The Sounds of Poetry Viewed as Music

""Fred Lerdahl gave the Schoff Lecture in 2018 and at long last has delivered a full book manuscript based on his lectures. The book focuses on only one of the three lectures: an in-depth study of the musical treatment of the sounds of poetry. It develops a musically conceived, rule-based theory of poetic rhythm, contour, and sound color. Lerdahl's strategy throughout the book is to present components of the theory before discussing related approaches in literary studies or linguistics. After a short initial chapter introducing basic features of musical rhythm, the second chapter presents a model of poetic rhythm. Chapter 3 relates the model to traditional poetic scansion, and chapter 4 discusses relevant research on prosodic rhythm in generative phonology. Chapter 5 advances a model of intonational contour for poetic lines and then considers related work in intonational phonology. Chapter 6 compares predictions of the theory to transcriptions of aural readings by poets and actors. Chapter 7 proffers a hierarchical model of syllabic sound color and reviews its connection to work in music theory. The final chapter briefly summarizes the architecture of the overall theory and suggests future avenues to explore.""-- Provided by publisher.

Fred Lerdahl is Fritz Reiner Professor Emeritus of Musical Composition at Columbia University. An acclaimed composer and music theorist, he has written numerous orchestral and chamber pieces, three of which have been finalists for the Pulitzer Prize in music. His books include A Generative Theory of Tonal Music, with linguist Ray Jackendoff (1983); Tonal Pitch Space (2001); and Composition and Cognition: Reflections on Contemporary Music and the Musical Mind (2020).