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  #41  
Unread 12-28-2011, 02:49 PM
Bill Carpenter Bill Carpenter is offline
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Neil,
You shouldn't miss Anton Lesser's reading of Paradise Lost. You won't believe how much emotion he squeezes out of it! But listen to the abridged version before the complete one. The abridged evidences a matured intent to give it everything an old Shakespearian can give, while the complete, which must be earlier, is just a decent reading. The abridged also has a charming actress reading Eve. Too bad they didn't also give her Sin. Best, Bill
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  #42  
Unread 01-02-2012, 08:01 AM
Jonathan James Henderson Jonathan James Henderson is offline
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Fascinating discussion here. Meter (and elements like substitutions) has been my primary interest in poetry since I started and I've read/thought quite a bit on it. The more I've thought, the more I've realized a need for a multi-metrical system. What I mean by that is that there is quite often a tension in poetry between the meter and how one would naturally read a line without it. The "classic" approach to this was that you read by the meter and syllables got promoted/demoted. But there are sometimes, especially in the works of Shakespeare and Donne, where this just doesn't work (you'd end up with some extremely awkward line readings). The only answer is that I think even the classicists thought in terms of substitutions and wasn't afraid to use them when they knew that a certain word couldn't be stressed in a context.

One thing that makes Shakespeare such a brilliant master of theatrical meter is the fact that he writes lines that allow themselves to be read numerous ways, depending on if you're reading naturally or by the meter. The classic "To be or not to be, that is the question" is a perfect example of a line that can be scanned/read numerous ways. I've always found it odd that modern actors/readers are so intent to always read it: "To be or not to be, that is" rather than "that is." I think it works equally well both ways, and both are tonally quite different. One thing I think people miss about putting the stress on is is that it highlights the pattern of "be" in the line, as "is" is, of course, a form (3rd person singular) of "to be". You can actually remove the unstressed words and understand the train of thought fragmentarily: "be, not be, is, quest(ion)".

As for metrical substitutions, I'm in favor of all of them given the right context. I think Alexander Pope got it quite right in his Essay on Criticism about using spondees/pyrrhics to "echo the sense". I recently experimented with seeing how different combinations of syllables/stresses in a line altered the rhythm and sense, one juxtaposition being this quatrain:

Arthritic rocking chairs creak, the seats
Depressed, slowed down, muted—too old to be
Like the running and the screaming legs as they flee
In the yard and crunch draught-dried leaves under their feet.

The syllable/stresses are: 9/5, 9/7, 12/4, 12/7 which is quite a ways away from classic accentual-syllabics of iambic pentameter. But I like the extreme juxtaposition in line 2 and 3 of the density ratio between syllables/stress. Just like Pope says, spondees and caesuras add weight/gravity and "slow down" the line, while pyrrhics lighten/enliven and "speed up" the line. I think the case with pyrrhics are fascinating because you'd think that since you're adding more syllables the line would seem longer, but because English is a stress-timed language (stresses should come equally in time) I think we have a tendency to "rush over" two-or-more unstressed syllables in a row so that they "last" almost equal to one stressed syllable. So the idea is that you're getting more words for less.

I think the big question is always "do they just get promoted/demoted instead of the reader hearing a spondee/pyrrhic?" Well, I think that depends. One reason I stopped reading poetry strictly in meter is that I realized I was missing out on obvious metrical substitutions. These days I use a general rule about balancing meter and natural stress, mostly that monosyllabic nouns, verbs, and adjectives are usually stressed, while monosyllabic articles, prepositions, and conjunctions are unstressed. Multisyllabic versions of these usually contain one stress. So with a line like: "A boy crossed dark roads tonight at nine" I read the dark road as a spondee. While if the line was "A boy on a sidewalk crossed the street" I read the "(bo)y on" as a pyrrhic.

Trochees should be used more sparingly, I think. I typically stick to the rule of using them at the beginning of a line, beginning of a new clause, or the beginning of a sub-clause (usually after a caesura). But I almost always use them for a kind of surprise/emphasis. I think they especially pair well with participle phrases where a strong "verbal" participle begins the phrase as it gives it a more verbal/active sense rather than just being an adjective.

As for anapests/dactyls, I use them somewhat sparingly too, but I do think they often provide a nice "hiccup" for a line. I could see, for instance, using them in a line where one is describing stumbling or running or something like that. I also like how they "lengthen out" the line a bit. Recently I used them in a poem to try and replicate the sense of floating away, as if the meter is "floating away" the same way the speaker is describing. I rather liked the effect.

Catalexis isn't something I've experimented much with yet. I think the thing that strikes me most about its possibilities is that it could also be used for a metrical "surprise," ending a piece on a semi-spondee, eg. The only instance I can think where I intentionally used one for an effect is where I transplanted the opening unstressed word from the beginning of a line to the end of a previous line. I did that because, one, the extra half-foot on the previous line echoed, I felt, the sense I was describing about "breaking free," and, two, I liked beginning the next line with a stress that simulated a trochee.

When it comes to the issue of stress I pretty much agree with the classic binary system. I realize that actual speech stress is not binary, but I think the important thing is that it relatively is. As I'm fond of saying in photography, we see the world in color (multiple-stresses), but we experience it in black and white (binary stress). The binary stress system is about relativity anyway, one stress being relatively strong/weak to another. That's why the IP was designed to where you'd always have a juxtaposition of weaker/stronger, even if the weaker and stronger weren't always exactly the same, they were still always weaker or stronger than the adjacent syllable.

What I DON'T like about classic metrics is how lines are scanned. I've started thinking more in terms of using a meter like IP as a "ghost meter," in which the real meter/stress is overlaid on top. Kinda like the relationship between the ictus in music and the ACTUAL rhythm. I especially think this is apparent when you utilize a kind of rhythmic parallelism. A recent alexandrine couplet I wrote for a sonnet is a good example:

"This symphony of summer quiets, decrescends;
Fires fade, darkening as gold the crescent sands."

Scanned classically this would be something like:
-/---/-/- || /-/
/-/ || /---/-/-/

I do think there's still the "ghost" of IP working here. If you read the L1F2 as a pyrrhic then it works fine as an iambic alexandrine. Much the same can be said for L2F3. But I don't think that's how the rhythmic "sense" goes. The idea is that the rhythm of L1F6 is identical to L2F1, and they're even "sectioned off" by caesuras, making the parallel even stronger. There's also a parallel in the rhythm of "symphony of" and "darkening as," which I think should register, at least unconsciously. So I read the REAL rhythm of the line as something like:

Catalectic unstressed syllable (This), First paeon (SYM-phon-y of), trochee (SUM-mer), trochee (QUI-ets), amphimacer (DE-cre=SCENDS) / amphimacer (FI-res FADE), First paeon (DARK-en-ing as), Catalectic stressed syllable (GOLD), iamb/iamb (the CRESC-ent SANDS).

As for worrying about adding/subtracting a stress from the line, I don't worry about that. It's part of my new approach to thinking about accentual-syllabic verse in that I'm willing to alter either the accents or syllables as long as the other remains consistent. So I don't mind having 4 or 6 stresses as long as there's 10 syllables, nor do I mind having 7-13 syllables as long as there's 5 stresses. To me, the main thing is to maintain a strong, dominant meter and then use variations to expressively punctuate it. It seems to me a waste of poetic resources to "throw out" either hyper/hypometrical syllables or metrical variations. You might as well be throwing out paint colors as a painter.

Last edited by Jonathan James Henderson; 01-02-2012 at 08:12 AM.
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  #43  
Unread 01-02-2012, 01:20 PM
Bill Carpenter Bill Carpenter is offline
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Welcome, Jonathan, and thanks for your very interesting entry in this discussion. I see your "real rhythm" as an attempt to notate stress-unstress clusters as both musical and semantic units, and more accurately describe how a poem is or could be read. It seems to be somewhat arbitrary whether you stick "of" to the end of "symphony" or to the front of "summer," or just call it an unstressed catalectic syllable, but that is not an argument against this form of description.

Your effort at greater accuracy is in the same spirit as using the Jespersen-Iwaskiewizc 4-point scale instead of the binary scale, and conceivably they could be combined, though there is certainly truth to the statement that stress and unstress are relative terms. On the other hand, the binary notation only relates the syllable to those adjacent to it, not to those further away.

The advantage of the more traditional scansion is that it exists halfway between the "genotype" (the metrical formula) and the "phenotype" (the individual line), and shows how they relate to each other. It shows the repeating figures in your couplet, and could have been used to develop your couplet. Your "real rhythm" adds another layer of analysis. The easier thing to do would be simply to add brackets to the traditional short-long notation to capture the semantic groupings. However, I can see the attraction to putting a foot name to a semantic unit like "decrescends." In your example, I'd be tempted to call "symphony," "summer qui-," "darkening," "decrescends," and "crescent sands" amphimacers, and to identify a dominant figure or foot as determining the real rhythm.

It always pays to answer the question raised above, why bother. Can you say again what you see as the practical benefit of adding another layer of description, with or without the more esoteric terms? Best wishes, Bill

Last edited by Bill Carpenter; 01-02-2012 at 01:37 PM.
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  #44  
Unread 01-02-2012, 02:02 PM
Orwn Acra Orwn Acra is offline
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Although everyone thinks of dipodic verse to be the long Victorian lines favored by Tennyson and Gilbert, it can be used to describe any line that can go both ways. So

I am the very model of a modern major general

is the technical meter but

I am the very model of a modern major general

is how it's actually said. Stallings talks about it here. Perhaps this is what Jonathan means between the poetic meter and "how one would naturally read the line without it".

Some linguists divide stresses into 4 categories (first stress, secondary stress, and so on) but only so they can write long papers on stress patterns and rules in English. In poetry, the ear is all that matters. Thinking about it too much isn't going to get one anywhere.
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  #45  
Unread 01-02-2012, 02:27 PM
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Jayne Osborn Jayne Osborn is offline
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My husband (no poet) puts it quite succinctly:

"If something sounds right, it probably is right."

OK, that's very simplistic, but he has a point! Orwn's "how it's actually said" is crucial, regardless of the metre, when it comes right down to it.

You can spout all the technical jargon you like, till the cows come home, but does it sound right? will always be the best rule of thumb IMO.
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  #46  
Unread 01-02-2012, 03:40 PM
Michael Cantor Michael Cantor is offline
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What Jayne said, and what Orwyn said.

There's writers and there's scorekeepers (except for very rare individuals like Alicia, who can do it all - but that's why she has a Macarthur and a Goog and we don't.) I'm a writer, and I trust my ear and go with what sounds right, and would go nuts if I tried quantifying stress patterns.
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  #47  
Unread 01-02-2012, 03:51 PM
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Maryann Corbett Maryann Corbett is online now
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The simple rule "If it sounds right..." hits a limit, though. The way it sounds to me may not be the way it sounds to you. Of course, different hearing will also yield different bean-counting. This is one reason we workshop: to get an ear-check.
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  #48  
Unread 01-02-2012, 03:52 PM
Roger Slater Roger Slater is online now
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Of course it's how it sounds that counts, and of course you shouldn't think about it "too much," but it's still very helpful to have a shared vocabulary so we can discuss among ourselves how things sound, or why we think something sounds good or doesn't. Knowing how to read music or discuss music theory doesn't tell you how to compose, but I imagine that it's the kind of thing that helps composers discuss their work with other composers if they get together in critical workshops.
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  #49  
Unread 01-03-2012, 07:30 AM
Jonathan James Henderson Jonathan James Henderson is offline
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RE: Bill

"It seems to be somewhat arbitrary whether you stick "of" to the end of "symphony" or to the front of "summer," or just call it an unstressed catalectic syllable"

I should stress (no pun intended) that this is all a very tentative, formative idea thus far. I haven't really attempted yet to develop any kind of hypothesis or work towards an actual gosh-darn theory, and elements like you point out here (where individual unstressed words/syllables belong) is definitely one of the stumbling blocks of the enterprise. One reason I think the "of" more naturally belongs to "symphony" is because I find that strings of unstressed syllables tend to run together. It's one reason Pre-modern poets got away with synaloepha to maintain the meter as much as they did.

"On the other hand, the binary notation only relates the syllable to those adjacent to it, not to those further away."

Right, and the reason I say I'm fine with the binary notation is that I'm not sure what the usage would be of quantifying stresses of syllables farther away from each other. I guess one could ask the same about the usage of rhythm outside of meter, but I do think that's quite different as everyone (I think) would agree that meter and rhythm aren't identical.

"The advantage of the more traditional scansion is that it exists halfway between the "genotype" (the metrical formula) and the "phenotype" (the individual line), and shows how they relate to each other."

And I should note that I'm not advocating doing away with traditional scansion and noting the metrical formula and where/when the line deviates. That would be like doing away with a time signature in music. But just like there can be completely different rhythms under the same time signature in music (a 4/4 bar composed of a whole note at 60bpm will hardly feel the same as a 4/4 bar composed of sixteen 16th notes at 120bpm) I think there can be completely different rhythms under the same meter in poetry. I think the attempt at "real rhythm" would be an attempt to point these more idiosyncratic rhythms out.

"In your example, I'd be tempted to call "symphony," "summer qui-," "darkening," "decrescends," and "crescent sands" amphimacers, and to identify a dominant figure or foot as determining the real rhythm. "

I don't think they'd all work as amphimacers because "darkening" and "symphony" would naturally read as dactyls (until paired with a another syllable behind or in front). Likewise, I think when you have two words like "summer quiets" the trochee/trochee (or ditrochee, if you want) pattern is too strong to split up "quiets" into two different groupings (that splitting of words/sense is something that bugs me about using classic meter as the be-all, end-all of discussing rhythm).

Plus, and here's to the point about not throwing out classic meter, I think the couplet (and the rest of the poem, actually) establishes it as iambic, despite all the variations. Just going by repeated stresses there are far more iambs then there are any other foot. But, again, I just consider that the ictus from which more complex rhythmic patterns emerge.

"Can you say again what you see as the practical benefit of adding another layer of description, with or without the more esoteric terms? "

I think there are plenty of those who would ask why bother about ANY metrical notation at all. Those who read poetry for its imagistic pleasures may not give a hoot that the classics are written in iambic pentameter as, dagnabbit, they're going to read it in whatever stress-pattern feels natural to them. So I think the "why bother" can only ever be answered by "because some people care." I ask "why bother" with Lacanian analysis of films, but some people seem to get a kick out of it.

That out of the way, let me utilize a great example from Keats:

Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art

Classically scanned would be something like: // || -/-//-//
Though some may make the argument it would be: // || -/-/-/-/ (but I think NOT stressing "fast" and stressing "as" would feel rather silly, so I'm going to work from the first)

I think it's still possible to read that as iambic pentameter with with a spondee substitution in F1 and F6 and a trochee in F5. Now, the question is how does one "group this," what's the "real rhythm?" The major thing I--and I think most--would notice here are the three pairs of consecutive stressed syllables: "Bright Star," "stedfast," "thou art." Once one picks those out I think you also notice a strong semantic correlation between them; it's almost the poem in little right there. In fact, inverse it and you have "Thou art stedfast Bright Star." So what's left over? Well, you have "would I were" between the 1st and 3rd spondee and "as" stuck between the 3rd and 4th. I think it makes sense to group these together to form an amphimacer and catalectic unstressed foot.

What's the use of this? Well, besides pointing out the semantic relation between the spondee set, I think it contrasts well with the two "leftovers:" "would I were" places the stressed "I" between an "island" of unstressed syllables while poor "as" is left out on its own. The differing rhythms of these two groupings contrasts wonderfully with the strong, consistent spondee pairs, seeming to enact the very thing it's describing: the speaker, like the words associated with him, are not as 'stedfast' as the 'bright star / thou art' subject.

So, in summation, I think the "use" of it is in pointing out certain substantial parallels and variations and what possible connotations it can have rhythmically on how we read a text. Perhaps one is tempted to call the above specious, sophistic, over-interpretation, but even if one is leery about assigning so definite and nuanced a meaning to such rhythms (I don't think many--if any--poets think this way about rhythm while composing), I still think the point about finding meaningful semantic/rhythmic patterns--like the spondees in Keats' poem, or the amphimacers in my couplet--is valuable to how rhythm can create semantic resonances in the mind of the reader.

RE: Orwn Acra

That link doesn't seem to be working, but I think it's a problem with the site itself.
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  #50  
Unread 01-03-2012, 09:22 AM
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Janice D. Soderling Janice D. Soderling is offline
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The link works for me.
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