Salinye Posted July 12, 2003 Report Share Posted July 12, 2003 Isn't it time for a new poetry exercise??? I want to do one that has to have the same number of beats every other line. Know what I mean? Something like 10, 6, 10, 6 or something. Is that a specific style? Can you show me? *cracks the whip* Get crackin! *grins then runs away* ~Salinye Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alaeha Posted July 13, 2003 Report Share Posted July 13, 2003 Only one of that sort that I know of offhand is a Limerick (I know... Insert groans here) which has a syllable count of 8 8 5 5 8. Though I did once write a poem with quatrains wherein the A lines were written in anapestic pentameter and the B lines in anapestic trimeter. It was an interesting poem. I'll get to work on it. I've had an... interesting past couple days. Wound up spending large amounts of time in a group of people who included my ex. (Who, of course, being the one who did the dumping, is quite ready to go on with life and be "just friends". *Sighs*) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HopperWolf Posted July 13, 2003 Report Share Posted July 13, 2003 actually, I think the style was fairly common before the 1800's, maybe 1750. but somewhat died out in the 1800's to be replaced by a more constant beat, probably seeking to express the more steady, unchanging shape of society through a similar poetic structure. Alexander Pope, for example, in his "Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot" rarely writes a line that is not 10 beats overs 424 lines. However, a nice example of the type of style you are after could be found by a Mr. John Dunne in "Death, be not proud" (not his most famous I believe, but still fairly well known) which seems to be loosly based on the old fashioned ballad style itself. The most popular balladic style was an 8, 7 beet aith A B A B rhyme scheme, and there are quite a few folk songs today that mimic it. It translates into quite a nifty tune actually. The real challange in writing a ballad though, are the more consisten trademarks, such as it being a tragic story (always is, unless pointledly otherwisee) with characters and speaches and a moral. Seems that they were the early version of movies. told in pubs and passed around the country by mouth till eventually we were able to write them down. Most of them are anonamous though, because no one knows who actually created them, they were just written down for posterity's sake. Still, if you are looking for this particular style then I would suggest looking at some tudor and Elizabethen Verse, or researching so traditional ballads (not to be confused with slow love songs ) Here ends the lesson, children. Hope to see you in class next week. Serious, I think I sound a bit patronising here, sorry. I spent far too long studying this stuff Too many essays. Oh the essays! They never ended! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zadown Posted July 13, 2003 Report Share Posted July 13, 2003 http://www.bartleby.com/105/72.html <--- "Death, be not proud" .. as a non-native english user it's meaning and spirit eludes me, but I can't read Kalevala either so I guess I'm just stupid like that when it comes to poetry. That's intresting stuff, Hopper. About the only thing I know about poems is that I don't know anything about them, but I'm always willing to learn. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Annael Posted July 14, 2003 Report Share Posted July 14, 2003 (edited) that is one of my favourite poems. Reminds me of something that one of my teachers said once. "Death be not proud, cause death itself must die." Which is pretty much what the poem is saying....so yeah..... Edited July 14, 2003 by Annael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts