Take me to the river
A shared language, a Southern heritage
Many years ago as a student I had the good fortune to find myself in the house troupe of actors for the inaugural season of Minneapolis's Tyrone Guthrie Theater. Though I had doubtful prospects I was eager to participate knowing that I would be in such a robust and elite company of actors, not the least of whom were the Lady and Sir Guthrie himself.
As rehearsals commenced all the ensemble were struck fairly dumb by the presence of such notables as the Guthries and their entourage. We eagerly absorbed each tidbit of professional wisdom and wit that this luminary couple would tender regarding acting and stage presence all, of course, delivered in the most precise, impossibly sonorous King's English. Day after day we stood bathed in the spell of language delivered by one of the truly great practitioners of words that were written by Shakespeare and meant to be spoken by Elizabethans for Elizabethans; I learned more about the English language in those two weeks than in the previous 12 years up to graduation.
One insight revealed during these lectures has remained with me to this day, English as spoken in Shakespeare's time is nowhere more exactly duplicated today as in the American south. What we snicker at, sometimes outright demean and vilify as the Southern drawl is, in fact, a syncopation and living interpretation of the tempo and sound of the first English settlers to the Carolinas and points south. Preserved in generations of traditional southern families, passed down from mother to son and father to child the spoken American language of the deep south sounds much as it did to Shakespeare and his contemporaries - aint that kick in the haid.
Now, perhaps I'm making too much of this but it seems to me reasonable, given that this preservation of the mother tongue exists exclusively in the American South, that a new respect for Southern prose, poetic and propinquity to our northern cousins is deserving.
That, and the fact that I appreciate magnolia blossoms and the ever present perfume of night blooming Jasmine and as I possess every known version of Take Me to the River* are just a few of the reasons I feel truly at home in the South.
*Take Me to the River:
Many years ago as a student I had the good fortune to find myself in the house troupe of actors for the inaugural season of Minneapolis's Tyrone Guthrie Theater. Though I had doubtful prospects I was eager to participate knowing that I would be in such a robust and elite company of actors, not the least of whom were the Lady and Sir Guthrie himself.
As rehearsals commenced all the ensemble were struck fairly dumb by the presence of such notables as the Guthries and their entourage. We eagerly absorbed each tidbit of professional wisdom and wit that this luminary couple would tender regarding acting and stage presence all, of course, delivered in the most precise, impossibly sonorous King's English. Day after day we stood bathed in the spell of language delivered by one of the truly great practitioners of words that were written by Shakespeare and meant to be spoken by Elizabethans for Elizabethans; I learned more about the English language in those two weeks than in the previous 12 years up to graduation.
One insight revealed during these lectures has remained with me to this day, English as spoken in Shakespeare's time is nowhere more exactly duplicated today as in the American south. What we snicker at, sometimes outright demean and vilify as the Southern drawl is, in fact, a syncopation and living interpretation of the tempo and sound of the first English settlers to the Carolinas and points south. Preserved in generations of traditional southern families, passed down from mother to son and father to child the spoken American language of the deep south sounds much as it did to Shakespeare and his contemporaries - aint that kick in the haid.
Now, perhaps I'm making too much of this but it seems to me reasonable, given that this preservation of the mother tongue exists exclusively in the American South, that a new respect for Southern prose, poetic and propinquity to our northern cousins is deserving.
That, and the fact that I appreciate magnolia blossoms and the ever present perfume of night blooming Jasmine and as I possess every known version of Take Me to the River* are just a few of the reasons I feel truly at home in the South.
*Take Me to the River:
- Al Green, Lenny Kravitz, BB King & Sheryl Crow
- Annie Lennox
- Commitments
- Etta James
- Eva Cassidy
- Foghat
- Grateful Dead
- Joan Osborne
- Monte Montgomery
- RatDog & Charlie Musselwhite
- Talking Heads
posted by Harlan Weikle | 9:07 AM
<< Home