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Play It Again, Sam: Repetition in the Arts

Samuel Jay Keyser

Arts, design, architecture & planning

Play It Again, Sam: Repetition in the Arts

By Samuel Jay Keyser, the Peter de Florez emeritus professor of linguistics

MIT Press · 2025

Leonard Bernstein, in his famous Norton Lectures, extolled repetition, saying that it gave poetry its musical qualities and that music theorists' refusal to take it seriously did so at their peril. "Play It Again, Sam" takes Bernstein seriously. In this book, Keyser explores why we enjoy works of poetry, music, and painting, and how repetition plays a central part in the pleasure.

From Summer 2025 recommended reading from MIT (MIT News). Cover image via Google Books.