Title: Remembering and the sound of words
Subtitle: Mallarmé, Proust, Joyce, Beckett
First published: 1996
Description: Remembering and the Sound of Words is a major new study of four of modern literature's most important writers - and the first serious attempt to account for complex sound effects in prose.

Adam Piette establishes fascinating new links between such sound effects and the representation of memory in literary texts. He sets out a workable taxonomy of sound-repetitions in prose and formulates, through a theory of alerting-devices, the ways in which the reader's attention is drawn to the acoustic surface of the text.

Through close analysis of Mallarme's prose-poetry, Proust's musical syntax, Joyce's memory-rhymes (from Portrait of the Artist through Ulysses to Finnegans Wake), and Beckett's prose and drama, Piette demonstrates that sound effects act as intricate reminders of memory-traces in the text. Despite wide divergence in these four writers' representations of memory, the book shows that the use of this memory-rhyme technique is common to them all, and is employed in particular to express the textual migration of past key-words, self-centred comic tyranny, and the fitful unification of body and memory within the narrative voice.

Mimesis is redefined in terms of textual rhymes - facsimiles of the complex resemblances, fusions, and reenactments of the mind's verbal memory.
Subjects: Comparative Literature, English and French, English literature, French and English, French literature, History and criticism, Language, Memory in literature, Mallarme, stephane, 1842-1898, Proust, marcel, 1871-1922, Beckett, samuel, 1906-1989, Joyce, james, 1882-1941, French literature, history and criticism, 19th century, French literature, history and criticism, 20th century, Comparative literature, french and english, Comparative literature, english and french, English literature, history and criticism, 20th century, Languagemallarmé, stéphane , 1842-1898, Languageproust, marcel , 1871-1922, Languagebeckett, samuel , 1906-1989, Languagejoyce, james , 1882-1941, French literature--history and criticism, French literature--19th century--history and criticism, French literature--20th century--history and criticism, Comparative literature--french and english, Comparative literature--english and french, English literature--history and criticism, English literature--20th century--history and criticism, Pq283 .p44 1996, 840.9
People: James Joyce (1882-1941), Marcel Proust (1871-1922), Samuel Beckett (1906-), Samuel Beckett (1906-1989), Stéphane Mallarmé (1842-1898)
Time periods: 19th century, 20th century
LC classification: PQ283 .P44 1996