An English Eccentric: Edith Sitwell and Her Experiments with Sound in Façade

Year 2018, Volume: 35 Issue: 2, 122 - 129, 30.12.2018

Fahriye Selvi Danacı

https://doi.org/10.32600/huefd.432270

Abstract

Throughout Edith Sitwell’s poetic career, one specific factor was always in the foreground in her works, that is, the experimental use of sound. Especially in her earlier period, employing rhythm as an experimental arrangement of sounds dominated the bulk of her poems. Sitwell prioritised this technical element over thematic components, and thus developed an inventive approach to the art of poetry in the early twentieth century. Her famous poetry collection, Façade (1922) can be considered one of the most distinguished examples of her experimental manner, consisting of several abstract poems which were compiled for dramatic performance and for William Walton’s music. With Walton’s contributions, Sitwell combined the elements of music and poetry in Façade, and she formed a new artistic domain where she could express and improve her poetic style by working on the use of sound and rhythm. The reason for her emphasis on the role of rhythm in poetry was not only its significance as a technical attribute but also its functioning as a representative of the century’s spirit. For Sitwell, the rhythm of the twentieth century must not be the rhythm of the eighteenth or the nineteenth centuries, on the contrary, it should reflect the soul of its era. Accordingly, Sitwell advocated that poetry should be compatible with the tone of the period in which it is produced. Therefore, the poems in the collection were designed to be as unsteady, tumultuous, and complex as the era they belonged to, and this composition was achieved through her experimental style. In this respect, the primary aim of this article is to discuss Sitwell’s technical and stylistic experiments with sound in her Façade poems and examine her perception of artistic creation in the twentieth century.

Keywords

Sound, Edith Sitwell, William Walton, Façade (1922)

İngiliz Bir Eksantrik: Edith Sitwell ve Façade Şiirlerinde Sesle Yaptığı Deneyler

Abstract

Edith Sitwell’in şiir kariyeri boyunca belirli bir unsur eserlerinde daima ön planda olmuştur. Bu unsur sesin deneysel kullanımıdır. Özellikle Sitwell’in erken döneminde ritmin seslerin deneysel düzenlenmesi olarak kullanılması şiirlerinin büyük bir kısmına hâkim olmuştur. Sitwell bu teknik unsuru tematik içeriklerden üstün tutmuştur. Böylelikle yirminci yüzyıl başında şiir sanatına yaratıcı bir yaklaşım geliştirmiştir. Sahne performansı ve William Walton’ın müziği için derlenen çeşitli soyut şiirlerden oluşan ünlü şiir derlemesi Façade (1922) Sitwell’in deneysel tarzının en göze çarpan örneklerinden biri olarak değerlendirilebilir. Walton’ın katkılarıyla Sitwell Façade’da müzik ve şiir unsurlarını bir araya getirmiş ve ses ve ritim kullanımı üzerinde çalışarak şiirsel stilini ifade edip geliştirebileceği yeni bir sanatsal alan oluşturmuştur. Şiirde ritmin rolüne olan vurgusunun sebebi yalnızca teknik bir özellik olarak önemi değil, aynı zamanda yüzyılın ruhunun bir temsili olarak işlev görmesiydi. Sitwell’e göre yirminci yüzyılın ritmi on sekizinci ya da on dokuzuncu yüzyılların riti olmamalı; aksine, ritim döneminin ruhunu yansıtmalıdır. Bu doğrultuda Sitwell şiirin üretildiği zamanın atmosferiyle uyumlu olması gerektiğini savunmuştur. Dolayısıyla derlemedeki şiirler ait oldukları dönem kadar istikrarsız, değişken ve karmaşık olarak tasarlanmıştır. Bu oluşum da Sitwell’in deneysel tarzıyla sağlanmıştır. Bu bakımdan, bu makalenin başlıca amacı Sitwell’in Façade şiirlerinde sesle olan teknik ve biçimsel deneylerini ele almak ve yirminci yüzyıldaki sanatsal yaratıcılık anlayışını incelemektir.

Keywords

Edith Sitwell, William Walton, Ses, Façade (1922)

References

• Albright, D. (2007). Modernist Poetic Form. N. Corcoran (Ed.), in The Cambridge Companion to Twentieth-Century English Poetry (pp. 24-41). Cambridge: Cambridge UP.
• Baldick, C. (Ed.). (2004). The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms (4th ed.). Oxford: Oxford UP.
• Bryant, M. (2007). Sitwell Beyond the Semiotic: Gender, Race, and Empire in ‘Façade’. Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature, 26, 2, 243-267. 20 Feb. 2017, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20455328
• Cole, Z. (1967). Edith Sitwell: A Critical Survey of Selected Poems 1913-1954, in the Light of Her Spiritual Conversion. MA Thesis. The University of Ottawa, Ottawa.
• Dowson, J. (1998). Modern Women’s Poetry 1910-1929. Diss. University of Leicester, Leicester.
• Harris, E. (2015). Modernist Experimentation and Avant-Garde Poetics as a Means of Re-enchantment with Nature in the Poetry of Edith Sitwell. ASLE-UKI Conference. 22 Feb. 2017, http://www.academia.edu/15502971
• Kennedy M. and Kennedy J. B. (2013). The Oxford Dictionary of Music. T. Rutherford-Johnson (Ed.) Oxford: Oxford UP.
• Lasansky, E. L. (1991). William Walton’s ‘Façade: An Entertainment’. Diss. The University of Arizona, Tucson.
• Lehmann, J. (1965). Introduction. Lehmann, J. (Ed.) in Selected Poems. London: McMillan.
• Ower, J. B. (1972). Alienation and Atonement in the Poetry of Edith Sitwell. Diss. The University of Alberta, Edmonton.
• Perloff M. and Dworkin C. (2009). Introduction: The Sound of Poetry/ The Poetry of Sound. Perloff M. and Dworkin C. (Eds.) in The Sound of Poetry/ The Poetry of Sound (pp. 1-18). Chicago and London: The U of Chicago P.
• Phillips, G. (1996). ‘The Rhythm of the Visible World’: Music, Text and Performance in Selected Writings of Edith Sitwell, Gertrude Stein and Virginia Woolf. Diss. The University of Western Ontario, Oshawa.
• Samberger, S. (2005). Artistic Outlaws: The Modernist Poetics of Edith Sitwell, Amy Lowell, Gertrude Stein and H.D. Münster: LIT.
• Sitwell, E. (1957). The Collected Poems. London: McMillan.
• ---. (2011). Taken Care Of: An Autobiography. London: A & C Black.
• Sitwell, O. (1949). Laughter in the Next Room: An Autobiography. London: McMillan.
• Slate-Liggett, P. G. (1992). The Sibylline Vision of Edith Sitwell: Priestess-Poet of Modernism. Diss. The University of Tulsa, Tulsa.
• Tramontana, C. J. (2000). The Courage of Their Peculiarities: Eccentricity and the Modernist Poetics of Marianne Moore, Edith Sitwell, and E.E. Cummings. Diss. The State University of New Jersey, New Jersey.
• Van Der Moere, T. L. (2000). Brother and Sister Poets: Representation of Female Subject in the Poetry of Dorothy and William Wordsworth, Christina and Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Charlotte and Branwell Brontë, and Edith and Osbert Sitwell. Diss. The University of Tulsa, Tulsa.