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Iambic Pentameter : On Tape?
At my other site, Diego found an old post of mine entitled, Iambic Pentameter - What Is It? He asked a good question. He's wondering if anybody has a good source on tape that teaches you what iambic pentameter sounds like. I figure somebody here might know. Anybody? I don't know of specific lessons, per se, but I have to assume that somebody out there has an audio sample of how iambic pentameter is supposed to be spoken.
5 comments:
If you can get your hand on any of the videos from John Barton's Playing Shakespeare series it had some of the most gifted Shakespeare speakers in the world delivering Iambic Pentameter as it should be done.
Most university libraries have these videos.
Geoff suggested the movie "Yes" by Sally Potter, which is written and performed entirely in iambic pentameter. His comment is mistakenly attached to a different post, located here: http://blog.shakespearegeek.com/2007/10/shakespeare-graffiti.html#comment-4682864019546462510
Perhaps this is too obvious to be mentioned, but a word of caution might be in order: Iambic pentameter isn't supposed to be an exact science and, as has often been remarked, the mature Shakespeare after the year 1600 or so more often than not twists and bends the formal structure of the verse to the extent that it's very hard to follow the conventional "de-dum, de-dum, de-dum, de-dum, de-dum" rhytm...
You can just do it your self by everyother syllable stressed...
Its pretty easy.
Well no, actually, it's not that easy (as Kristian mentions, above). If all you do is go through the lines with a dah DAH dah DAH dah DAH cadence you sort of lose the whole beauty of the thing.
Imagine doing Robert Frost that way. Whose WOODS are THESE I THINK I KNOW his HOUSE is IN the VILLage THOUGH... it's accurate, but it's not right.
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