More than a century has elapsed since James Joyce’s wavering decision to publish his slender volume of love poems, whose title, Chamber Music, was a plain mark of his artistic interests: perhaps it is too soon forgotten that the Irish writer was endowed with excellent musical qualities and, being a trained tenor himself, he truly meant his poems to be sung and accompanied by music. There is no doubt that the success of his poetry—generally underestimated by literary critics—can be measured by the increasingly high number of composers who were attracted to the refined musical texture of his two collections of poems, Chamber Music and Pomes Penyeach. Unfortunately, however, little attention has been paid to the musical settings of the lyrics, as a consequence of the low esteem that many scholars still have towards Joyce’s poetry. Therefore, the aim of this paper is both to investigate a minor production in the Joyce canon and to reassess the value of the thirteen songs contained in The Joyce Book, whose ultimate goal was to promote a better knowledge of the poems themselves.

"A minor Joyce? Pomes Penyeach set to music"

PETILLO, MARIACRISTINA
2009-01-01

Abstract

More than a century has elapsed since James Joyce’s wavering decision to publish his slender volume of love poems, whose title, Chamber Music, was a plain mark of his artistic interests: perhaps it is too soon forgotten that the Irish writer was endowed with excellent musical qualities and, being a trained tenor himself, he truly meant his poems to be sung and accompanied by music. There is no doubt that the success of his poetry—generally underestimated by literary critics—can be measured by the increasingly high number of composers who were attracted to the refined musical texture of his two collections of poems, Chamber Music and Pomes Penyeach. Unfortunately, however, little attention has been paid to the musical settings of the lyrics, as a consequence of the low esteem that many scholars still have towards Joyce’s poetry. Therefore, the aim of this paper is both to investigate a minor production in the Joyce canon and to reassess the value of the thirteen songs contained in The Joyce Book, whose ultimate goal was to promote a better knowledge of the poems themselves.
2009
1-4438-1235-8
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11586/53355
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