How to Memorize and Recite a Poem

 

1. Read it out loud. Get to know it.
2. Find good places to take a breath.
3. Break it into small parts of a few lines.
4. Starting with the first part or the last part, doing a little bit every evening:
   a. Read it
   b. Make images and connections to help you remember.
   c. Close your eyes and see how much you can remember.
   d. Repeat those steps until you have that section memorized.
   e. Go onto the next part.
   f. As you go, repeat all the parts you have memorized one after another.
5. Recite the poem out loud to yourself, and then to friends, classmates, and family.
6. Practice speaking clearly and standing upright.
7. Read the poem just before you get a good night's sleep.
8. Read it briefly before class.
9. Recite:
   a. Stand up straight but relaxed, without rocking.
   b. Speak with your mouth and throat open
   c. Speak with expression
   d. Keep your hands out of your pockets
   e. It may help to look at something just over the heads of your audience.

Some links:

Sheila Hageman, 2002, How to memorize a poem, accessed July 20, 2003, http://nyny.essortment.com/howtomemorize_rjzb.htm

Bob Holman and Margery Snyder, 2003, How to memorize a poem, accessed July 20, 2003, http://poetry.about.com/cs/textarchives/ht/howmemorizepoem.htm

Dr. Turner's experience.

A quotation:

"The sudden accessibility of information deadens memory and may even make its functions seem obsolete. But to memorize is to possess something, whether it be a sonnet or a succession of kings, by making it an almost physical part of you, a kind of invisible companion." --Billy Collins, "On Slowing Down," commencement address at Choate Rosemary Hall, 2003.