Sound Logic: Verse Form, Musical Paradox, and The Phoenix and the Turtle

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper traces the historical and cultural associations of the heptasyllabic verse form of The Phoenix and the Turtle to contextualize its use in the poem and how that might shape the interpretation of the musical and theological allusions in the text. Finding connections to both Catholic and Reform musical worship, it demonstrates that the versification of the poem enacts the paradoxes at work throughout the text, which are read here as a confluence across confessions rather than a contradiction between them. The paper also considers the use of heptasyllables by Ben Jonson in the same collection to see how the same form is manipulated to very different acoustic effect in three poems, each suited to and materializing the concerns of their respective texts. In so doing, it resists the allegorical interpretation of a given verse form, instead focusing on its polysemic potential.