ENGL 100 Poetry
Its metre is iambic pentameter (see below).
the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in verse" (434).
metre
any kind of composition arranged in lines of stressed and unstressed syllables.
poetry
influenced by the Italian sonneteers
Sir Thomas Wyatt
It is fourteen lines in length.
It has a specific rhyme scheme (Cuddon 610), depending on the type of sonnet (see
below).
It includes a volta (a turn or change of thought that naturally divides the poem into two
sections), the placement of which depends on the type of sonnet (see below) (Cuddon 668-70).
English sonnet
is composed of three quatrains and a couplet, like the Shakespearean sonnet, but its
slightly different rhyme scheme of abab bcbc cdcd ee creates a linking effect between the
quatrains. The volta occurs between the third quatrain and the couplet. The link sonnet is
sometimes known as the Spenserian sonnet because its main practitioner was the sixteenth-
century English poet Edmund Spenser
Sonnet
is composed of an octave (Cuddon 487) and a sestet (Cuddon 650), and usually has a
rhyme scheme of abba abba cde cde (though other variations exist). The volta occurs between
the octave and the sestet. The Italian sonnet is sometimes known as the Petrarchan sonnet
because its main practitioner was the Italian Renaissance poet Petrarch.
Italian sonnet
is composed of three quatrains (Cuddon 579-80) and a couplet (Cuddon 162-63), and
usually has a rhyme scheme of abab cdcd efef gg. The volta occurs between the third quatrain
and the couplet. The English sonnet is sometimes known as the Shakespearean sonnet because
its main practitioner was Shakespeare (
Link sonnet
octave and sestet (usually abba abba cde cde)
Petrarchan/Italian Sonnet
three quatrains and couplet (abab cdcd efef gg)
Shakespearean/English Sonnet
: three quatrains and couplet (abab bcbc cdcd ee)
Spenserian/link sonnet
associated with the seventeenth century "metaphysical poets," a group that included
Donne and Marvell, among others
metaphysical poetry
characteristics include wit, ingenuity, colloquialism, flexible rhythms and metres,
complex themes, paradox, caustic humour, elliptical thought, tersely compact expression
Metaphysical poetry
metaphysical imagery often involves a ________________, a striking juxtaposition of
opposites (433-34)
discordia concors
the branch of philosophy that deals with the first principles of things, including such
concepts as being, knowing, substance, essence, cause, identity, time, and space; the
philosophy of mind. (OED)
26)
dramatic poetry
Lines in a sonnet
14
Metre in a sonnet
iambic pentameter
metaphysics
a far-fetched comparison, especially as a stylistic affectation; a convoluted or unlikely
metaphor; a fanciful notion. (OED)
conceit
an arresting or wholly original image, idea, or conception (Cuddon 433- 34)
metaphysical conceit
a relatively short poem expressive of one's thoughts and feelings, appreciated for its
aural qualities
lyric poetry
a longer poem that tells a story or a series of stories
narrative poetry
a poem featuring the voice of an imaginary character, with nothing added by poet (24-
aba aba aba aba aba abaa
Lines of a villanelle
19
rhyme scheme of a villanelle
“five tercets rhyming aba followed by a quatrain rhyming abaa”
poems with a fixed, regular, and symmetrical pattern of rhymes and/or stanzas
closed forms
haiku
3 unrhymed lines (5, 7, 5) usually focusing on nature
a poetical description of a particular landscape
topographical poetry
a poem inspired by a poet's return to a particular landscape after a period of time has
passed, to meditate on the extent to which that landscape has changed
return poem
also known as fixed forms
a special kind of topographical poem in which "the poet views a broad scene from a high
vantage point"
prospect poem
"has no regular metre of line length, and depends on natural speech rhythms and the
counterpoint of stressed and unstressed syllables. In the hands of a gifted poet, it can acquire
rhythms and melodies of its own"
Free verse
"A composition printed as prose but distinguished by elements common in poetry, such
as elaborately contrived rhythms, figures of speech, rhyme, internal rhyme, assonance,
consonance, and startling images"
Prose poetry
a poem presented as a certain "shape" by means of "pictorial typography" and/or other
"cryptographic tricks with letters" or words
Concrete poetry
eventually gave up medicine to become a poet, experimenting with numerous genres
John Keats
Writes odes
John Keats
• Greek for song or sung
• types:
• characteristics:
– expresses lofty sentiments
– private: reflective purposes
– ceremonious tone and style
– public: ceremonial occasions
– elaborate stanza structure (traditionally, strophe, antistrophe, and epode)
• a lyric poem, usually of some length, that celebrates a person, a thing, or an event
(encomiastic)
Ode
Greek for "description" • the intense pictorial description of an object, scene, or person
• the virtuosic description of physical reality to evoke an image in the mind's eye as intense as if
the described object were actually before the reader (228)
Ekphrasis
poems that do not use a fixed, regular, or symmetrical pattern of rhymes and/or stanzas
open forms
John Keats' odes include "Ode to a Nightingale," "Ode on a Grecian Urn," and "To
Autumn."
in series
Keats, who originally trained to be a physician, wrote his famous odes in 1819. Readers
who appreciate Keats' odes may also enjoy Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "Dejection: An Ode."
non-restrictive clause
Familiar with the ancient Greek and Roman antecedents, Keats adapted the ode to suit
his own purposes. Greek and Roman odes are closed forms. Keats' odes are open forms.
subordinate clauses
Keats died at the relatively young age of twenty-five, but he wrote some of the most
enduring poems in the English language.
coordinating conjuction
Keats' odes offer touching, heartfelt meditations on human states of mind.
Coordinate adjectives
The ____ of the speaker is the “attitude … manner, mood, and moral outlook” of the
speaker
viewpoint
"a single person speaking alone—with or without an audience."
monologue
"A poem in which there is one imaginary speaker [who is not the poet] addressing an
imaginary audience [who is not the reader]" (216)
dramatic monologue
"the vocabulary used by a writer"
Diction
tone
The _______ of the speaker is, as the introduction puts it, “who [the] ‘I’ or ‘we’ is” in a
poem (22).
Wordsworth
"A group of poets who were prominent immediately before the First World War" who
"believed that a hard, clear image was essential to verse. They also believed that poetry should
use the language [i.e., diction] of everyday speech and have complete freedom in subject
matter (Cuddon 357) (see Slide 4)
imagists
Direct treatment of the "thing" whether subjective or objective.
To use absolutely no word that does not contribute to the presentation.
As regarding rhythm: to compose in the sequence of the musical phrase, not in
sequence of the metronome. (see Slide 3)
3 tenets of imagism
the decorous, elevated, or artificial diction used by poets until the nineteenth century
poetic diction
the most literal and limited meaning of words, regardless of feelings or suggestions
denotation
the suggestion or implication evoked by words, over and above what they denote
_______________, for example, endeavoured to use the “language really used by men”
in his Lyrical Ballads
connotation
a literary and artistic movement of the twentieth century
• innovative and revivifying; a breaking away from established rules, traditions, and
conventions
• endeavoured to articulate new ways of looking at humankind's place in the universe
• marked by wide-ranging experimentation with language, form, style, etc. (e.g., free
verse)
• associated movements include surrealism, structuralism, the avant-garde, French
symbolism, absurdism, etc. (441-42)
modernism
was being used as early as the Middle Ages, but was developed mainly in the twentieth
century by poets such as Whitman, Pound, Eliot, Williams, and others
Free verse
"an extended, often elaborate metaphor which invites an unexpected comparison or
parallel, particularly in poetry"
conceit
"A figure of speech in which the name of an attribute or a thing is substituted for the
thing itself"
metonymy
trope
litotes
cummings
a change in word sound and/or order to achieve an effect. For example, at the beginning
of “The Stenographers,” Page uses alliteration (Cuddon 22-23)—“brief bivouac” (1), “flag,
flutter” (3)—to call attention to the military imagery in the stanza and, by extension, to the
repetitive, almost militarized tedium of the stenographers’ lives.
____________ is strongly associated with the avant-garde, a term denoting a modernist
artistic movement that embraced “exploration, fathfinding, innovation and invention,
something new, something advanced (ahead of its time), and revolutionary”
Scheme
is an alteration of the meaning of a word to extend, alter, or transform its literal
meaning. For example, in “The Stenographers,” Page uses metaphor (Cuddon 433)—“the kites
of their hearts” (18)—and simile (Cuddon 657)—“leave them like rubbish” (20)—to describe the
stenographers. The stenographers are not literally “rubbish,” nor are their “hearts” literally
flightless “kites.” Page is using language figuratively, transforming the literal meanings of “kites”
and “rubbish” to help convey the hopelessness and loneliness of the stenographers’ lives.
contains an understatement
The omission of the last syllable or syllables in a regular metricle line. Often done in
trochaic and dactylic verse to avoid monotony.
catalexis
The omission of slurring of a syllable
elision
ellipsis
pun
• an influential group of Canadian poets who attended McGill University in the 1920s,
including F.R. Scott, A.J.M. Smith, A.M. Klein, and others. • later became associated with other
poets such as P.K. Page. • founded and/or contributed to "little magazines" such as The McGill
Daily Literary Supplement (1924-25), The McGill Fortnightly Review (1925-27), The Canadian
Mercury (1928-29), Preview (1942-45), and others • endeavoured to introduce a modernist
sensibility to Canadian poetry: free verse, Imagism, rhetorical complexity, etc. • published the
seminal anthology of Canadian modernism, New Provinces: Poems of Several Authors (1936)
Montreal group
the use of "long vowels" and "liquid consonants" to produce "pleasing, mellifluous
sounds" (Cuddon 258) (e.g., "murmur of innumerable bees").
Euphony
"The opposite of euphony," the use of short vowels and hard consonants to produce
"Harsh" and dissonant sounds (Cuddon 97) (e.g., "juts of slippery crag that rang").
cacophony
"The formation and use of words to imitate sounds" (Cuddon 493) (e.g., "snap,"
"crackle," "pop").
onomatopoeia
the repetition of consonant sounds, "especially at the beginning of words or stressed
syllables" (e.g., "Five miles meandering with a mazy motion") (Cuddon 22).
alliteration
