'Spoken word notation'
Posted: Fri Dec 10, 2010 6:12 pm
When I was a child, I was fortunate enough to be taught how to read music. The beauty of musical notation is that the composer can communicate so much information about the music to the performer - so much more than just the notes. He can also instruct the performer how many beats to hold each note for, whether there are any pauses, etc. He can even tell the performer to play three notes in the time it would normally take to play two notes - or even one - if he wants to. Can poets convey similar information to the performers of our work? No, we can't, because a language of 'spoken word notation' (unlike musical notation) has not been developed.
Let me give you a simple example.
CJ Dennis wrote a poem called 'Wheat'.
The first line of the chorus reads as follows:
"Wheat, Wheat, Wheat! Oh, the sound of it is sweet!"
It is clear to me that he meant it to be recited as follows, with the emphasis on the syllables with the capital letters:
WHEAT, WHEAT, WHEAT! OH, the SOUND of IT is SWEET!
Clearly to make this work, there has to be a short gap between each of the 'wheats' - otherwise there just aren't enough syllables to make it even. I have heard it read exactly the way it is written - without any pauses between the 'wheats' - and it sounds terrible.
So Dennis had to rely on the reader working it out for himself. There was no clear way for him to write down the way he meant it to sound. We have no language for this.
This leaves us poets with a dilemma. Either we trust the performer to work it out for himself, or else we work to make everything foolproof by counting out all the syllables. While this is safer, we run the risk of writing poetry that then sounds monotonous.
People sometimes say to me that they find my work difficult to perform. For years I couldn't work this out, but I realise now that I know where all my little pauses are, but I have no way of communicating them in written form - and the truth is, I like my little pauses. I think they can add dramatic effect. I don't want to write them all out, so I leave it to the reader, and hope he (or she) will find a way to work it out for themselves.
I think it can also be fun to throw in an extra syllable every now and then. Again, I have no way of communicating 'here are three syllables that you need to read in the time it normally takes to read two'.
It seems a shame that musicians have such freedom in this regard, but we are so limited. I wonder why such a language was never developed. Clearly, there was never felt the need. Perhaps it isn't too late. Perhaps we poets can develop a 'spoken word notation' which will allow us to write more rhythmically complex and interesting poems, confident in the knowledge that whoever reads our poems will know exactly how we want them to be recited!
Let me give you a simple example.
CJ Dennis wrote a poem called 'Wheat'.
The first line of the chorus reads as follows:
"Wheat, Wheat, Wheat! Oh, the sound of it is sweet!"
It is clear to me that he meant it to be recited as follows, with the emphasis on the syllables with the capital letters:
WHEAT, WHEAT, WHEAT! OH, the SOUND of IT is SWEET!
Clearly to make this work, there has to be a short gap between each of the 'wheats' - otherwise there just aren't enough syllables to make it even. I have heard it read exactly the way it is written - without any pauses between the 'wheats' - and it sounds terrible.
So Dennis had to rely on the reader working it out for himself. There was no clear way for him to write down the way he meant it to sound. We have no language for this.
This leaves us poets with a dilemma. Either we trust the performer to work it out for himself, or else we work to make everything foolproof by counting out all the syllables. While this is safer, we run the risk of writing poetry that then sounds monotonous.
People sometimes say to me that they find my work difficult to perform. For years I couldn't work this out, but I realise now that I know where all my little pauses are, but I have no way of communicating them in written form - and the truth is, I like my little pauses. I think they can add dramatic effect. I don't want to write them all out, so I leave it to the reader, and hope he (or she) will find a way to work it out for themselves.
I think it can also be fun to throw in an extra syllable every now and then. Again, I have no way of communicating 'here are three syllables that you need to read in the time it normally takes to read two'.
It seems a shame that musicians have such freedom in this regard, but we are so limited. I wonder why such a language was never developed. Clearly, there was never felt the need. Perhaps it isn't too late. Perhaps we poets can develop a 'spoken word notation' which will allow us to write more rhythmically complex and interesting poems, confident in the knowledge that whoever reads our poems will know exactly how we want them to be recited!