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e. In horror and despair, the low, concrete tones are uttered with the least possible suggestion of variety (see § 94: 3, 4).

The last three (c, d, and e) are given with the monotone.

93. The Monotone is caused by a repetition, more frequent than in other cases, partly of the same key at the beginning of emphatic or unemphatic concrete slides and partly of the same sort of a median stress (§ 102) on all syllables whose quantity can be prolonged.

These kinds of repetitions suggest monotony. But the voice really moves up and down the scale sufficiently to answer all the requirements of variety. Moreover, the median stress (§ 102) that may make prominent either the beginning, middle or end of a concrete tone, may cause this tone to appear to differ in pitch from another that begins on the same key, or to agree in pitch with another that begins on a different key. These facts combine to allow of sufficient modulation to rescue the monotone from real monotony (see, also, § 80).

94. The Monotone is used in almost all cases in which, as already described, the general pitch is low, tending to very low, and the special pitch unvaried; i. e. to express that which oppresses the mind with a sense of weight, grandeur, power, majesty, splendor or sublimity, inspiring reverence, solemnity, awe, amazement, terror or horror.

a. In such cases, whenever we speak naturally, the presence of something to subdue the free exuberance of feeling prevents variety of tone. At the same time, as this presence is conceived of as external, rather than internal,—caused by grandeur without, rather than by weakness within,--it does not always, though it may sometimes, necessitate the wailing or plaintive effects of semitonic melody.

Read 92: c, d; also the following, with a monotone, in slow time, low pitch, smooth, sustained, effusive or expulsive force (§§ 106-120), orotund quality (§ 134), long quantity and predominating median stress (§ 102).

1. Be mèrciful unto me, O Gòd, be mèrciful unto me: for my soul trùsteth in thee: yéa, in the shadow of thỳ wings will I make my rèfuge.

Partially semitonic.

2. And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out

of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bond-man, and every free-man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains; and said to the mountains and rocks, "Fall on us and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: for the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?" (See § 220.)

Idem, but at medium pitch.

3. I had a dream, which was not all a dream.

The bright sun was extinguished, and the stars
Did wander, darkling, in the eternal space,
Rayless and pathless, and the icy earth

Swung blind and blackening in the moonless air;
Morn came, and went, and came, and brought no day,
And men forgot their passions, in the dread

Of this their desolation; and all hearts
Were chill'd into a selfish prayer for light.

Idem, but at very low pitch, with aspirated pectoral quality (§ 129) and tremulous and thorough, as well as median, stress (§§ 105, 104, 102):

4. Methought I heard a voice cry, "Sleep no mòre.
Macbeth doth murder sleep-the innocent sleep:
Sléep that knits up the ravelled sleeve of càre,
The death of each day's life, sore lâbour's bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great Nature's second course,
Chief nourisher in Life's feast."

Still it cried, "Sleep no more!" to all the house.

§§ 219, 220, 226, contain examples of monotone at medium pitch. also the passages mentioned in § 80.

Consult

95. Poetry, especially rhyme, should be read with a monotone. In reading it thus avoid sliding the voice up perceptibly on an unemphatie rhyming syllable. Give this no more than the slide appropriate for an unemphatic concrete tone. Be careful, too, to slide the voice downward at least two tones, and so to give a full cadence whenever the sense of a clause is completed; e. g.

Middle pitch, orotund quality, long quantity, predominating median stress, sustained effusive and expulsive force:

I know that age to age succeeds,

Blowing a noise of tongues and deeds,
A dust of systems and of crèeds.

I cannot hide that some have striven,
Achieving calm, to whom was given
The joy that mixes man with heaven:

Who, rowing hard against the stream,
Saw distant gates of Eden gleam,
And did not dream it was a dream.

Where the lamps quiver
So far in the river,

With many a light

From window and casement,
From garret to básement,
She stood, with amazement,
Houseless by night.

Forty flags with their silver stars,
Forty flags with their crimson bars,

Flapped in the morning wind: the sun
Of noon looked down, and saw not one.
Up rose old Barbara Frietchie then,
Bowed with her fourscore years and tên;

Bravest of all in Fréderick town,
She took up the flag the men hauled down;

In her attic window the staff she set,
To show that one heart was loyal yet.

Semitonic.

Flash'd all their sabres bare,
Flashed as they turned in air,
Sabring the gunners there,

Charging an army, while

All the world wonder'd:

Plunged in the battery-smoke,
Right through the line they broke;

Cossack and Russian

Reel'd from the sabre-stroke.

O the famine and the fèver!
O the wasting of the famine!
O the blasting of the fèver!

All the earth was sick and famished;
Hungry was the air around them,
Hùngry was the skỳ above them,

And the hungry stars in heaven

Like the eyes of wolves glared at them!

Read also, on the different keys and with the different quality marked for each, §§ 222–225.

KEY.

96. Light, gay, lively or uncontrolled states of mind find expression in a key comparatively high; serious, grave, dignified or self-determined states in a key comparatively low. (§§ 32, 140-145.)

For illustrations of this principle see §§ 143, 144, 145–153. Practice the exercises in § 13.

Special attention needs to be given to the difficult matter of transitions in pitch, treated in §§ 147-151, which see.

97. A common fault is to invariably fly to high pitch, as well as to rapid time, when passing to a very emphatic or forcible word, even when this expresses an idea relatively more serious, grave, dignified or self-determined.

a. The downward inflections in words like those in italics in the following examples should be started slightly, if at all, higher (and sometimes lower) than the general pitch; and in all cases the voice should pause before or after them, and utter them slowly. The longer the pause, the higher and louder will it be proper to utter the word following it.

I saw

The corse, the mangled corse, | and then I cried

For vengeance! | Rouse, ye Romans! | Rouse, ye slàves! | Have ye brave sons?

To see them die. ||

Look in the next fierce brawl

I'm with you once again!-I call to you

With all my voice- | I hold my hands to you,
To show they still are free. I rush to you
As though I could | embrace you!

FORCE.

SPECIAL FORCE.

98. Special Force, by which is meant the force that is used with special syllables or words, may be abrupt or smooth, loud or soft. The kinds and degrees of force are considered in §§ 106–108. As a rule,

a. Special Force should be used in the utterance of all words that are emphasized by pauses or inflections, or that stand at the end of a sentence. (§§ 32, 35, 43, 140–145.)

b. Be particularly careful to give Special Force to Adjectives emphasized by the pause that are essential to the sense of the nouns that they qualify; e. g.

Its foundations, great | truths, far more lasting than mere granite; its pillars, great | rights, far more beautiful than mere | porphyry; its roof, great | hopes, swelling higher than any dome of bronze and gold.

c. It is well to form a habit of giving more force to the last word of a sentence, because (a) otherwise one is apt to let his force subside on it, and utter it indistinctly; (b) this last word is usually important to the sense; its forcible utterance (c) conveys a suggestion of reserved power, by causing the audience to recognize that the speaker's breath is not exhausted, and (d) is almost essential if one is to start the last inflection of the sentence on a key suggesting that another sentence is to follow (§ 75).

STRESS.

99. Stress is determined by the way in which force is applied to emphatic syllables.

Practice the different kinds of stress, according to the directions in § 15.

a. Do not confound the method of stress with the degree of it. All kinds of stress may be given with a soft, as well as a loud, tone.

b. To use more force with an utterance necessitates using more time with it; therefore, words emphasized by stress usually take longer time for their utterance than the words surrounding them take.

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