Rhythm and meter

The pattern of interchange of strong and weak segments is called rhythm. It’s a regular recurrence of stressed and unstressed syllables that make a poetic text. Various combinations of stressed and un stressed syllables determine the metre. Disyllabic metres are trochee and iambus; trisyllabic are dactyl, amphibrach and anapaest:

Disyllabic metres:

1. Trochee. The foot consists of two syllables; the first is stressed: 'u. Disyllabic words with the first syllable stressed demonstrate the trochaic metre: duty, evening, honey, pretty (and many others, including the word trochee itself).

Men of England, wherefore plough

For the lords who lay ye low?

Wherefore weave with toil and care

The rich robes your tyrants wear? (Shelley)

2. Iambus. Two syllables. The first is unstressed: u'. Examples of iambic words: mistake, prepare, enjoy, behind, again, etc.

There went three kings into the east

Three kings both great and high

And they had sworn a solemn oath

John Barleycorn should die. (Barns)

Trisyllabic metres:

3. Dactyl. The stress is upon the first syllable; the subsequent two are unstressed: 'uu. Examples of dactylic words: wonderful, beautiful, certainly, dignity, etc.

Take her up tenderly

Lift her with care,

Fashion’d so slenderly

Young and so fair. (Hood)

4. Amphibrach. The stress falls on the second (medial) syllable of the foot; the first and the last are unstressed: u'u. Examples: umbrella, returning, continue, pretending, etc.

I sprang to the stirrup and Joris and he,

I galloped, Dick galloped, we galloped all three. (Browning)

5. Anapaest. The last (third) syllable is stressed: uu'. Examples: understand, interfere, disagree, etc.

I am monarch of all I survey

From the central all round to the sea. (Pope)

Rhyme consists in the acoustic coincidence of stressed syllables at the end of verse lines.

1. Rhymes in words ending with a stressed syllable (i.e. monosyllabic rhymes) are called mate (masculine, or single) rhymes: dreams — streams; obey - away understand — hand.

2. Rhymes in words (or word combinations) with the last syllable unstressed are female (feminine, or double) rhymes: duty-beauty; berry-merry, Bicket — kick it (Galsworthy)

3. Rhymes in which the stressed syllable is followed by two unstressed ones are 'dactylic' rhymes (in English, they are preferably called 'triple', or 'treble’ rhymes):

tenderly – slenderly; battery — flattery.

'Eye-rhymes' (or: 'rhymes for the eye'):

Thus, Byron rhymes the words supply and memory:

For us, even banquets fond regret supply In the red cup that crowns our memory.

In the well-known poem My Heart's in the Highlands by Robert Burns we encounter:

Farewell to the forests and wild-hanging woods,

Farewell to the torrents and loud-pouring floods.

'Inner', or 'internal' rhyme:

I am the daughter of earth and water... (Shelley)

Rhymeless verse is called 'blank verse':

Should you ask me whence these stories,

Whence these legends and traditions

With the odor of the forest,

With the dew and damp of meadows (The Song of Hiawatha by H.W. Longfellow).

---

Дата добавления: 2015-11-14