) -- and from both ends as reader or listener. For that was nearly a daily activity in my 38 years of marriage to my wife Angelee, as a matter of fact, something I dearly miss now that she is gone.
So hearing your recordings of things read aloud here on Word and Song is, for me, a distinct pleasure and a fond and longing memory of those reading aloud times in front of the fireplace on a rainy day.
From social commentator Douglas Murray: “Everybody has their own Christmas traditions. One of mine is listening to Olivier Messiaen’s great organ cycle “La Nativité du Seigneur—the cycle is dark and knotty
in places, which makes the final explosion of joy even more astounding. The other is reading T.S. Eliot’s “The Journey of the Magi.”