Saturday, November 15, 2008

Totally Optional Prompt: Sound

Poetry has wandered far from its roots as an oral art. Time was when most people encountered poetry exclusively as a sung or spoken thing; mass-market printing and widespread literacy, which we now take for granted, are recent inventions. They've also meant that most poems now will be read by far more people than they are heard.

Technology has begun to reverse the pendulum oh so slightly. It's now possible to record poems and songs cheaply and easily and make them available in a wide variety of formats.

I'm working on developing audio capacity on my blog, and may eventually put together a collection of poetry recordings. In the meantime, I'd like TOPers to post sound links for this week's
Totally Optional
prompt.

If you don't have some kind of sound enabled on your blog (or your MySpace or SoundClick or whatever page), then share your thoughts about poetry as an oral medium. Tell us about readings you've given or readings you've been to. Or link to recordings of other people reading poetry: there's plenty of good stuff out there.

Enjoy!

PS: Gautami, if you didn't see my response to your question last week: TOP has been on its current schedule for over a year, and I'm reluctant to change it and make everyone go through the adjustment. Unless (a) there's a good reason and (b) no-one objects. You didn't mention what your reason was, and I'll leave it up to other TOPers to let me know if there's an objection.

3 comments:

Rob Kistner said...

Here is a link to a section of my blog which features a variety of my poetry, which I read and recorded, many including soundtracks.

This 'spoken word' section in called Visceral Voice.

said...

This poem is not recorded, but it is all about sound. It should be spoken aloud.

At Feast End

Anonymous said...

R Is for . . . Relaxing from Rigors, on THE MANE POINT