The Poetics of American Song Lyrics

by Charlotte Pence (Editor)

The Poetics of American Song Lyrics is the first collection of academic essays that regards songs as literature and that identifies intersections between the literary histories of poems and songs. The essays by well-known poets and scholars including Pulitzer Prize winner Claudia Emerson, Peter Guralnick, Adam Bradley, David Kirby, Kevin Young, and many others, locate points of synthesis and separation so as to better understand both genres and their crafts. The essayists share a desire to write on lyrics in a way that moves beyond sociological, historical, and autobiographical approaches and explicates songs in relation to poetics. Unique to this volume, the essays focus not on a single genre but on folk, rap, hip hop, country, rock, indie, soul, and blues.

The first section of the book provides a variety of perspectives on the poetic history and techniques within songs and poems, and the second section focuses on a few prominent American songwriters such as Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, and Michael Stipe. Through conversational yet in-depth analyses of songs, the essays discuss sonnet forms, dramatic monologues, Modernism, ballads, blues poems, confessionalism, Language poetry, Keatsian odes, unreliable narrators, personas, poetic sequences, rhythm, rhyme, transcription methods, the writing process, and more. While the strategies of explication differ from essay to essay, the nexus of each piece is an unveiling of the poetic history and poetic techniques within songs.

Genres: Poetry, Music

312 pages, Paperback

First published November 21, 2011

About the author

Charlotte Pence is the author of Many Small Fires (Black Lawrence Press, 2015), The Branches, the Axe, the Missing (winner of the BLP Black River chapbook prize), and Weaves a Clear Night (winner of Flying Trout chapbook prize). A professor of English at Eastern Illinois University, Pence also edited The Poetics of Song Lyrics (University Press of Mississippi, 2012), which explores the intersections between poetry and songs.

Reviews

[Patrice Thomas]

I am glad to have participated in this book with so many insightful writers. Charlotte has provided a public service as editor by bringing us together for this informative and thoughtful volume... and she is a fine poet as well.

[Beth · Rating 5 out of 5]

In academia there has been a certain amount of disagreement about whether song lyrics should be considered poetry. Recently the awarding of the Nobel prize for literature to songwriter/performer, Bob Dylan, has brought it up again. In the first part of this book, this is discussed - particularly relating the "blues," "rap," and "country" music. the second part of the book deals with particular songwriters and/or specific songs.

This is a fascinating book, but only for persons who are interested in poetry/lyrics discussion.

[Alison Law · Rating 5 out of 5]

Studying The Poetics of American Song Lyrics: An Interview with Charlotte Pence | Southern Spines: http://bit.ly/183ePEF

[Jon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pence has taken on a major task, in editing this collection, and done it well. Still, it is intimidating to think of tackling a subject so vast, and comprised of so much material. The essays ran widely in style and content, and cover a huge amount of territory in the American musical canon. African-American music, punk, rap, Country-Western, all get in-depth treatment, and Rock gets allot of billing. And there are gaps as well. But how could there not be. This is not light reading, but scholarly work for both students of the musical world and practitioners, and I found it insightful and enjoyable.

[Swell Versed · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought this book as I was interested in the intersections of poetry and song, and this book provides some distinctive essays on this subject. My favorite sections are the ones focused on genres rather than specific artists/works, e.g. Pat Pattison's critical analysis of poetry vs. song and Adam Bradley's comparison of rap vs. song (which is also included in his "Book of Rhymes").