Metre, rhythm and emotion in poetry. A cognitive approach

This essay integrates what I have written on the contribution of meter and rhythm to emotional qualities in poetry, opposing them to emotional contents. I distinguish between “meaning-oriented” approaches and “perceived effects” approaches, adopting the latter; and adopt a qualitative (rather than quantitative) method of research. Providing a simplified list of structural elements of emotion, I explore structural resemblances between rhythmic patterns and emotions. I investigate such issues as convergent and divergent poetic styles, convergent and divergent delivery styles, hypnotic poetry, the contribution of meter and rhythm to a “dignified quality”; and the rhythmic performance and emotional effect of stress maxima in weak positions. Finally, I locate my work between impressionist criticism on the one hand, and meaning-oriented criticism on the other. NOTE. The pdf version of this paper contains sound files, which may not work if you open the pdf in the browser. If this is the case, please download the pdf and open it from your computer

Performing Mediaeval Hebrew Poetry

This is an instrumental exploration of theoretical issues related to the vocal performance of Mediaeval Hebrew pegs-and-cords meter, of which we have neither authentic recordings, nor verbal descriptions of actual performances of the time. Consequently, I am exploring only possibilities implied by poetic structures as embodied in later performances, not in actual authentic performances. But, in my earlier writings, I have extensively explored similar issues in English, Hungarian and modern Hebrew poetry, as recorded by experienced readers. The pegs-and-cords meter is a unique quantitative system based on systematic (not necessarily regular) alternation of schwa mobile and full vowels. The time ratio between the two is supposed to be 1:2, 1:3 or 1:4. Some scholars believe that in Jewish Yemenite liturgy the authentic performance has been preserved. This article is focused on one brief liturgical masterpiece by Shlomo Ibn Gabirol, submitting to computer analysis a modern recital of it, and a sung performance of a Yemenite master. Regarding the correspondence of language and versification, eleventh-century Hebrew poets explicitly distinguished between two possibilities: word endings may or may not coincide with the ending of a metric foot. I have investigated on the computer whether it is possible to convey continuation and discontinuation at the same time by a single voice, where word endings and metricfoot endings do not coincide. Neither performer observed the conflicting endings consistently, but both provided evidence that it is possible to identify the problems and solve them by vocal manipulation. In the Yemenite masters’ performances, computer measurements could not establish that the schwas are consistently shorter than the vowels. Furthermore, poetic rhythm requires the simultaneous perception of two versification levels at least: a wider unit (the verse line or a hemistich), and the metric feet that divide it. Psychologically, simultaneous presence implies being contained within the same span of short-term memory. In the Yemenite masters’ performances, the wider units exceed by far the span of short-term memory, owing to repetition of phrases and drawn-out embellishments, so that the poems’ rhythms could not be preserved. In the 16th–17th century there were Jewish musicians in Western Europe who composed liturgic music in the baroque tradition, some of it to pegs-and-cord texts. In a brief pilot I point out the differences in aesthetic conception between this baroque music and the Yemenite master. Finally, Mediaeval poets treated a schwa+vowel as a unit called “peg”. Here the question of psychological reality arises. The issue at stake is whether two immediately-observable constituents can be experienced at a more abstract level as one unit. The precedent of what generative metrists call “disyllabic occupancy of metrical position” in English poetry suggests a positive answer. “Power” at the end of an iambic line may be perceived as occupying one or two metrical positions. Computer analysis shows systematic acoustic diff erences between instances in which two syllables occupy one or two positions. We cannot know, however, what was actually the case with the peg, since we do not know how it was performed; in this respect, we have demonstrated only a possibility

Acoustics and Resonance in Poetry: The Psychological Reality of Rhyme in Baudelaire’s “Les Chats”

This article uses the term “psychological reality” in this sense: the extent to which the constructs of linguistic theory can be taken to have a basis in the human mind, i.e., to somehow be reflected in human cognitive structures. This article explores the human cognitive structures in which the constructs of phonetic theory may be reflected. The last section is a critique of the psychological reality of sound patterns in Baudelaire’s “Les Chats”, as discussed in three earlier articles. In physical terms, it defines “resonant” as “tending to reinforce or prolong sounds, especially by synchronous vibration”. In phonetic terms it defines “resonant” as “where intense precategorical auditory information lingers in short-term memory”. The effect of rhyme in poetry is carried by similar overtones vibrating in the rhyme fellows, resonating like similar overtones on the piano. In either case, we do not compare overtones item by item, just hear their synchronous vibration. I contrast this conception to three approaches: one that points out similar sounds of “internal rhymes”, irrespective of whether they may be contained within the span of short-term memory (i.e., whether they may have psychological relit); one that claims that syntactic complexity may cancel the psychological reality of “internal rhymes” (whereas I claim that it merely backgrounds rhyme); and one that found through an eye-tracking experiment that readers fixate longer on verse-final rhymes than on other words, assuming regressive eye-movement (I claim that rhyme is an acoustic not visual phenomenon; and that there is a tendency to indicate discontinuation by prolonging the last sounds in ordinary speech and blank verse too, as well as in music — where no rhyme is involved)

Enjambment – Irony, Wit, Emotion. A Case Study Suggesting Wider Principles

This study submits to empirical investigation an old idea of Tsur’s regarding the effect of enjambment on the perceived subtleness of irony in a poetic passage. We submitted two versions of a Milton passage to over 50 participants with “background in literary studies”, ranging from undergraduates to tenured professors, asking them to rate the perceived subtleness of irony and forthrightness of expression. We received four incompatible combinations of relative subtleness and forthrightness in the two passages. Two of the combinations were logically reasonable (though resulting from opposite performances), and two were internally inconsistent. An analysis of these results revealed two sources of this discrepancy: enjambments can be performed in three different ways, and participants respond not to abstract enjambments, but to performed enjambments; and they act upon partly overlapping definitions of irony. Assuming different performances of the enjambment, both logically acceptable response patterns support our hypothesis. Yet, a large part of the responses in this study were incoherent to some extent. This highlights the difficulty in collecting subjective interpretations of complex aesthetic events. We discuss this methodological issue at length

Translation Studies, Cultural Context, and Dante

In his article, Translation Studies, Cultural Context, and Dante, Reuven Tsur explores limits of legitimacy in translation studies. Tsur\u27s approach is a critique of the theoretical assumptions and their application in Edoardo Crisafulli\u27s cultural interpretation of Seamus Heaney\u27s decisions in translating the Ugolino episode in Dante\u27s Inferno. Crisafulli claims that Heaney\u27s choices show internal consistency, and can be accounted for by appealing to the Irish situational context. Instead, Tsur argues that Crisafulli\u27s cultural interpretations are arbitrary and that a more satisfactory account can be offered through an analysis of constraints within a conception of the aesthetic object as an elegant solution to a problem. Another disagreement concerns the intertextual processes between Dante\u27s segment and Heaney\u27s volume of original poetry in which it is printed. It is suggested here that by juxtaposing two texts, high-salient features of one text may reinforce similar features in the other and promote their salience

Picture Poems: Some Cognitive and Aesthetic Principles

This paper explores some cognitive and aesthetic principles concerning picture poems. It conceives of language as of a hierarchy of signs: the graphemic string signifies a phonological string which signifies units of meaning which signify referents in extralinguistic reality. Our linguistic competence urges us to reach the final referents as fast as possible. Poetic language draws attention to itself, that is, to the hierarchy of signifiers. In manneristic styles there is a greater awareness of the separateness of signifiers than in non-manneristic styles; hence their witty or disorienting effect. While rhyme, metre, alliteration impose additional patterning upon the phonological signifiers, picture poems, acrostich, and some other manneristic devices impose additional patterning upon the graphemic signifiers. When alliterations are turned into puns, they become manneristic patterning of the phonological signifier. It is argued, by analogy with synaesthesia, that stable characteristic visual shapes obstruct smooth perceptual fusion; and based on speech perception, that speech sounds are special in our cognitive economy, and visual patterning cannot achieve the naturalness of their patterning. That is why visual patterning is not admitted in non-manneristic styles. Cognitive poetics suggests that in the response to poetry, adaptive devices are turned to an aesthetic end. In a universe in which "the centre cannot hold", readers of poetry find pleasure not so much in the emotional disorientation caused by mannerist devices, but rather in the reassertion that their adaptive devices, when disrupted, function properly. This is one reason for mannerist styles to recur in cultural and social periods in which more than one scale of values prevail

Phonetic Cues and Dramatic Function Artistic Recitation of Metered Speech

This article attempts a brief synthesis of two of my research areas: sound symbolism and poetic rhythm, focussed on Simon Russel Beale's performance of Gloucester's first soliloquy in Richard III. It explores three structural relationships between phoneti c cues and their effects: redundancy (when several phonetic cues combine to the same effect); conflicting cues (which serve to convey conflicting prosodic effects by the same stretch of speech); and overdetermination (when one phonetic cue serves to conve y a variety of unrelated -- e.g., phonological, rhythmical and expressive -- effects). Iván Fónagy speaks of dual coding of phonetic cues; the same cues convey phonological and emotive information. This article proposes "triple coding": the same cues conv ey phonological, emotive and rhythmic information. The expanded version concerns two instances of stress maxima in weak positions in Gloucester's soliloquy, performed by an outstanding British actor. One of them is the least performable kind, and this is sofar my only chance for studying it. The expansion attempts to explore a methodological innovation too: The audio version of the Merriam-Webster Dictionary offers recordings of the entries by highly trained speakers, to which the artistic reading can be compared. It may serve as a standard from which the artistic recital deviates. But this suggested to me an additional, completely unexpected possibility as well. When Cleanth Brooks speaks of irony, he means "the kind of qualification which the various elements in a context receive from the context". I suddenly realised that this allowed me to explore the kind of qualification which certain intonation contours receive from the context. .

The Structure and Delivery Style of Milton's Verse: An Electronic Exercise in Vocal Performance

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