Songs and Song-Writers

The Song of Songs: Translation and Notes

Our translation of the Song of Songs attempts to adhere as closely as possible to the Hebrew text. As such, we follow the lead set by Everett Fox, most prominently, in his approach to translation. In addition, we have attempted to utilize common English words to render common Hebrew words and rare English words to render rare Hebrew words (see notes h and ac, for example). We also follow Fox’s ...

Gender Imagery in the Song of Songs

In no other book of the Hebrew Bible does the imagery figure so prominently as it does in the Song of Songs. The rich and extravagant array of figurative language boldly draws the reader into the world so joyously inhabited by the ancient lovers. The poetic craft of the unknown author or authors succeeds at a descriptive level in conveying the lushness of the natural settings and also the beaut...

Mate, neighbour and stranger songs: a female song sparrow perspective.

We investigated discrimination by female song sparrows Melospiza melodia, between different categories of male song using the copulation solicitation display as a preference assay. Females responded most strongly to songs recorded from their mates, less strongly to songs of neighbouring males and least strongly to songs of stranger males. Among the stranger songs, however, females preferred son...

Drinking Songs: Alcohol Effects on Learned Song of Zebra Finches

Speech impairment is one of the most intriguing and least understood effects of alcohol on cognitive function, largely due to the lack of data on alcohol effects on vocalizations in the context of an appropriate experimental model organism. Zebra finches, a representative songbird and a premier model for understanding the neurobiology of vocal production and learning, learn song in a manner ana...

Is God Present in the Song of Songs?