| re: my problem with Sondheim's problem with "I Feel Pretty" | |
| Posted by: Singapore/Fling 08:26 pm EST 12/24/21 | |
| In reply to: my problem with Sondheim's problem with "I Feel Pretty" - Chazwaza 07:58 pm EST 12/24/21 | |
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| I think Sondheim would counter that the vocabulary and linguistic achievements of a character - including internal rhymes - while not meant to be understood literally are meant to reflect the character's linguistic intelligence and sophistication. Over the years, Sondheim took his own criticism to heart and made a point of writing his lyrics in ways that better suit the character. On stage, I've tended to agree with your reading of Scenario 1, which is that Maria is singing and showcasing her intelligence in Spanish, and we are hearing it in English. In this most recent film, I think we are told explicitly that she is singing in English, and I think we've also been told up until this point that her English, which workable, is not nearly up to the task of the song... and while I think there's a great insight that she could be whipping off vocabulary words like "charming" and "dizzy" and "sunny", I don't buy the argument that she's at the point where she's learning "entrancing" nor mastered the sentence structure to say "a committee should be organized to honor me", which is both complicated grammatically and also a tricky verb tense, conditionals being a bit higher level... especially since she is likely learning from a book in a time when language learning was more about rote repetition... but maybe we can make an argument that these are all phrases she's had to learn from a lesson? I think where you hit the nail on the head is that Sondheim is maybe a bit embarrassed that he thought, at 27, that the song was showcasing his cleverness as a lyricist, when in fact the rhymes are all a bit obvious and beat-you-over-the-head, and he's attempting to find a sophisticated way to explain away his own self-critic. |
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