636
Lifeless in appea rance, sluggish
dazed spring approach es -
PARTISAN REVIEW
The quality o f space beh eld reaches us through sound , as surely as it
does in Campion 's "There is a Garden in her Face," or any o ther
compl etely rea lized poem, I assume Ho ll ander wo uld agree tha t no
poetry- a t leas t in a book-can exist without both a visua l and an
aural dimension , and that any successful poem must in vo lve an
interpl ay between the two.
A mo re serious fl aw concern s the ghost of sphery mu ic haunting
Hollander. He seems to occupy himself excessively with efforts
to
lay
this ghost-belaboring poets and prosodi sts who have made mi slead–
ing poetry-music analogies, extensively demonstra tin g, as if it needed
demonstra tion , the in adequacy of musical settings
to
Donne's un-song–
like "son gs," recounting a t length the differences between Greek
meters, whi ch were music-based, and English, whi ch a re no t. We may
all suffer from a nostalgia for primal h armony which we recognize as a
fiction , but Ho ll ander's repeated digress ion s from poeti c to musical
matters practicall y entitl e thi s book to be call ed
Th e E lephan t and the
Music Problem.
Finall y, and unfortunately, bo th Ho ll ander's organiza tion and hi s
p rose leave much to be desired. This is a meandering, repetitive book,
in which mo st of the essays read like occasional pieces o r even worked–
up footno tes, and the writing style is as stuffy as an o verhea ted , over–
furni shed , close-windowed lamplit room. T he possession of vast
learning should no t exempt an author from the lucidity and grace
required o f other mortals. In thi s case, non -specia lists should brace
themsel ves . Nevertheless, the ideas in
Vision and R esonance
deserve a
wide audi ence for their so lid di scoveri es and fo r their provoca tive
suggestio ns, and for reminding us aga in , as a t the outset o f hi s first
vo lume, tha t " parti cul arl y in the case of poe try, the fun ctional rela–
tionship o f form to content continues to pose the mos t demanding
criti cal ques tio ns."
ALICIA OSTRIKER
