Memorable Writing

[mindsweeper]

Can anyone explain to me why some writing and/or poetry is more easily memorised than others? I am thinking particularly of Shakespeare and the A.V. as being more easily memorised than, say, modern poetry and modern translations of the Bible.

For instance, I know by heart the following passage - I didn't set out to learn it, I just absorbed it.

"Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.

I Corinthians ch 13 - A.V.

The same verses in the N.I.V. read thus:

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.

This version, I cannot, or have not, memorised, even though I frequently use this translation as an aid to understanding. Is it just me? Or is there something deeper at work that aids memorising? And if so, what is it?

Ruth

P.S.

Other beginning or middle lines that have stuck in my mind without any intent to memorise:

I must go down to the sea again, to the lonely sea and the sky

The quality of mercy is not strained, it droppeth ... (and a hundred and one other Shakespearean lines)

Gentians, big and dark, only dark, darkening the daytime, torchlike in the smoking blueness of Pluto's gloom (okay, modern poetry..but it has stuck)

In Kubla Khan did Xanadu a stately pleasure dome decree (have I got that right - this is memory so I don't want to cheat by checking up)

a glass of wine and thou beside me in the willderness and wilderness is paradise enow

And so on and so on...why do thse lines, and others, stick yet plenty more do not?

[sarahkelley]

Ruth,

Interesting question.

My first two thoughts concerned resonance and familiarity.

How many times have I read something? I'm not sure how many it takes when I'm not trying to learn it. But eventually I learn it.
Do I also discuss it with others and say the lines aloud when I do so? That commits them to memory quickly.

How much does it mean to me? Did I mark the passage? Reread it out loud? Did it crystallize an emotion? If something strikes me as important and beautiful or funny I'm more likely to remember it.

So I'd think that in some cases it's not a property of the passage that makes it memorable so much as a propertyof the person. Some cases.

Sarah

[Dunc]

As you already know, and as bards, skalds, shenachies and other professional rememberers in oral cultures have always known, if you say it in regular metre then you can commit even works the length of the Iliad and Odyssey to memory. In this context, note the strong prose rhythms of the KJV too.

As to what else may be involved, clarity, strength of expression and personal identification with what is said, are all a help.

And consider a more general example than our various personal preferences. Of Edward FitzGerald's Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, Dick Davis noted -

"In the 1953 edition of The Oxford Book of Quotations there are 188 excerpts from [it] (of which 59 are complete quatrains) - this is virtually two-thirds of the total work ... it is a clear indication of the poem's extraordinary popularity.

"Why should this be so? ...

"The work's surface exoticism certainly has something to do with it ...
as has its brevity
and the condensed pithiness of the individual quatrains.
Despite Keats' recommendation, it is far easier and quicker to take FitzGerald's Khayyam on board than Chapman's Homer ...
the remarkable congruence ... between the character of the translator and that of the poet he is translating ...
It bestrides the two worlds - and such diverse worlds - that it gives the illusion of being universal ...
And this feeling of universality is increased immeasurably by the snap and finality, the curt implication of 'argue with that if you can', of the epigrammatic form in which it is written."

[I divided the last par up to separate the various points he makes.] Regards / Dunc

[mindsweeper]

And this feeling of universality is increased immeasurably by the snap and finality, the curt implication of 'argue with that if you can', of the epigrammatic form in which it is written."

This is quite interesting and goes some way to explaining why the Rubaiyat is one of the easiest (though by no means the shortest) poems to memorise that I have ever encountered.

note the strong prose rhythms of the KJV too.

Is this the major difference between the AV (or KJV) and modern translations? (apart from the updated language, that is). And would it have been possible for the translators to repeat the strong prose rhythms in the modern translations or do they belong to the archaic language?

Ruth

[Dunc]

The KJV does it better. Opening the KJV at a random page and choosing a clear example, I get -

Neh 3:13

KJV
The valley gate repaired Hanun, and the inhabitants of Zanoah; they built it and set up the doors thereof, and the bars thereof, and a thousand cubits on the wall unto the dung gate.

RSV
Hanun and the inhabitants of Zanoah repaired the Valley Gate; they rebuilt it and set its doors, its bolts and its bars, and repaired a thousand cubits of the wall, as far as the Dung Gate.

Living Bible
The people from Zanoah, led by Hanun, built the Valley Gate, hung the doors, and installed the bolts and bars; then they repaired the 1,500 feet of wall to the Dung Gate.

The KJV gets its rhythms by a series of inversions and repetitions, while the others are much more concerned to express the ideas clearly rather than sonorously. Regards / Dunc

[Harry R]

The KJV is based largely on the translation by William Tyndale.

Tyndale, as part of his protestantism, wanted a Bible which could be accessible to anyone - he said somewhere he wanted it to for polughboys as well as priests, or something to that effect. So, unlike previous translations, which tended to lean heavily on Latinate vocabulary to stay close to the text (most were translated from the Vulgate, though Tyndale went back to the Greek and Hebrew), he favoured simple, commmon vocabulary. He also wanted the text to work well from the pulpit, so the rhythms of the prose are written for maximum effectiveness when spoken aloud.

His Bible is undoubtedly the single greatest work of translation in the English language, and one of greatest pieces of literature of any kind in the language as well.

He was burnt at the stake shortly before Henry VIII came over all protestant all of a sudden and commissioned the KJV. The committee who wrote the KJV mainly relied on his translation (for those bits he had time to write before he was burnt), and where they tweaked it, they usually made it worse.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/034911532X/qid=1075724839/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_11_1/026-4222235-6922047

Harry

[Dunc]

(Er, it was KJ who drummed up the KJV.)

[Harry R]

Originally posted by Dunc McReil
(Er, it was KJ who drummed up the KJV.)

Yup, just having a stupid moment there.

[River Not]

Originally posted by mindsweeper
Can anyone explain to me why some writing and/or poetry is more easily memorised than others?


I was going to respond with what I thought was a decent response, but then I found out that, unsurprisingly, it was an answer Dunc had already supplied. sarahkelley also stated something similar to what I was going to say.



My first two thoughts concerned resonance and familiarity. - Sarah

As to what else may be involved, clarity, strength of expression and personal identification with what is said, are all a help. - Dunc



However, the additionally unsurprising surprise that I found in Dunc's response was his reference to a poem that has been fascinating me the last several days, and, just yesterday I had found a decent page concerning said poem. I hope the posting of this link is acceptable:

http://www.kellscraft.com/rubaiyatedition1.html


The neat thing is that I didn't peek in on this discussion until today, but I've been brooding over the aforementioned poem for a week and a half or so.

I know, it's only coincidence. But, like my dear friend C. Millstead once told me, "synchronicity is always a good sign."

just thought I'd share that.