Sonata Form in Non-Musical Writing

One summer day when I was back at home visiting my family, a Mozart symphony billowed out of our radio thanks to our local NPR station. After the first movement played for a few measures, my parents asked me, the sole musician on the trip, to explain the quality Mozart’s writing that allowed them to enjoy it so much more than other classical works. While I could have enlightened them with many examples as to why this piece is so brilliant harmonically, but unfortunately this explanation would have only fallen on tone-deaf ears. Fortunately however, an in-depth analysis is not needed in order to fully understand why this movement works and has enthralled listeners for centuries. All my parents need to understand is sonata form.

So, I began to explain to them that underneath the melody, the harmony, the violins cellos and horns, there is this form that keeps this masterpiece all together and that this form is designed to be understood, regardless of one’s musical ability. I showed them that they were hearing this all along, and the only thing keeping them from fully understanding the piece was the act of putting it into words. I further explained to them the reason why they enjoyed it was not because they could hear the structure of the piece, but rather that they could follow the drama that was written within the symphony. When explaining how Mozart created a work that has this ability, I brought up the common idea that sonata form is a musical argument. It is a battle of two separate ideas trying to win over the listener, and like many structured arguments, sonata form has a similar structure. There is the presentation of the ideas, the debate, and then the conclusion in which the winner of the argument is decided.

After introducing and explaining sonata form, my parents started to better understand this form of composition and we all began to hear how other composers used this technique and how it helps unfold the drama of the piece; however, I was stuck thinking about the correlation between sonata form and arguments. This was a common analogy in my circle, yet I had hardly heard it used the opposite way, that arguments are structured similarly to sonata form. If we flip the analogy, we get a unique view of the structure of arguments and how to create one. Therefore, we can use sonata form as an effective way to structure and analyze persuasive and creative writing, and we can use this skill to enhance our analysis and structure of musical works.

The first notion to consider when implementing this idea is the relations between each facet of sonata form and written text. The three large sections of sonata are probably the easiest to translate to the outline of most writing. The exposition can serve as the introduction and thesis, the development as the body, and the recapitulation as the conclusion.  More importantly, the roles of the sections of sonata form can carry over as well. These three sections in sonata form should be able to live “autonomously” yet come together to create the structure of overall piece; therefore the best writing practice is assigning an overall role to the three sections.[1]The role of the exposition is to set the key and introduce the themes. It determines the underlying purpose of the work and what will be explored later. The development puts the themes up against each other element. Each theme can be seen appearing here but not necessarily in its original form. The themes can be broken down to their simplest form, all while departing from the original stated key. Then the recapitulation will return us to the original idea and remind the listener of the underlying purpose of the work. However, instead of departing into new ideas, the recapitulation will choose to settle and prolong the initial key, determining it as home despite it being absent from the body of the piece.

This is where the gap between musical writing and persuasive writing can be bridged. Sonata form has the two themes, and as in writing there is the argument and counter argument. Both contrasting parts have a relationship to each other by topic, however, if sonata form and its keys are to be considered, then the original idea will be the ultimate victor, but this will be covered more recapitulation. This is similar to the first paragraph in a standard five-paragraph essay, but what would differ is to introduce the second point or counterpoint. What is important in this section is to make the points clear and thought out because they will later be picked apart. Interestingly, as opposed to a work of music in sonata form, the second point could be implied, assuming that it is a counterargument that directly opposes the main argument. It is also important to leave this section open ended because this is neither when evidence is presented nor when an answer is reached.

In the exposition of an argument it is imperative that the underlying idea (key) is set. While the points and themes will be brought up throughout the argument, it is this underlying idea that keeps the argument together. This idea is the more abstract part of an argument, but when broken down, it becomes essence of the dispute. An example of this kind of exposition would go similar to this: “I don’t believe in murder because it is in violation of an individual’s right to life.”   The two opposing points to this argument are not believing in murder, which is stated, and supporting murder, which is the directly implied counterargument. The abstract essence, or key, to this argument is the idea of “violating an individual’s right to life.” It has been set in this initial statement and the argument will immediately depart from there.

The bulk of a “sonata argument” would happen in the development section directly after the exposition. Here the two points will be explored, put up against each other, and new information will be brought into the argument. This all is intended to shine new light on the different points in hopes of answering the questions of why they might differ. However, just as sonata form becomes more chromatic as to depart from the original key, a sonata argument will use debate to depart from the original essence of the argument. In the murder example given before, this is when the debate what “violating an individual’s right to life” really means. New ideas will be brought in to explore this core idea such as: is this something that can be violated, what does the right to life mean, do these people deserve this right. This way of thinking is used to depart from the original idea similar to how sonata form uses chromatics to modulate to a new key. However, the ultimate goal with this departure is to return to the original statement with a more grounded understanding.

If an argument is to directly mirror sonata form, then the last line of the development section should head directly into the recapitulation, such as how many sonatas usually prolong the dominant. While the original key might be hinted at, this statement should not be confused with the conclusion of the argument, but rather just a conclusion of the development. In the murder example it might appear as, “murder will always violate an individual’s right to life because murder is defined as taking life from and innocent person.” The original essence of the argument is hinted at, but it does not appear in its original form. It does signal, however, a direct return to the beginning, and thus transitions quite well into the recapitulation.

The first item to appear in a recapitulation is the double return, which would be the return of the original stance and the essence of the argument. In the murder example, this would be nearly a direct restating of the exposition; yet, the difference would be stating the counterargument but with it having been transformed by the key idea. The full recapitulation of the murder example would appear as, “I don’t believe in murder because it is in violation of an individual’s right to life, and I cannot support murder because it will always violate that right.” Here the counterargument, supporting murder, makes an appearance, but it has been transformed to appear in the original essence. The argument has come to a conclusion; it might still have a final statement, or coda, but for the most part, a victor has been decided.

Constructing arguments in sonata form might be helpful for people looking for a way to structure their argument; however, using this concept as a tool of analyzing various forms of writing might be the best contribution to music this notion has to offer. If sonata form appears in text, then other qualities of those works could be brought over to the music world. One unique quality of that music has which some other forms of writing do not have is the intimate connection to time. A novel can be opened to, read and reread from any page in any order and authors might even use this to their advantage. There are additions of the Holy Biblethat have citations of when certain lines will reference other lines elsewhere in the book. Choose Your Own Adventurewill send the reader on a journey by having them flip to new pages every time they reread the book. Even when reading Choose Your Own Adventure, the reader might flip to a page they might remember or want to reread for sheer pleasure. Music has a unique marriage to time; therefore the idea of form in music is key in its development as a story.[2]

When using sonata form to analyze writing, the goal, in its essence, is to break down how the writing unfolds its ideas over time. The analyzer should be able to quickly identify the themes of the writing and their purpose in order to map out the structure of the writing. Most writing, even it appears to be written in sonata form, will not be using sonata form the same way that composers do; however, by understanding the author’s use of the form, whether he or she was consciously using the sonata form or not, the analyzer should be able to come away with a deeper understanding of the work.

In 1922, the popular American poet and critic, Ezra Pound, stated that James Joyce’s Ulysseswas written in sonata form and in 1965 Robert Boyle published an article exploring that claim. In his analysis, he found that the book is not a perfect sonata form like pound claims, but rather an echo of the for form, or as he puts it, “frustrated” sonata form.[3]He found that he could read the book with a clear exposition with two themes and two keys and he discovered that the book had a development section that explores the themes and their tonality. Nevertheless, he found that sonata form fails at the recapitulation in what can viewed as a beautify way to fail. He states that in the book the recapitulation is seemingly backwards. He points out that theme one hardly makes an appearance and when it does, it has been brought down to the key of theme two which dominates the recapitulation.[4]While James Joyce probably had no intention of following sonata form when writing his book, this retrospective view shines a light of how Ulysses evolves the themes that the characters have developed over time.

Similar to Ulysses, some scholars have noted that Virginia Woolf’s novel, To the Lighthouse, also has a resemblance to sonata form. In their paper covering this subject, humanity social scientists Wei Ding and Lixia Jia, explored a detailed analysis of how the book uses sonata form to achieve structural unity. [T]he novel To the Lighthouse is composed of three parts: The Window, Time Passes, and The Lighthouse. In the first part The Window, the writer presents the two contrasting themes—harmony and conflict around Mrs. Ramsay’s family, with a closing theme at the party at the end of this part, which can be analogized as the exposition part (A) in a sonata. In the second part Time Passes, the writer turns to a completely different angle from human world to non-human world to explore the themes presented in the first part, which can function as the development (B) in a sonata form. In the third part of the novel To the Lighthouse, the narrative returns to human world with all the characters solving the conflict they confront in the first part and deepens the theme, which represents the recapitulation part (A’) in a sonata form.[5]

This analysis demonstrates that the three sections of the novel progress the plot in a similar manner to how sonata form develops its musical themes. This would hold true whether or not Woolf had music forms in mind while writing. The use of adapting this musical technique allows Woolf to unify her writing by having the novel’s themes hold throughout even while the plot drastically changes. It also helps the reader realize that the three sections are far from independent. This is the advantage of sonata form. Adhering to a highly structured form might seem constricting to a writer; however, sonata form allows the writer to create a work that constantly progresses while letting the initial ideas to be the glue that holds the evolving themes together.

While a musical form can work well on text, the written word does have a temporal difference by nature. A reader can, at any moment, revisit previous moments of the text and it will always appear exactly the same. This is not the case in music—at least in the traditional sense of listening to live music. When a composer writes with an audience in mind their work should be able to completely flush out the main ideas in one pass for the reason the composer can never be certain that the audience members will have a chance to revisit the piece. Therefore, an effective form would be one that reflects that quality. Similar to music, speeches have a similar relationship to time and the live audience. Therefore, sonata form should be a helpful tool to analysis and structure speeches.

In perhaps his most famous speech, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. has a structure that closely mirrors that of sonata form. King starts his speech with the line “Five score years ago a great American in whose symbolic shadow we stand today signed the Emancipation Proclamation.”[6]This is not only a reference to the Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, but also to the abolitionist laws and that came from this era. This is the beginning of the exposition with the Gettysburg Addressas the theme and old America as the key. In this speech, King abandons the Gettysburg Address as quickly as it is introduced. It is not a real abandoning though. It merely fades away similar to how the theme seems to fade away in Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony. King’s impressive writing shows that he is able to allude to Lincoln without directly quoting him. King achieves this by referencing Lincoln’s influence on the African-American people. By having his theme simply fade away rather than having distinct markers of the departure, King allows his whole speech to feel as if it is the development section. This works even better when he introduces his the second theme, the modern life of the black man in America.

In the body of the speech, King develops his argument by juxtaposing the past life of the black man and the modern life. This all culminates in his recapitulation. However, King does something brilliant by disguising his double return. Instead of quoting Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, King instead quotes the initial line of Declaration of Independence, which is the same line that Lincoln quotes at the start of his address. By doing this he softens the turning point of his speech by masquerading it as more of the development. Thus begins his “I have a dream” portion of the speech.[7]This is where the second theme is reintroduced but having been greatly influenced by the first theme. King shows this by not going back into the past or even continuing with the present, but rather King now focuses on the immediate future for the black man in America. He then ends by quoting lines of freedom from a spiritual. This is the final echo of the theme of early American documents that both King and Lincoln had referenced.

It might be difficult to find texts that were written strictly adhering to sonata form; however, due to the nature of how the form approaches themes and their development, sonata form is shown to be a helpful tool when analyzing and constructing text. Also, learning from this technique can help analyzers understand the effectiveness of the form and why it was used so extensively. Composers might also learn from these analyses. Whether it is in King’s subtlety, Woolf’s ability to use the themes as the structural glue, or even in simplistic configuration of an argument, these texts show that form should be something that drives the work rather than constrict it. What is perhaps the greatest contribution that comes with this view of writing is how it helps enhance our vocabulary when discussing music. My parents finally understood sonata form when I introduced the argument analogy, so maybe similar analogies will help some musicians finally appreciate their favorite novels.

[1]Charles J. Smith, "Musical Form and Fundamental Structure: An Investigation of Schenker's 'Formenlehre'," Music Analysis 15, no. 2/3 (Summer 1996): 191-297. Accessed October 15, 2017. JSTOR.

[2]Peter Elbow, "The Music of Form: Rethinking Organization in Writing," College Composition and Communication 57, no. 4 (2006): 620-66. Accessed October 14, 2017.

[3]Robert Boyle, ""Ulysses" as Frustrated Sonata Form," James Joyce Quarterly 2, no. 4 (Summer 1965): 247-54. Accessed October 14, 2017. JSTOR.

[4]Robert Boyle, ""Ulysses" as Frustrated Sonata Form," James Joyce Quarterly 2, no. 4 (Summer 1965): 247-54. Accessed October 14, 2017. JSTOR.

[5]Wei Ding and Lixia Jia, “The Unity of to the Lighthouse Achieved by Sonata Form,” Advances in Literary Study, 4, 16-21. doi: 10.4236/als.2016.41003.

[6]Martin Luther King Jr., "I Have a Dream," Speech, March on Washington, Washington D.C., Washington D.C., 1963. https://www.archives.gov/files/press/exhibits/dream-speech.pdf.

[7]Martin Luther King Jr., "I Have a Dream," Speech, March on Washington, Washington D.C., Washington D.C., 1963. https://www.archives.gov/files/press/exhibits/dream-speech.pdf.