Word Like a Bell: John Keats, Music and the Romantic PoetMusic was supremely important to the Romantic poets, particularly to John Keats. In this first book-length study on the subject, John A. Minahan explores Keats's work in relation to the art of music. Word Like a Bell considers Keats's major poems as well as his letters and minor verse. Writing in a jargon-free style, Minahan examines the relationship between the musical and literary manifestations of Romantic theory, and the connection between that theory and Keats's work. He then offers new insights into Keats's poetry and his era, among them a detailed explanation of why the "Great Odes" ought to be considered a single extended piece. Also receiving extensive treatment are Wordsworth, Coleridge, Shelley, Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven, whose ideas and creations illustrate how music influences every aspect of Romantic thought. In his exploration of the relationship between different but related arts, Minahan both locates Romanticism in its historical and aesthetic context and expands the capabilities of literary criticism. He finds that music enables Romanticism to voice its fundamental concern about time and its passage, and shows us that an understanding of poetry's relation to music can enrich our appreciation of both arts while deepening our own experiences of time. This interdisciplinary study will appeal to readers of poetry and literary criticism and to professional musicians who would increase their understanding of an age's art, songwriters interested in word/music relations, and poets who crave an extensive discussion of poetic technique and craft that uses music as a way to clarify such points. |
From inside the book
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Page 53
... lead there , but of his own ability as a poet to find it , not just in music , but at all . The sestet lacks music ; it also lacks a program . Failing to address exactly how the new world will be born , the ending of this sonnet seems ...
... lead there , but of his own ability as a poet to find it , not just in music , but at all . The sestet lacks music ; it also lacks a program . Failing to address exactly how the new world will be born , the ending of this sonnet seems ...
Page 66
... lead us on . The drive toward the affective leads us from fullness through emptiness to a new kind of fullness . Present becomes absent and absence becomes presence . The Romantic landscape is the landscape of a moment , empty save for ...
... lead us on . The drive toward the affective leads us from fullness through emptiness to a new kind of fullness . Present becomes absent and absence becomes presence . The Romantic landscape is the landscape of a moment , empty save for ...
Page 119
... lead both away from and back to ordinary time , so language - as - sound ought to lead away from and back to ordinary language . Prosody doesn't turn language into music ; it allows verbal language to re - collect itself in mu- sical ...
... lead both away from and back to ordinary time , so language - as - sound ought to lead away from and back to ordinary language . Prosody doesn't turn language into music ; it allows verbal language to re - collect itself in mu- sical ...
Contents
The Varieties of Musical Experience | 29 |
Words Music and Interpretation | 59 |
The Romantic Uses of Sound | 98 |
Copyright | |
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Common terms and phrases
achieve allows argued artist attention awareness Bate beauty becomes Beethoven begins called combination comes composed consciousness creates critical described difference dream early effect emotion empty enacts experience fact feel finally follow forward gives hear Heath ideas imagination important interpretation John Keats Keats's kind language lead less live loss lyric materials meaning melos memory mind move nature never notes odes once opposition ordinary organized particular passing past pattern perhaps poem poem's poet poet's poetic poetry possible present provides question re-collection reference region relation remains rhetorical rhyme rhythm Romantic Romantic poets says seeks seems sense shape Shelley song sonnet sound Special stanza structure suggests temporal theme thing thought tonal tone truth understand unfolding usual verbal verse voice wanted Wordsworth writing written