James Fenton Quotes & Sayings (Page 5)

“I prefer writing in the mornings, so to that extent I have a routine. I do reading and other things in the afternoon.”

“In rap, as in most popular lyrics, a very low standard is set for rhyme; but this was not always the case with popular music.”

“Nobody really knows whether they are a poet. I knew I was interested from the age of 15.”

“Poetry carries its history within it, and it is oral in origin. Its transmission was oral.”

“A cabaret song has got to be written - for the middle voice, ideally - because you've got to hear the wit of the words. And a cabaret song gives the singer room to act, more even than an opera singer.”

“A really interesting and happy time was when I first went to Florence as a student and studied Italian. I was living in a pensione on an allowance of £40 a month, which was princely. I did a lot of work and enjoyed myself immensely.”

“At four lines, with the quatrain, we reach the basic stanza form familiar from a whole range of English poetic practice. This is the length of the ballad stanza, the verse of a hymn, and innumerable other kinds of verse.”

“In my opinion, it is easier to avoid iambic rhythms, when writing in syllabics, if you create a line or pattern of lines using odd numbers of syllables.”

“In song the same rule applies as in dramatic verse: the meaning must yield itself, or yield itself sufficiently to arouse the attention and interest, in real time.”

“Rhyme is a mnemonic device, an aid to the memory. And some poems are themselves mnemonics, that is to say, the whole purpose of the poem is to enable us to remember some information.”