Machine generated contents note: 1. General principles of poetic form; 2. Indo-European and Germanic meters; 3. Old English meter in the era of Beowulf; 4. From late Old English meter to Middle English meter; 5. Middle English type A1 and the hypermetrical b-verse; 6. Type A1 in the a-verse; 7. Types B and C; 8. Survival and extinction in types A2, Da, and E; 9. Type Db and the hypermetrical a-verse; 10. The birth of English iambic meter; 11. General summary.
Summary:
"In this fascinating study, Geoffrey Russom traces the evolution of the major English poetic traditions by reference to the evolution of the English language, and considers how verse forms are born, how they evolve, and why they die. Using a general theory of poetic form employing universal principles rooted in the human language faculty, Russom argues that certain kinds of poetry tend to arise spontaneously in languages with identifiable characteristics. Language changes may require modification of metrical rules and may eventually lead to extinction of a meter. Russom's theory is applied to explain the development of English meters from the earliest alliterative poems in Old and Middle English and the transition to iambic meter in the Modern English period. This thorough yet accessible study provides detailed analyses of form in key poems, including Beowulf and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and a glossary of technical terms"-- Provided by publisher. "Given the structure of English, a sound echo involving stressed syllables will usually have semantic as well as phonological prominence. Ideally, semantic relations marked by the echo will take on special meaning within a particular work. Shakespeare's rhymes highlight semantic kinships in day / May (times associated with youth), shines / declines (high point and descent), dimmed / untrimmed (loss of beauty), and fade / shade (loss of color). At a more abstract level, these rhymes align life and death with light and darkness. Alliteration has comparable semantic importance in Meredith's poem. In the fourth stanza, for example, the unifying sound echoes occur in fish, fur, fierce, fire, faggots, and froze"-- Provided by publisher.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.