App-lying herself: memorizing poems with an iPhone

Over at the New Yorker's Book Bench blog, Eileen Reynolds ponders one of the iPhone's poetry apps. Once she heard about "VerseByHeart" —primarily a Bible memorization tool—she knew she had to try it. Ezra Pound's "The Garrett" was her poem of choice.

In the first drill, the poem is displayed with words missing, and you read it aloud to yourself, filling in the blanks. If you get tripped up, you can tap a blank space to momentarily reveal the missing word. Next, you’re given a line or two of text with the words scrambled, and you have to put them in the correct order. (This was particularly helpful for sorting out a line I found tricky: “Nor has life in it aught better.”) Finally, when you feel that you know the poem quite well, the third drill asks you to enter the first letter of each word in the poem. If you make a mistake at any point, the phone trembles angrily.

The app, like poetry itself, is imperfect.

The app’s one serious disadvantage is that it removes line breaks, so the poem becomes somewhat shapeless. (I wonder if this is because the app is billed as a tool for memorizing Bible verses—presumably for devotional purposes—rather than poems for literary reasons.) Overall, though, I was delighted to find that I had memorized “The Garrett” in under an hour. Several days later, I can still recite it perfectly, and because I’ve spent some time fretting over word order and listening to each line in my own voice, I feel a much deeper appreciation for the subtle connections between sound and meaning. (Certain lines make me smile as they roll around in my head: “Come, my friend, and remember that the rich have butlers and no friends, And we have friends and no butlers.”)

Very nice, Ms. Reynolds, but "The Garrett" is really child's play. We at Harriet hope you'll consider taking on The Cantos next. (And for more Poetry App action, you should take ours for a spin!)