Long Poem Including Music: Reading the Score in Armand Schwerner’s “Tablet XII”

“Tablet XII” of Armand Schwerner’s long poem The Tablets (1968–1999) contains musical writing. Part of a broader twentieth century history of musical notation in experimental long poems, Schwerner’s incorporation and citation of musicography has implications for the ways in which long poems are read, performed, and interpreted. Drawing upon modernist practices, Schwerner’s literary score also opens up the potential for musical analogies in relation to poetic form. Appearing roughly in the middle of the work, the score in effect divides the question of the “musical” and the “lyrical” at the point of its appearance, marking a subjective and critical crux in the structure of the long poem.