The rhythm of rhymes and ranges: what does poetry have in common with mathematics?
It feels as though poetry and science are miles apart, but according to poet and UvA scientist Piet Gerbrandy, it is not like that at all. For three whole evenings, he explores the overlaps between the two. “There is a certain rhythm in mathematics. Poetry has such a rhythm too.”
What does mathematics have to do with poetry? Or biology with poetry? Little at first glance, but those who look longer see some similarities. At least, that is the belief of poet and classicist Piet Gerbrandy. He is organising a debate series on science and poetry at the Academy of Arts.
“It is a question that has occupied my mind for quite some time,” Gerbrandy begins from his study under the wooden beams on Turfdraagsterpad. “What do we do as poets? Are we saying something about the world or creating our own? Poets rely on intuition or imagination, where poetry seems to evade logic. But it is ultimately not. You also apply certain patterns in poetry that you also apply elsewhere in life, like in science and mathematics.”
“I hear from mathematicians, for example, that they also use their intuition in their work,” says Gerbrandy, “just as poets do. They often start from a hunch, a hypothesis, and then they sit down and calculate and fiddle with formulas and finally they have a proof that it is like that. In that respect too, they use the same human abilities as poets.”
In addition, according to Gerbrandy, both scientists and poets use metaphors. “A equals B. That is a thinking pattern that not only mathematicians follow, but also poets. Another pattern is causality. Scientists use that to predict something. Think of the saying: where there is smoke, there is fire. But you can also play with this as a poet. For example, you can mention the word smoke to evoke the phenomenon of fire.”
Rhythm
The first evening will be about the overlaps between mathematics and poetry. “There is a certain rhythm in mathematics, just as poetry has a rhythm,” Gerbrandy says. |Look at the numbers: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, that’s a sequence. Mathematics has a certain rhythm, it is something that moves forward. Poetry also has such a rhythm, for instance in the form of a metre.”
But he does not have an answer to everything in terms of similarities, Gerbrandy beseeches. “That is precisely why I am organising such an evening. Most poets will never meet a mathematician and vice versa. Although this is not entirely true: many mathematicians love music and the rhythm behind it. And poet Gerrit Krol was a mathematician who worked at Shell.”
Moreover, science and poetry used not to be seen as something contradictory back in the day, Gerbrandy says. “On the contrary, it was a natural form of expressing yourself. Ancient Greek and Roman philosophers explored the world through verse. The Greek poet Empedocles, for instance, wrote a poem on cosmology and the origin of the universe. And the Roman Lucretius, contemporary of Cicero and Caesar, wrote a wonderful ‘leerdicht’ (a poem in which a philosophical or scientific subject is discussed), about atoms. Poetry was the form in which intellectuals communicated. It was largely an oral culture. You can imagine that if you communicate things in poetry form, it is easier to remember.”
And look at Charles Darwin, says Gerbrandy. “I often let my students read the book on the origin of species and they are always pleasantly surprised. It is beautiful literary prose. It is poetic, evocative, it has swinging language. In the nineteenth century, that was still possible. Although it still occurs today: physicist Carlo Rovelli is at the forefront of modern physics. He writes wonderful physics essays, a delight to read.”
Healing effect
The second evening will focus on poetry and social sciences / medicine; the third evening will be about poetry and biology. “In social sciences and medicine, the connection with poetry is intuitively easier to make than in mathematics,” says Gerbrandy. “It has been said that poetry has a healing effect. Just look at how often poems are read at funerals. Or consider the fact that we have a Poet Laureate.”
Biology has also paid much more attention to language in recent years, Gerbrandy argues, for example with trees and fungi. “Slowly it is becoming clear that these organisms, too, possess a form of language. Biologists discovered that orcas and dolphins have their own language and dialects. The overlap between humans and non-humans is increasing.”
According to Gerbrandy, the need for poetry is a primal need. “We know that babies are already sensitive to rhythmic language. Poetry appeals to certain faculties, as it were, deep in evolution. That sense of rhythm is in all of us, in both humans and animals.”
The first session will take place on 27 November from 19.30 to 21.00 at the KNAW Trippenhuis. You can register via this link.
