From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Poetry (from the Greek "ποίησις", poiesis, a "making" or "creating") is a form of art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its ostensible meaning. Poetry may be written independently, as discrete poems, or may occur in conjunction with other arts, as in poetic drama, hymns or lyrics.
Poetry, and discussions of it, have a long history. Early attempts to define poetry, such as Aristotle's Poetics, focused on the uses of speech in rhetoric, drama, song and comedy.[1] Later attempts concentrated on features such as repetition and rhyme, and emphasised the aesthetics which distinguish poetry from prose.[2] From the mid-20th century, poetry has sometimes been more loosely defined as a fundamental creative act using language.[3]
Poetry often uses particular forms and conventions to expand the
literal meaning of the words, or to evoke emotional or sensual
responses. Devices such as assonance, alliteration, onomatopoeia and rhythm are sometimes used to achieve musical or incantatory effects. Poetry's use of ambiguity, symbolism, irony and other stylistic elements of poetic diction often leaves a poem open to multiple interpretations. Similarly, metaphor and simile create a resonance between otherwise disparate imagesa layering of meanings, forming connections previously not perceived. Kindred forms of resonance may exist, between individual verses, in their patterns of rhyme or rhythm.
Some forms of poetry are specific to particular cultures and genres,
responding to the characteristics of the language in which the poet
writes. While readers accustomed to identifying poetry with Dante, Goethe, Mickiewicz and Rumi may think of it as being written in rhyming lines and regular meter, there are traditions, such as those of Du Fu and Beowulf, that use other approaches to achieve rhythm and euphony. In today's globalized world, poets often borrow styles, techniques and forms from diverse cultures and languages.
[edit] History
-
Poetry as an art form may predate literacy.[4] Many ancient works, from the Vedas (17001200 BC) to the Odyssey (800675 BC), appear to have been composed in poetic form to aid memorization and oral transmission, in prehistoric and ancient societies.[5] Poetry appears among the earliest records of most literate cultures, with poetic fragments found on early monoliths, rune stones and stelae.
The oldest surviving poem is the Epic of Gilgamesh, from the 3rd millennium BC in Sumer (in Mesopotamia, now Iraq), which was written in cuneiform script on clay tablets and, later, papyrus.[6] Other ancient epic poetry includes the Greek epics, Iliad and Odyssey, and the Indian epics, Ramayana and Mahabharata.
The efforts of ancient thinkers to determine what makes poetry
distinctive as a form, and what distinguishes good poetry from bad,
resulted in "poetics" the study of the aesthetics of poetry. Some ancient societies, such as the Chinese through the Shi Jing, one of the Five Classics of Confucianism,
developed canons of poetic works that had ritual as well as aesthetic
importance. More recently, thinkers have struggled to find a definition
that could encompass formal differences as great as those between
Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and Matsuo Bashō's Oku no Hosomichi, as well as differences in context spanning Tanakh religious poetry, love poetry, and rap.[7]
Context can be critical to poetics and to the development of poetic genres and forms. Poetry that records historic events in epics, such as Gilgamesh or Ferdowsi's Shahnameh,[8] will necessarily be lengthy and narrative, while poetry used for liturgical purposes (hymns, psalms, suras and hadiths) is likely to have an inspirational tone, whereas elegy and tragedy are meant to evoke deep emotional responses. Other contexts include Gregorian chants, formal or diplomatic speech,[9] political rhetoric and invective,[10] light-hearted nursery and nonsense rhymes, and even medical texts.[11]
The Polish historian of aesthetics, Władysław Tatarkiewicz, in a paper on "The Concept of Poetry," traces the evolution of what is in fact two concepts of poetry. Tatarkiewicz points out that the term is applied to two distinct things that, as the poet Paul Valéry observes, "at a certain point find union. Poetry [...] is an art based on language.
But poetry also has a more general meaning [...] that is difficult to
define because it is less determinate: poetry expresses a certain state of mind." ."[12]
[edit] Western traditions
Classical thinkers employed classification as a way to define and
assess the quality of poetry. Notably, the existing fragments of Aristotle's Poetics describe three genres of poetry
the epic, the comic, and the tragic and develop rules to
distinguish the highest-quality poetry in each genre, based on the
underlying purposes of the genre.[13] Later aestheticians identified three major genres: epic poetry, lyric poetry and dramatic poetry, treating comedy and tragedy as subgenres of dramatic poetry.
Aristotle's work was influential throughout the Middle East during the Islamic Golden Age,[14] as well as in Europe during the Renaissance.[15] Later poets and aestheticians often distinguished poetry from, and defined it in opposition to, prose, which was generally understood as writing with a proclivity to logical explication and a linear narrative structure.[16]
This does not imply that poetry is illogical or lacks narration, but
rather that poetry is an attempt to render the beautiful or sublime
without the burden of engaging the logical or narrative thought
process. English Romantic poet John Keats termed this escape from logic, "Negative Capability."[17] This "romantic" approach views form
as a key element of successful poetry because form is abstract and
distinct from the underlying notional logic. This approach remained
influential into the twentieth century.
During this period, there was also substantially more interaction
among the various poetic traditions, in part due to the spread of
European colonialism and the attendant rise in global trade. In addition to a boom in translation, during the Romantic period numerous ancient works were rediscovered.
[edit] Twentieth-century disputes
Some 20th century literary theorists,
relying less on the opposition of prose and poetry, focused on the poet
as simply one who creates using language, and poetry as what the poet
creates. The underlying concept of the poet as creator is not uncommon,
and some modernist poets essentially do not distinguish between the creation of a poem with words, and creative acts in other media such as carpentry.[18] Yet other modernists challenge the very attempt to define poetry as misguided, as when Archibald MacLeish concludes his paradoxical poem, "Ars Poetica," with the lines: "A poem should not mean / but be."[19]
Disputes over the definition of poetry, and over poetry's
distinction from other genres of literature, have been inextricably
intertwined with the debate over the role of poetic form. The rejection
of traditional forms and structures for poetry that began in the first
half of the twentieth century coincided with a questioning of the
purpose and meaning of traditional definitions of poetry and of
distinctions between poetry and prose, particularly given examples of
poetic prose and prosaic "poetry".
Numerous modernist poets have written in non-traditional forms or in
what traditionally would have been considered prose, although their
writing was generally infused with poetic diction and often with rhythm
and tone established by non-metrical means.[20] While there was a substantial formalist
reaction within the modernist schools to the breakdown of structure,
this reaction focused as much on the development of new formal
structures and syntheses as on the revival of older forms and
structures.[21]
More recently, postmodernism
has fully embraced MacLeish's concept and come to regard the boundaries
between prose and poetry, and also among genres of poetry, as having
meaning only as cultural artifacts. Postmodernism goes beyond
modernism's emphasis on the creative role of the poet, to emphasize the
role of the reader of a text, and to highlight the complex cultural web within which a poem is read.[22]
Today, throughout the world, poetry often incorporates poetic form and
diction from other cultures and from the past, further confounding
attempts at definition and classification that were once sensible
within a tradition such as the Western canon.
[edit] Basic elements
[edit] Prosody
-
Main article: Meter (poetry)
Prosody is the study of the meter, rhythm, and intonation of a poem. Rhythm and meter, although closely related, should be distinguished.[23]
Meter is the definitive pattern established for a verse (such as iambic
pentameter), while rhythm is the actual sound that results from a line
of poetry. Thus, the meter of a line may be described as being
"iambic", but a full description of the rhythm would require noting
where the language causes one to pause or accelerate and how the meter
interacts with other elements of the language. Prosody also may be used
more specifically to refer to the scanning of poetic lines to show meter.
[edit] Rhythm
-
- See also Parallelism, inflection, intonation, foot
The methods for creating poetic rhythm vary across languages and
between poetic traditions. Languages are often described as having timing set primarily by accents, syllables, or moras, depending on how rhythm is established, though a language can be influenced by multiple approaches.[24] Japanese is a mora-timed language. Syllable-timed languages include Latin, Catalan, French and Spanish. English, Russian and, generally, German are stress-timed languages. Varying intonation also affects how rhythm is perceived. Languages also can rely on either pitch, such as in Vedic or ancient Greek, or tone. Tonal languages include Chinese, Vietnamese, Lithuanian, and most subsaharan languages.[25]
Metrical rhythm generally involves precise arrangements of stresses or syllables into repeated patterns called feet
within a line. In Modern English verse the pattern of stresses
primarily differentiate feet, so rhythm based on meter in Modern
English is most often founded on the pattern of stressed and unstressed
syllables (alone or elided). In the classical languages, on the other hand, while the metrical units are similar, vowel length rather than stresses define the meter. Old English poetry used a metrical pattern involving varied numbers of syllables but a fixed number of strong stresses in each line.[26]
The chief device of ancient Hebrew Biblical poetry, including many of the psalms, was parallelism,
a rhetorical structure in which successive lines reflected each other
in grammatical structure, sound structure, notional content, or all
three. Parallelism lent itself to antiphonal or call-and-response performance, which could also be reinforced by intonation.
Thus, Biblical poetry relies much less on metrical feet to create
rhythm, but instead creates rhythm based on much larger sound units of
lines, phrases and sentences. Some classical poetry forms, such as Venpa of the Tamil language, had rigid grammars (to the point that they could be expressed as a context-free grammar) which ensured a rhythm.[27] In Chinese poetry, tones as well as stresses create rhythm. Classical Chinese poetics identifies four tones: the level tone, rising tone, falling tone, and entering tone. Note that other classifications may have as many as eight tones for Chinese and six for Vietnamese.
The formal patterns of meter used developed in Modern English verse
to create rhythm no longer dominate contemporary English poetry. In the
case of free verse, rhythm is often organized based on looser units of cadence than a regular meter. Robinson Jeffers, Marianne Moore, and William Carlos Williams are three notable poets who reject the idea that regular accentual meter is critical to English poetry.[28] Jeffers experimented with sprung rhythm as an alternative to accentual rhythm.[29]
-
In the Western poetic tradition, meters are customarily grouped according to a characteristic metrical foot and the number of feet per line. Thus, "iambic pentameter" is a meter comprising five feet per line, in which the predominant kind of foot is the "iamb." This metric system originated in ancient Greek poetry, and was used by poets such as Pindar and Sappho, and by the great tragedians of Athens. Similarly, "dactylic hexameter," comprises six feet per line, of which the dominant kind of foot is the "dactyl." Dactylic hexameter was the traditional meter of Greek epic poetry, the earliest extant examples of which are the works of Homer and Hesiod.
Meter is often scanned based on the arrangement of "poetic feet" into lines.[30]
In English, each foot usually includes one syllable with a stress and
one or two without a stress. In other languages, it may be a
combination of the number of syllables and the length of the vowel that
determines how the foot is parsed, where one syllable with a long vowel
may be treated as the equivalent of two syllables with short vowels.
For example, in ancient Greek poetry, meter is based solely on syllable
duration rather than stress. In some languages, such as English,
stressed syllables are typically pronounced with greater volume,
greater length, and higher pitch, and are the basis for poetic meter.
In ancient Greek, these attributes were independent of each other; long
vowels and syllables including a vowel plus more than one consonant
actually had longer duration, approximately double that of a short
vowel, while pitch and stress (dictated by the accent) were not
associated with duration and played no role in the meter. Thus, a
dactylic hexameter line could be envisioned as a musical phrase with
six measures, each of which contained either a half note followed by
two quarter notes (i.e. a long syllable followed by two short
syllables), or two half notes (i.e. two long syllables); thus, the
substitution of two short syllables for one long syllable resulted in a
measure of the same length. Such substitution in a stress language,
such as English, would not result in the same rhythmic regularity. In Anglo-Saxon meter, the unit on which lines are built is a half-line containing two stresses rather than a foot.[31] Scanning meter can often show the basic or fundamental pattern underlying a verse, but does not show the varying degrees of stress, as well as the differing pitches and lengths of syllables.[32]
As an example of how a line of meter is defined, in English-language iambic pentameter,
each line has five metrical feet, and each foot is an iamb, or an
unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable. When a particular
line is scanned, there may be variations upon the basic pattern of the
meter; for example, the first foot of English iambic pentameters is
quite often inverted, meaning that the stress falls on the first syllable.[33] The generally accepted names for some of the most commonly used kinds of feet include:
- spondee two stressed syllables together
- iamb unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable
- trochee one stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable
- dactyl one stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables
- anapest two unstressed syllables followed by one stressed syllable
- pyrrhic - two unstressed syllables together (rare, usually used to end dactylic hexameter)
The number of metrical feet in a line are described in Greek terminology as follows:
There are a wide range of names for other types of feet, right up to a choriamb
of four syllable metric foot with a stressed syllable followed by two
unstressed syllables and closing with a stressed syllable. The choriamb
is derived from some ancient Greek and Latin poetry. Languages which utilize vowel length or intonation rather than or in addition to syllabic accents in determining meter, such as Ottoman Turkish or Vedic, often have concepts similar to the iamb and dactyl to describe common combinations of long and short sounds.
Each of these types of feet has a certain "feel," whether alone or
in combination with other feet. The iamb, for example, is the most
natural form of rhythm in the English language, and generally produces
a subtle but stable verse.[34] The dactyl, on the other hand, almost gallops along. And, as readers of The Night Before Christmas or Dr. Seuss realize, the anapest is perfect for a light-hearted, comic feel.[35]
There is debate over how useful a multiplicity of different "feet" is in describing meter. For example, Robert Pinsky
has argued that while dactyls are important in classical verse, English
dactylic verse uses dactyls very irregularly and can be better
described based on patterns of iambs and anapests, feet which he
considers natural to the language.[36]
Actual rhythm is significantly more complex than the basic scanned
meter described above, and many scholars have sought to develop systems
that would scan such complexity. Vladimir Nabokov
noted that overlaid on top of the regular pattern of stressed and
unstressed syllables in a line of verse was a separate pattern of
accents resulting from the natural pitch of the spoken words, and
suggested that the term "scud" be used to distinguish an unaccented
stress from an accented stress.[37]
[edit] Metrical patterns
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Main article: Meter (poetry)
Different traditions and genres of poetry tend to use different meters, ranging from the Shakespearian iambic pentameter and the Homerian dactylic hexameter to the Anapestic tetrameter
used in many nursery rhymes. However, a number of variations to the
established meter are common, both to provide emphasis or attention to
a given foot or line and to avoid boring repetition. For example, the
stress in a foot may be inverted, a caesura (or pause) may be added (sometimes in place of a foot or stress), or the final foot in a line may be given a feminine ending to soften it or be replaced by a spondee
to emphasize it and create a hard stop. Some patterns (such as iambic
pentameter) tend to be fairly regular, while other patterns, such as
dactylic hexameter, tend to be highly irregular. Regularity can vary
between language. In addition, different patterns often develop
distinctively in different languages, so that, for example, iambic tetrameter
in Russian will generally reflect a regularity in the use of accents to
reinforce the meter, which does not occur or occurs to a much lesser
extent in English.[38]
Some common metrical patterns, with notable examples of poets and poems who use them, include:
- Iambic pentameter (John Milton, Paradise Lost[39])
- Dactylic hexameter (Homer, Iliad;[40] Ovid, The Metamorphoses)
- Iambic tetrameter (Andrew Marvell, "To His Coy Mistress"; Aleksandr Pushkin, Eugene Onegin)[41]
- Trochaic octameter (Edgar Allan Poe, "The Raven")[42]
- Anapestic tetrameter (Lewis Carroll, "The Hunting of the Snark";[43] Lord Byron, Don Juan)[44]
- Alexandrine, also known as iambic hexameter (Jean Racine, Phèdre)[45]
[edit] Rhyme, alliteration, assonance
-
The Old English epic poem
Beowulf is written in alliterative verse and in paragraph form, not separated into lines or stanzas.
Rhyme, alliteration, assonance and consonance
are ways of creating repetitive patterns of sound. They may be used as
an independent structural element in a poem, to reinforce rhythmic
patterns, or as an ornamental element.[46]
Rhyme consists of identical ("hard-rhyme") or similar ("soft-rhyme")
sounds placed at the ends of lines or at predictable locations within
lines ("internal rhyme").[47]
Languages vary in the richness of their rhyming structures; Italian,
for example, has a rich rhyming structure permitting maintenance of a
limited set of rhymes throughout a lengthy poem. The richness results
from word endings that follow regular forms. English, with its
irregular word endings adopted from other languages, is less rich in
rhyme.[48]
The degree of richness of a language's rhyming structures plays a
substantial role in determining what poetic forms are commonly used in
that language.
Alliteration and assonance played a key role in structuring early
Germanic, Norse and Old English forms of poetry. The alliterative
patterns of early Germanic poetry interweave meter and alliteration as
a key part of their structure, so that the metrical pattern determines
when the listener expects instances of alliteration to occur. This can
be compared to an ornamental use of alliteration in most Modern
European poetry, where alliterative patterns are not formal or carried
through full stanzas.[49]
Alliteration is particularly useful in languages with less rich rhyming
structures. Assonance, where the use of similar vowel sounds within a
word rather than similar sounds at the beginning or end of a word, was
widely used in skaldic
poetry, but goes back to the Homeric epic. Because verbs carry much of
the pitch in the English language, assonance can loosely evoke the
tonal elements of Chinese poetry and so is useful in translating
Chinese poetry. Consonance occurs where a consonant sound is repeated
throughout a sentence without putting the sound only at the front of a
word. Consonance provokes a more subtle effect than alliteration and so
is less useful as a structural element.
[edit] Rhyming schemes
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Main article: Rhyme scheme
In many languages, including modern European languages and Arabic,
poets use rhyme in set patterns as a structural element for specific
poet forms, such as ballads, sonnets and rhyming couplets.
However, the use of structural rhyme is not universal even within the
European tradition. Much modern poetry avoids traditional rhyme schemes. Classical Greek and Latin poetry did not use rhyme. Rhyme entered European poetry in the High Middle Ages, in part under the influence of the Arabic language in Al Andalus (modern Spain).[50] Arabic language poets used rhyme extensively from the first development of literary Arabic in the sixth century, as in their long, rhyming qasidas.
Some rhyming schemes have become associated with a specific language,
culture or period, while other rhyming schemes have achieved use across
languages, cultures or time periods. Some forms of poetry carry a
consistent and well-defined rhyming scheme, such as the chant royal or the rubaiyat, while other poetic forms have variable rhyme schemes.
Most rhyme schemes are described using letters that correspond to
sets of rhymes, so if the first, second and fourth lines of a quatrain
rhyme with each other and the third line does not rhyme, the quatrain
is said to have an "a-a-b-a" rhyme scheme. This rhyme scheme is the one
used, for example, in the rubaiyat form.[51] Similarly, an "a-b-b-a" quatrain (what is known as "enclosed rhyme") is used in such forms as the Petrarchan sonnet.[52]
Some types of more complicated rhyming schemes have developed names of
their own, separate from the "a-b-c" convention, such as the ottava rima and terza rima. The types and use of differing rhyming schemes is discussed further in the main article.
- Ottava rima
- The ottava rima
is a poem with a stanza of eight lines with an alternating a-b rhyming
scheme for the first six lines followed by a closing couplet first used
by Boccaccio. This rhyming scheme was developed for heroic epics but has also been used for mock-heroic poetry.
- Dante and terza rima
Dante's Divine Comedy[53] is written in terza rima,
where each stanza has three lines, with the first and third rhyming,
and the second line rhyming with the first and third lines of the next
stanza (thus, a-b-a / b-c-b / c-d-c, et cetera.) in a chain rhyme.
The terza rima provides a flowing, progressive sense to the poem, and
used skillfully it can evoke a sense of motion, both forward and
backward. Terza rima is appropriately used in lengthy poems in
languages with rich rhyming schemes (such as Italian, with its many
common word endings).[54]
[edit] Poetic form
Poetic form is more flexible in modernist and post-modernist poetry,
and continues to be less structured than in previous literary eras.
Many modern poets eschew recognisable structures or forms, and write in
'free verse'. But poetry remains distinguished from prose by its form
and some regard for basic formal structures of poetry will be found in
even the best free verse, however much it may appear to have been
ignored. Similarly, in the best poetry written in the classical style
there will be departures from strict form for emphasis or effect. Among
the major structural elements often used in poetry are the line, the stanza or verse paragraph, and larger combinations of stanzas or lines such as cantos. The broader visual presentation of words and calligraphy can also be utilized. These basic units of poetic form are often combined into larger structures, called poetic forms or poetic modes (see following section), such as in the sonnet or haiku.
[edit] Lines and stanzas
Poetry is often separated into lines on a page. These lines may be
based on the number of metrical feet, or may emphasize a rhyming
pattern at the ends of lines. Lines may serve other functions,
particularly where the poem is not written in a formal metrical
pattern. Lines can separate, compare or contrast thoughts expressed in
different units, or can highlight a change in tone. See the article on line breaks for information about the division between lines.
Lines of poems are often organized into stanzas, which are denominated by the number of lines included. Thus a collection of two lines is a couplet (or distich), three lines a triplet (or tercet), four lines a quatrain, five lines a quintain (or cinquain), six lines a sestet, and eight lines an octet.
These lines may or may not relate to each other by rhyme or rhythm. For
example, a couplet may be two lines with identical meters which rhyme
or two lines held together by a common meter alone. Stanzas often have
related couplets or triplets within them.
Alexander Blok's poem, "
Noch, ulitsa, fonar, apteka" ("Night, street, lamp, drugstore"), on a wall in
Leiden.
Other poems may be organized into verse paragraphs,
in which regular rhymes with established rhythms are not used, but the
poetic tone is instead established by a collection of rhythms,
alliterations, and rhymes established in paragraph form. Many medieval
poems were written in verse paragraphs, even where regular rhymes and
rhythms were used.
In many forms of poetry, stanzas are interlocking, so that the
rhyming scheme or other structural elements of one stanza determine
those of succeeding stanzas. Examples of such interlocking stanzas
include, for example, the ghazal and the villanelle,
where a refrain (or, in the case of the villanelle, refrains) is
established in the first stanza which then repeats in subsequent
stanzas. Related to the use of interlocking stanzas is their use to
separate thematic parts of a poem. For example, the strophe, antistrophe and epode of the ode
form are often separated into one or more stanzas. In such cases, or
where structures are meant to be highly formal, a stanza will usually
form a complete thought, consisting of full sentences and cohesive
thoughts.
In some cases, particularly lengthier formal poetry such as some
forms of epic poetry, stanzas themselves are constructed according to
strict rules and then combined. In skaldic poetry, the dróttkvætt
stanza had eight lines, each having three "lifts" produced with
alliteration or assonance. In addition to two or three alliterations,
the odd numbered lines had partial rhyme of consonants with dissimilar
vowels, not necessarily at the beginning of the word; the even lines
contained internal rhyme in set syllables (not necessarily at the end
of the word). Each half-line had exactly six syllables, and each line
ended in a trochee. The arrangement of dróttkvætts followed far less
rigid rules than the construction of the individual dróttkvætts.
[edit] Visual presentation
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Main article: Visual poetry
Even before the advent of printing, the visual appearance of poetry often added meaning or depth. Acrostic poems conveyed meanings in the initial letters of lines or in letters at other specific places in a poem. In Arabic, Hebrew and Chinese poetry, the visual presentation of finely calligraphed poems has played an important part in the overall effect of many poems.
With the advent of printing,
poets gained greater control over the mass-produced visual
presentations of their work. Visual elements have become an important
part of the poet's toolbox, and many poets have sought to use visual
presentation for a wide range of purposes. Some Modernist
poetry takes this to an extreme, with the placement of individual lines
or groups of lines on the page forming an integral part of the poem's
composition, whether to complement the poem's rhythm through visual caesuras of various lengths, or to create juxtapositions so as to accentuate meaning, ambiguity or irony, or simply to create an aesthetically pleasing form.[55] In its most extreme form, this can lead to concrete poetry or asemic writing.[56]
[edit] Poetic diction
-
Main article: Poetic diction
Illustration for the cover of
Christina Rossetti's
Goblin Market and Other Poems (1862), by
Dante Gabriel Rossetti.
Goblin Market
used complex poetic diction in nursery rhyme form: "We must not look at
goblin men, / We must not buy their fruits: / Who knows upon what soil
they fed / Their hungry thirsty roots?"
Poetic diction
treats of the manner in which language is used, and refers not only to
the sound but also to the underlying meaning and its interaction with
sound and form. Many languages and poetic forms have very specific poetic dictions, to the point where distinct grammars and dialects are used specifically for poetry.
Poetic diction can include rhetorical devices such as simile and metaphor, as well as tones of voice, such as irony.[57] Aristotle wrote in the Poetics that "the greatest thing by far is to be a master of metaphor."[58] Since the rise of Modernism, some poets have opted for a poetic diction that deemphasizes rhetorical devices, attempting instead the direct presentation of things and experiences and the exploration of tone. On the other hand, Surrealists have pushed rhetorical devices to their limits, making frequent use of catachresis.
Allegorical stories are central to the poetic diction of many cultures, and were prominent in the west during classical times, the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance.[59] Rather than being fully allegorical, however, a poem may contain symbols or allusions that deepen the meaning or effect of its words without constructing a full allegory.
Another strong element of poetic diction can be the use of vivid imagery for effect. The juxtaposition of unexpected or impossible images is, for example, a particularly strong element in surrealist poetry and haiku. Vivid images are often, as well, endowed with symbolism.
Many poetic dictions use repetitive phrases for effect, either a
short phrase (such as Homer's "rosy-fingered dawn" or "the wine-dark
sea") or a longer refrain. Such repetition can add a somber tone to a poem, as in many odes, or can be laced with irony as the context of the words changes. For example, in Antony's famous eulogy of Caesar in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, Antony's repetition of the words, "For Brutus is an honorable man," moves from a sincere tone to one that exudes irony.[60]
[edit] Poetic forms
Specific poetic forms have been developed by many cultures. In more
developed, closed or "received" poetic forms, the rhyming scheme, meter
and other elements of a poem are based on sets of rules, ranging from
the relatively loose rules that govern the construction of an elegy to the highly formalized structure of the ghazal or villanelle.
Described below are some common forms of poetry widely used across a
number of languages. Additional forms of poetry may be found in the
discussions of poetry of particular cultures or periods and in the glossary.
[edit] Sonnets
-
Among the most common form of poetry through the ages is the sonnet,
which, by the thirteenth century, was a poem of fourteen lines
following a set rhyme scheme and logical structure. The conventions
associated with the sonnet have changed during its history, and so
there are several different sonnet forms. Traditionally, English poets
use iambic pentameter when writing sonnets, with the Spenserian and Shakespearean sonnets being especially notable. In the Romance languages, the hendecasyllable and Alexandrines are the most widely used meters, although the Petrarchan sonnet
has been used in Italy since the 14th century. Sonnets are particularly
associated with love poetry, and often use a poetic diction heavily
based on vivid imagery, but the twists and turns associated with the
move from octave to sestet and to final couplet make them a useful and
dynamic form for many subjects. Shakespeare's sonnets are among the most famous in English poetry, with 20 being included in the Oxford Book of English Verse.[61]
[edit] Jintishi
-
The jintishi (近體詩) is a Chinese poetic form based on a series of set tonal patterns using the four tones of the classical Chinese language in each couplet: the level, rising, falling and entering tones. The basic form of the jintishi
has eight lines in four couplets, with parallelism between the lines in
the second and third couplets. The couplets with parallel lines contain
contrasting content but an identical grammatical relationship between
words. Jintishi often have a rich poetic diction, full of allusion, and can have a wide range of subject, including history and politics. One of the masters of the form was Du Fu, who wrote during the Tang Dynasty (8th century). There are several variations on the basic form of the jintishi.
[edit] Sestina
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The sestina has six stanzas, each comprising six unrhymed lines, in
which the words at the end of the first stanzas lines reappear in a
rolling pattern in the other stanzas. The poem then ends with a
three-line stanza in which the words again appear, two on each line.
[edit] Villanelle
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The Villanelle
is a nineteen-line poem made up of five triplets with a closing
quatrain; the poem is characterized by having two refrains, initially
used in the first and third lines of the first stanza, and then
alternately used at the close of each subsequent stanza until the final
quatrain, which is concluded by the two refrains. The remaining lines
of the poem have an a-b alternating rhyme. The villanelle has been used
regularly in the English language since the late nineteenth century by
such poets as Dylan Thomas,[62] W. H. Auden,[63] and Elizabeth Bishop.[64] It is a form that has gained increased use at a time when the use of received forms of poetry has generally been declining.
[edit] Pantoum
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The pantoum is a rare form of poetry similar to a villanelle. It is
composed of a series of quatrains; the second and fourth lines of each
stanza are repeated as the first and third lines of the next.
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The Tanka is a form of Japanese poetry,
generally not possessing rhyme, with five lines structured in a 5-7-5
7-7 patterns. The 5-7-5 phrase (the "upper phrase") and the 7-7 phrase
(the "lower phrase") generally show a shift in tone and subject matter.
Tanka were written as early as the Nara period by such poets as Kakinomoto no Hitomaro,
at a time when Japan was emerging from a period where much of its
poetry followed Chinese form. Tanka was originally the shorter form of
Japanese formal poetry, and was used more heavily to explore personal
rather than public themes. It thus had a more informal poetic diction.
By the 13th century, Tanka had become the dominant form of Japanese
poetry, and it is still widely written today.
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Haiku is a popular form of traditional Japanese poetry. As it has evolved in recent centuries, haiku is a 17-onji verse comprising three metrical units of 5, 7, and 5 onji. The onji is a linguistic idea identical in concept with that of mora. Onji are not syllables.
[edit] Ruba'i
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Four lines of verse practised by Arabian and Persian poets. Omar Khayyam is famous for his Rubaiyat. The most famous translation of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam from Persian into English was done by Edward Fitzgerald. An example is given below:
- They say the Lion and the Lizard keep
- The Courts where Jamshyd gloried and drank deep:
- And Bahram, that great Hunter--the Wild Ass
- Stamps o'er his Head, and he lies fast asleep.
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A short musical lyric practised by Korean poets. They are usually
written in three lines. The lines average 14-16 syllables, for a total
of 44-46. There is a pause in the middle of each line and so, in
English, Sijo are sometimes printed in six lines instead of three. An example is given below:
- You ask how many friends I have? Water and stone, bamboo and pine.
- The moon rising over the eastern hill is a joyful comrade.
- Besides these five companions, what other pleasure should I ask?
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Odes were first developed by poets writing in ancient Greek, such as Pindar,[65] and Latin, such as Horace. Forms of odes appear in many of the cultures that were influenced by the Greeks and Latins.[66] The ode generally has three parts: a strophe, an antistrophe, and an epode.
The antistrophes of the ode possess similar metrical structures and,
depending on the tradition, similar rhyme structures. In contrast, the
epode is written with a different scheme and structure. Odes have a
formal poetic diction, and generally deal with a serious subject. The
strophe and antistrophe look at the subject from different, often
conflicting, perspectives, with the epode moving to a higher level to
either view or resolve the underlying issues. Odes are often intended
to be recited or sung by two choruses (or individuals), with the first
reciting the strophe, the second the antistrophe, and both together the
epode. Over time, differing forms for odes have developed with
considerable variations in form and structure, but generally showing
the original influence of the Pindaric or Horatian ode. One non-Western
form which resembles the ode is the qasida in Persian poetry.
[edit] Ghazal
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The ghazal (Persian/Urdu/Arabic: غزل) is a form of poetry common in Arabic, Persian, Urdu and Bengali poetry. In classic form, the ghazal has from five to fifteen rhyming couplets that share a refrain
at the end of the second line (which need be of only a few syllables).
Each line has an identical meter, and there is a set pattern of rhymes
in the first couplet and among the refrains. Each couplet forms a
complete thought and stands alone, and the overall ghazal often
reflects on a theme of unattainable love or divinity. The last couplet
generally includes the signature of the author.
As with other forms with a long history in many languages, many
variations have been developed, including forms with a quasi-musical
poetic diction in Urdu. Ghazals have a classical affinity with Sufism,
and a number of major Sufi religious works are written in ghazal form.
The relatively steady meter and the use of the refrain produce an
incantatory effect, which complements Sufi mystical themes well. Among
the masters of the form is Rumi, a Persian poet who lived in Turkey.
[edit] Other forms
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Other forms of poetry include acrostic poetry, in which letter
patterns create multiple messages (such as where the first lettres of
lines, read downward, form a separate phrase or word), and concrete
poetry, which uses word arrangement, typeface, color or other visual
effects to complement or dramatize the meaning of the words used;
cinquains, which have five lines with two, four, six, eight, and two
syllables, respectively, and free verse, which is based on the
irregular rhythmic cadence or the recurrence, with variations, of
phrases, images, and syntactical patterns rather than the conventional
use of meter.
[edit] Poetic genres
In addition to specific forms of poems, poetry is often thought of in terms of different genres
and subgenres. A poetic genre is generally a tradition or
classification of poetry based on the subject matter, style, or other
broader literary characteristics.[67] Some commentators view genres as natural forms of literature.[68] Others view the study of genres as the study of how different works relate and refer to other works.[69]
Epic poems
are one commonly identified genre, often defined as lengthy poems
concerning events of a heroic or important nature to the culture of the
time.[70]
Lyric poetry, which tends to be shorter, melodic, and contemplative, is
another 'commonly identified genre. Some commentators may organize
bodies of poetry into further subgenres, and individual poems may be
seen as a part of many different genres.[71] In many cases, poetic genres show common features as a result of a common tradition, even across cultures. Greek lyric poetry influenced the genre's development from India to Europe.[citation needed]
Described below are some common genres, but the classification of
genres, the description of their characteristics, and even the reasons
for undertaking a classification into genres can take many forms.
[edit] Narrative poetry
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