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Thursday, November 28, 2019

On reciting "Kubla Khan" from memory, a Twitter conversation

Adam Roberts was discussing his trials with the poems of Geoffrey Hill. He tweeted:

To which I replied:
Do you deliberately set out to memorize is do you just read them and, ZIP!, they're in the memory vault?
Adam:
Some I just read and reread until they stick in my head. Sometimes I do set out to memorise a poem deliberately.
Me:
I've been working on "Kubla Khan" off and on for years, but couldn't recite the whole thing, only 54 lines. Big chunks of it, yes, but not the whole. If I worked just a bit, I'd have it. But then in time it would fall apart (you know, surface of a pond, etc.).
Adam, who is a Coleridge expert:
KK is four poems bolted together; each verse paragraph is a separate thing. Hard to hold all three. I can recite the first and the last, but lose my way in the middle.
Me:
Interesting remark, Adam, very interesting.

I've seen it set in type as 2 stanzas (1-36, 37-54), 3 (1-11, 12-36, 37-54), and of course 4 (1-11, 12-30, 31-36, 37-54). I believe the Crewe ms. goes for two.

But, yes, each of the 4 is its own little universe.
Adam:
KK is four poems bolted together; each verse paragraph is a separate thing. Hard to hold all three. I can recite the first and the last, but lose my way in the middle.
Me:
Interesting remark, Adam, very interesting.

I've seen it set in type as 2 stanzas (1-36, 37-54), 3 (1-11, 12-36, 37-54), and of course 4 (1-11, 12-30, 31-36, 37-54). I believe the Crewe ms. goes for two.

But, yes, each of the 4 is its own little universe.
At that point I broke it off and went to take my morning shower. And then back to Twitter:
So, I was getting out of the shower and I tried a little experiment. I started with l. 37, "A damsel with..." and made it through to the end with no problem. Then I went to the beginning, got through l. 12, and failed at 13. That's the first stanza in the 4 stanza version.

So I skipped over to l. 31, "The shadow of ...", and made it through to 36. That's the third stanza. It's the 2nd stanza that's problematic, the one with the woman, demon lover, and the thrusting fountain.

So we fail at the same point, Adam. You know what they say, great minds fail alike, or is it flail alike?
Adam:
... or that part of the extraordinary genius of the opening & close of the poem inheres in its memorability, where the middle, with its sinuous subterranean river, is, appropriately enough, less so.

4 comments:

  1. I had to learn it 25 years ago spoke it once. Audition, panel of vocal experts in this case.

    Not had to think about it since then.

    In Xanadu....... gardens bright.

    A damsel.... she played.

    And all should cry..... Paradise.

    Are the memorable parts. I can't remember the rest, but I can remember how to do these sections.

    They are all places where you simply hold the image in mind and let that do the heavy lifting. All places where its projected directly and immediately to the audience.

    The major 'all who hears shall see them moments' to my mind.

    Hard part I found was not remembering the words but working out the level of absorption at the end, which starts with sight on 'a damsel with a dulcimer' and then full absorption in the sound as the last verse unfolds.

    Crack in the dome and absorption before the end where you are fully in the moment and at the center of the storm.

    Or that was my childish sense of learning to speak it years ago. I seized on the easy to deal with dramatic moments where you engage fully with the audience.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ah, was it routine audition piece?

      Some well known actors have recorded that poem.

      Delete
  2. No. You do a poetry recital at the end of vocal training.

    Looking at it again, the verse sort of reflects that learning processes.

    The deception used, that the poem is incomplete, uncertain and the speaker is distractedly moving in and out of absorption and can't let go of the conscious part of mind and its idle chatter.

    Its appealing and curious to perform as its the processes and issues of learning (& the disunity between mental states) that tie the verse together and make it whole; I think, as you are forced to balance them and move without stumbling from one moment to the next.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Interesting. Yes, the disunity between mental states, central to the poem. It's something of a map or tour of mental states.

    ReplyDelete