A Poem to memorize - suggestions, please

[Suzieq47]

Help, please!

I am starting my swimming regimen again, after several years' hiatus. The only problem with that is that it is extremely boring. Can't look at anything, can't read, can't listen to anything interesting. When I swam every morning (six years ago), I used the 30 minutes to recite lines in my head - usually "set pieces" - of plays I was in or had been in, Streetcar Named Desire, As You like It. Then I memorized the Hollow Crown speech from Richard II, and about half of Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. Now, I'm beginning again and need suggestions for a new poem or two to memorize, and then contemplate, while I swim.

I've been through a number of anthologies before I found this site. I know there's somebody out there who might have a good suggestion or two. Anybody? Anybody? Bueller? Bueller?

Suzie

[mir]

i'd go for Poe's The Raven. that's a cool thing to memorize, and it has a good rhythm so it should keep you paced.

[Suzieq47]

Thanks, MIr. That's a great idea, and something most people (many people? some people? oh, who cares!) already know a lot of. And rhythmic, too, so good for swimming several laps. I had thought of Little Orphant Annie, but I thought I would laugh even "hearing" myself reciting it in my mind . . . I'll start working on it today . . .
Suzie :nod:

[mono]

Hello, Suzieq47, welcome to the forum! ;) I must say - quite an impressive list of things you have memorized, especially work by T.S. Eliot.
I always enjoy memorizing poems with a music-like quality, such as 'Kubla Khan' by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, lots of poetry by Emily Dickinson, even 'Jabberwocky' by Lewis Carroll, or some of the sonnets by William Shakespeare, Petrarch, Edmund Spenser, Elizabeth Barrett-Browning, Percy Bysshe Shelley, or John Keats.
Good luck!

[Suzieq47]

Hi, Mono, and thanks for the welcome. That's quite a list you have there - prolific poets all I think. So suggest a fave, if you're so inclined. And, by the way, thanks, but that particular Eliot ain't that impressive. There used to be a bar in, I think, Boston, named "Prufrock's" where anybody who could recite the whole "Love Song" would get . . . . oh, I can't remember. Drinks on the house or something. It's almost a parlor trick. But, frankly, if you recite it to yourself it's quite moving. I ordered an audiobook for my Ipod recently that had Prufrock, among other poems, on it, and the reader trivialized the thing, I thought. But then, that's the peculiar thing about poetry, or at least about certain poems. Having someone else read them aloud strips them of much of their power. Poetry,almost by definition, should be "interpreted" only by the reader. Maybe that's one reason why "studying" poetry in school, especially highschool, is always so dismal. OOOh dear. I have gone so far afield of this thread! Sorry. :rolleyes:

[mono]

Hello, Suzieq. Never worry about writing too much! Especially when it comes to poetry, I will, no doubt, never hesitate in reading the whole message.
Hmmm, yes, I just noticed how much I wrote while recommend poets. To list a few specific poems worthy of memorizing, in my opinion: 'Kubla Khan' by Samuel Taylor Coleridge (especially with its rhythm), 'Jabberwocky' by Lewis Carroll (definitely a challenge; a friend and I would frequently have contests of who could recite it the quickest after memorization), Sonnet LXXV by William Shakespeare (my personal favorite), and 'Ozymandias' by Percy Bysshe Shelley.

[Suzieq47]

Thanks for narrowing the field! Good ideas, all. I'd considered Kubla Khan as I thumbed through anthologies at the Barnes & Noble this weekend. Jabberwocky, although great fun, just didn't seem to give me enough to think about after the feat of memorization. Shakespeare's Sonnets are too short for my particular needs here, i.e., I need at least 20 minutes to recite during my swim. I don't mean to sound sexist, but I was looking for something I could "make my own" and somehow a lament about Lenore, or Prufrock's world, or Ozymandius didn't quite get me there (although The Raven really is fun to read and say, and is the perfect length). I think that's why reciting a speech by Shakespeare's Rosalind or Williams' Blanche du Bois was so interesting; getting under the skin of those particular gals is quite a challenge, and can keep me going lap after lap after lap . . ..

Suzie

[Petrarch's Love]

I'm glad to know someone else does the reciting while swimming thing. I was beginning to think I was the only one who ever thought of doing that. I had an ambition to memorize all of Shakespeare's sonnets and used to go over them while taking my daily swim when I still lived full time in CA at a place with a pool. I only remember through about number twenty-five though. I've been thinking of renewing the effort next year during my walks to school (something to distract the mind from the Chicago temps ;)). You've gotten some really good suggestions here. How about the Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner? That's a long one that'll keep you busy (you'd have to memorize it in sections of course). I memorized that one my senior year of highschool and it was a fun one to spend some time with.

[Suzieq47]

Hey, Pet's L! Thanks for the suggestion; I'll check out Rhyme and see if it would work for me. I have just the first 2 stanzas of The Raven down pat, and as I recited them aloud this evening in the (empty) steam room, and in my head while swimming, I could tell that there are many ways to get into in that particular poem by that master of dread . . . it's going to be REALLY fun to "work on".

If you got into the Sonnets, you really might want to try the Hollow Crown speech from Richard II. Makes me cry, it really does. I've seen a couple of gorgeous productions of it at Stratford, but that particular speech crosses the centuries . . . Every time I commit a particular poem or piece to memory I realize how that is the best way to really understand what it's about, or at the very least, to appreciate the art of really fine writing . . . Works for particular sentences, too, as long as you remember their context. Think of the best "First Sentences" you know . . . (there's a thread in that, I'll bet; e.g., "Favorite first sentences" . . .)

Suzie

[Petrarch's Love]

have just the first 2 stanzas of The Raven down pat, and as I recited them aloud this evening in the (empty) steam room, and in my head while swimming, I could tell that there are many ways to get into in that particular poem by that master of dread . . . it's going to be REALLY fun to "work on".


Ah, that is a good one!


If you got into the Sonnets, you really might want to try the Hollow Crown speech from Richard II. Makes me cry, it really does. I've seen a couple of gorgeous productions of it at Stratford, but that particular speech crosses the centuries . . .

...It does indeed. That's one of those plays I've always looked forward to teaching almost expressly so that I can have the pleasure of reciting that speech before a hushed lecture hall. ;)


Works for particular sentences, too, as long as you remember their context. Think of the best "First Sentences" you know . . . (there's a thread in that, I'll bet; e.g., "Favorite first sentences" . . .)

Yup. Here (http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2611&page=1) it is. :)

[Suzieq47]

Thanks for the link! I had a ball noodling around in "First Sentences".

And as to that hushed audience . . . there's nothing like Shakespeare for getting that. "I live with bread like you. Taste want. Feel grief. Need friends. Subjected thus, how can you say to me, I am a king?" myohmyohmy.

A teacher, eh? I taught for a nanosecond. Nothing quite so fulfilling. Unfortunately, you can't make a living doing it. At least I couldn't. So I went back to school and walked out 3 years later into the most reviled profession in our culture.

And I got my first couple of pieces of parchment in the Chicago area, too. Evanston, to be precise. You, too?

Suzie

[Bysshe]

I'd recommend any of Shelley's shorter poems, simply because they're well-written, and fairly easy to memorise. It wouldn't take you long to memorise one, so you could memorise several.

For example, this one:


Music, when soft voices die,
Vibrates in the memory,
Odours, when sweet violets sicken,
Live within the sense they quicken.

Rose leaves, when the rose is dead,
Are heaped for the beloved's bed;
And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone,
Love itself shall slumber on.

along with a few others. It's quite relaxing, memorising Shelley and repeating it to yourself.

[Suzieq47]

Lovely. Thanks. Will keep Shelley on the list.

Suzie

[Petrarch's Love]

And as to that hushed audience . . . there's nothing like Shakespeare for getting that. "I live with bread like you. Taste want. Feel grief. Need friends. Subjected thus, how can you say to me, I am a king?" myohmyohmy.


Nothing like it. I have the great pleasure of specializing in Renaissance lit, meaning I'll get the chance to recite lots of Shakespeare to hushed lecture halls (though maybe they'll just be hushed because they all fell asleep during my lecture:lol:).


A teacher, eh? I taught for a nanosecond. Nothing quite so fulfilling. Unfortunately, you can't make a living doing it. At least I couldn't. So I went back to school and walked out 3 years later into the most reviled profession in our culture.

Dear me, may I ask what said reviled profession is? I'm hoping to be able to at least earn my daily bread teaching. I just hope it works out that way. :lol:

And I got my first couple of pieces of parchment in the Chicago area, too. Evanston, to be precise. You, too?

Northwestern then? I'm down south at the U of C., where I got the M.A. last year and am currently headed for the PhD. I got the B.A. at UC Santa Barbara though, so I'm really a lifetime Californian transplanted temporarily to the middle west.

[Suzieq47]

With a PhD (especially from the U of C) you'll be able to publish, and teach at the college level, so it won't matter that you won't be making much money. You'll be surrounded by colleagues who also aren't making truckloads of money. It's going to be a great life.

With a Master's, I could only teach in public secondary schools and it was pretty dreary.

So I got my Shakespeare studying done by doing Rosalind, Titania, Lady M, and Olivia on stage instead. And by going to Stratford every year. Hope you do that soon and often. Truly remarkable. Americans just don't seem to be able to do Shakespeare like the Brits and Canadians can . . . this year they're doing Duchess of Malfi, along with the usual Shakespearean plays.

How do you do the "quoting"? I'm new here and I haven't been able to figure that out.

Suzie

[Suzieq47]

Oh, and yes - I did go to Northwestern. And I'm a lawyer.

[Sabo]

How do you do the "quoting"? I'm new here and I haven't been able to figure that out.Suzie

Do you mean the button at the lower right corner of the message you want to quote?

A suggestion for poems: do you like early German Romanticism? (I do...) A lot of interesting stuff there.

[Suzieq47]

Hi, Sabo -
Yes, I don't know how people put a quote from someone's post into their responsive post . . .

And early German Romanticism? Like who, for example?

[Sabo]

You can either
1) press the button "Quote" at the lower right corner of the message you want to quote, and you will get the entire message quoted inside your new message; of course you can delete parts if you want

or 2) write [QUOTE=name_you_want_to_quote] in the start of the passage you want to cite and than you copy and paste in what you want to quote; at the end of the quote, you write [/QUOTE ] but without the space I made before ] (if I don't put space, the computer is going to make my text look like a quote).

Germans? I like Novalis (Friedrich von Hardenberg). Hölderlin/Hoelderlin is more of a Neoclassicist, but it's the same time period. Then there is a lot of short poetry by Goethe.

Another idea: Silver age of Russian poetry, end of XIX and start of XX century. Alexander Blok, Anna Akhmatova, esp. the last one. She wrote among other things Requiem, the beginning of which always gives me goose bumps. The poet is standing in a line to get into a KGB-prison (given implicit). A lady in front recognizes her, turns back and asks: "Can you describe this? / And I answered "I can." Such a powerful statement!

French? Baudelaire.

[Suzieq47]

Another idea: Silver age of Russian poetry, end of XIX and start of XX century. Alexander Blok, Anna Akhmatova, esp. the last one. She wrote among other things Requiem, the beginning of which always gives me goose bumps. The poet is standing in a line to get into a KGB-prison (given implicit). A lady in front recognizes her, turns back and asks: "Can you describe this? / And I answered "I can." Such a powerful statement!

Thanks Sabo. I've tried your second method of quoting, so it may not work. anyway, Great suggestions. I'm going to start reading some of the poetry you suggested this very evening. I'm headed to Moscow and St. Petersburg at the end of July (just for a week) so I'm going to start with the Russians.

Suzie

[mono]

Germans? I like Novalis (Friedrich von Hardenberg). Hölderlin/Hoelderlin is more of a Neoclassicist, but it's the same time period. Then there is a lot of short poetry by Goethe.
Though I feel biased in German Romanticism, as I have a huge affinity for Goethe, I would highly recommend any poetry by him - amazing! :nod:

French? Baudelaire.
If I may suggest more here, as Charles Baudelaire seems a great suggestion, I would like to add Paul Verlaine and Arthur Rimbaud as well. ;)

[Sabo]

Paul Verlaine and Arthur Rimbaud as well. ;)

. :thumbs_up Most definitely!

[Petrarch's Love]

So I got my Shakespeare studying done by doing Rosalind, Titania, Lady M, and Olivia on stage instead. And by going to Stratford every year. Hope you do that soon and often. Truly remarkable. Americans just don't seem to be able to do Shakespeare like the Brits and Canadians can . . . this year they're doing Duchess of Malfi, along with the usual Shakespearean plays.


Sounds fabulous. I've never seen Duchess performed, but I've always thought it would make a great one to put on stage. I only made it to Stratford once briefly for an afternoon, and didn't get the chance to catch a play while there. We have a prof. in our department who goes every year, and I'm always envious to hear about all the lovely performances he's been. Ah well...someday when the time and money isn't all dedicated to grad. school.


I'm headed to Moscow and St. Petersburg at the end of July (just for a week) so I'm going to start with the Russians.


How exciting, though it's a shame it's only a week. That's a part of the world I've never seen. Do you speak/understand some Russian?


Oh, and yes - I did go to Northwestern. And I'm a lawyer.
Not so reviled and terrifying as some things I could imagine. ;) Seriously though, it's a good profession, and you seem to at least get time off to travel to England an Russian and what not. ;)

By the way, you can also use the quote button which appears on the screen when you type your post. It's the little off-white thing that looks like a cartoon quote on the far right of the line up of buttons just above the text box (the same line with bold and italics etc.). If you select the text you want to quote and click on that button it will put the quote tags around the selected text for you (though it won't put in the name of the person being quoted--you have to do that yourself if you want it).

I was thinking just last night that Tennyson's "The Lady of Shalott" is a pretty easy one to memorize, though you're probably full up on suggestions for the nonce.

[Suzieq47]

I was thinking just last night that Tennyson's "The Lady of Shalott" is a pretty easy one to memorize, though you're probably full up on suggestions for the nonce.

Full up for the nonce, yes indeed! (Loved that. ;) ) But I'll keep the Tennyson suggestion for when I tire of frightening myself with The Raven . . .

And yes, I do speak a little Russian, and have brushed up on Cyrillic so that I can sound out street signs, menus, etc. I read a marvelous book some years ago by Janet Malcom called Reading Chekhov. Malcom visited many places in Russia where Chekhov wrote. Excellent criticism of Chekhov's writing, review ofhis life, and a picturesque travelogue to boot.