CHAPTER IV

THE ANALYSIS OF VERSE

Verse may be rhythmical; it may be merely alliterative; it may, like the French, depend wholly on the (quasi) regular recurrence of the rhyme; or, like the Hebrew, it may consist in the strangely fanciful device of repeating the same idea. It does not matter on what principle the law is based, so it be a law. -ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, On Some Technical Elements of Style in Literature.

Trochee trips from long to short;

From long to long in solemn sort

Slow Spondee stalks, strong foot, yet ill able

Ever to come up with Dactyl trisyllable.

Iambics march from short to long;

With a leap and a bound the swift Anapæsts throng;
One syllable long with one short at each side

Amphibrachys hastes with a stately stride;

First and last being long, middle short, Amphimacer
Strikes his thundering hoofs like a proud high-bred racer.

-COLERIDGE.

The earliest poetry was born of music and dancing; and although we often forget this origin, sound and movement are still the two elements that govern verse. Somewhat more narrowly than Mr. Stevenson, we may therefore lay down this law: Verse must consist of a succession of pleasing or at least peculiarly expressive-sounds, set in a pattern of rhythmic time. Hence the value of both sound and movement in their relations to verse will be fully developed as these studies progress.

1. The Relation of Spirit to Form

If you wish to turn your philosophy, or your patriotism, or your religion, into poetry, well and good, but the fact that your philosophy is deep, or your patriotism lofty, or your religion lovely, will not of necessity make your poetry so-the spirit must be clothed upon with body, and the body must be of form suitable for the appareling of so deep, lofty, and lovely a spirit. The highest poetic ideas, if clumsily expressed, can never take their place as poetry, for poetry is not only the spirit of the ideal, but it is the spirit of the ideal expressed suitably and effectively. This, then, is why we insist upon a knowledge, and even a mastery, of the forms of verse- -those poetic ideas are most effective which are so clothed with language, and arranged in such verbal order, as to harmonize spirit and form perfectly. In technical language, good poetry consists of good poetic ideas couched in good verse-that is, arranged in a succession of pleasing syllables, and ordered in rhythmic sequence.

The expression "pleasing syllables" is used advisedly because the pleasure derived from poetry may in certain instances be independent of its meaning. At first this appears to be heresy, but it is true. For example, it is possible for a person with no knowledge of German to feel a distinct delight in reading Heine's lyrics, and for another, ignorant of Greek, to enjoy a recitation from Homer or Sophocles. It is apparent, of course, that this is due to the musical nature of verse. Naturally, too, where the words are understood, and where the sound, meaning, and

rhythm enhance one another, the pleasure is highest; but when only the sonorous and rhythmical qualities of poetry are felt, the pleasure may be none the less really experienced. On the other hand, the pleasure derived from an imperfect apprehension of a poetic idea-as when it is but vaguely in the mind, badly expressed in sound and movement, or crudely recited-will be inferior to the enjoyment derived from the harmonious, sonorous, and rhythmical expression of a lofty poetic sentiment: in other words, from good poetry.

For the writing of successful verse, three things are necessary: an idea, emotion, and technical expression; and in good poetry these three are one. The two former are not always to be had for the asking, but technical expression may be studied and cultivated.

It is obvious that individuals vary greatly in their sensitiveness to the value of words and the sounds of words, just as one man may have an ear for music and another be unable to recognize an air after hearing it twenty times; or one person may readily distinguish delicate shades of color and another be color-blind. The poetic equipment should include a natural sense of language, but the average person may be made to recognize good word-grouping when it is pointed out; he may learn by analysis why it is good, and if he has interest and enthusiasm he will want to try to make something similar himself. Given poetic ideas and the emotions arising from them, there should be no excuse for the verse-writer's expressing these ideas badly, for that means either ignorance or laziness—or both. Therefore, having considered the nature of poetry as thought

and emotion, we are now to give attention to the means of its adequate expression.

2. Meter

Meter, or the form in which poetry is cast, means measure. Greek verse was measured by the number of foot-beats forwards and backwards in the dance. The time required for the rise and fall of one foot was very naturally called a foot. Since the poem was chanted or sung as an accompaniment to the dance-which, as we have seen, was generally an important element in primitive religious ceremonials—the syllables marked by the stress of the voice necessarily corresponded to the beat of the foot in marking time. The measures were named from the arrangement of long and short syllables. The iambus was a short, then a long syllable; the trochee a long, then a short syllable; the anapast two short syllables, then a long one; the dactyl a long, then two short syllables. These, with other more complicated combinations, must be examined in detail later.

English poetry followed, in a ruder way, the same line of development as the Greek; it too was born of music and dancing, and arose, in dim Teutonic times, in the solemn chant which accompanied the march or dance in primitive religious rites. The rhyming games of children are a survival of the primitive instinct to associate foot-movements with chant or song.

When verse in England ceased to be a spontaneous singing, and the learned tried to reduce it to rule, they naturally attempted to apply the classical system of

measurement to English poetry. But at once they encountered a difficulty. The rules of Greek and Latin meters were based on the combination and contrast of long and short syllables, according to the length of time required to pronounce them. This quality of length we call

3. Quantity

A long syllable was counted as equal to two short ones, in the classics; but in English, there was no such rule. Although as a matter of fact all English syllables do not take quite the same length of time to pronounce the syllables of viol for instance being shorter than those of landmark-it was not possible to base a system of meter on these differences. Poetry was already written, much of it was beautiful and noble, but when wise men tried to analyze it they found that the classical system of measurement would not fit. English meters, they found, were based, not on quantity, or length of syllables, but on accent, or stress upon certain syllables, somewhat corresponding to beat in musical measure.

4. Accent

All English words, they saw, could be resolved into syllables, strong or weak, accented or unaccented, rather than long or short. They therefore divided the lines of English poetry into feet, counting the English strong syllable as equal to the Greek long syllable, the English weak syllable as equal to the Greek short syllable, and adopted the old classic names, iambic, trochaic, anapastic, dactylic, etc.,