“the sounds of poetry” by john malcolm brinnin with additional commentary (***) by mrs....
TRANSCRIPT
“The Sounds of Poetry” by John Malcolm Brinnin
with additional commentary (***) by Mrs. Berchtold
Essential Question: How is Music like Poetry?
“Mere air these words, but delicious
to hear.” ~Sappho
History of Poetry
• Some writers believe that poetry has its origins in song. Most of the characteristics that distinguish it from other forms of utterance—rhythm, rhyme, compression, intensity of feeling, the use of refrains—appear to have come about from efforts to fit words to musical forms.
• Preliterate societies, lacking the means to write down important cultural information, use similar methods to preserve it.
• The use of verse to transmit cultural information continues today. Many English speaking–Americans know that "in 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue".
Poets ARE Composers
• Poets use many techniques to make music out of words. The most common sound effects used in poetry are also used in the songs you love to listen to.
• Like musicians, poets are also concerned with sounds. Imagine a composer of music trying various patterns of notes on a piano in order to create a pleasing melody. That will give you a good idea of what poets try to do with words.
• Poets choose their words with great care. They revise them repeatedly, trying to find the combination that will produce just the right sound – perhaps a harsh sound, a musical sound, or a sound that matches the gallop of a horse.
• A poet’s goal is to create sounds that will match the feelings and ideas they want to share with us.
Rhythm: The Rise and Fall of Our Voices
• Rhythm refers to the rise and fall of our voices as we use language. As in music, a poem’s rhythm can be fast or slow, light or solemn. A poem might also sound just like everyday speech.
• A poem’s rhythm can be shown by using accent marks ( / ) for stressed syllables and cups ( ᵕ ) for unstressed syllables.
• The process of marking is called scanning (scansion).
“Stress”
• ***You all know what “stress” is; you use it every day when you speak! If we didn’t, we would sound monotone and extremely boring! – Think Ben Stein! ->
• Sometimes, stress can even CHANGE the word entirely!
Click to play
Scan Each of the Following ( / ) ( ᵕ )
• The farm was used to produce produce.• The rebel soldier decided to rebel against his
leaders decision.• The dump was so full that it had to refuse more
refuse.• He thought it was time to present the present.• I did not object to the object.• The insurance was invalid for the invalid.• I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
Poetic Meter
No!!
Yes!!
Meter
• Poetry that is written in meter has a regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables.
• When poets write in meter, they count out the number of stressed syllables (or strong beats) and unstressed syllables (weaker beats) in each line.
• They repeat the pattern throughout the poem.
Shakespeare’s Sonnet #18. Use accent marks and cups
as you scan for stress, or meter.
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?Thou art more lovely and more temperate:Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,And often is his gold complexion dimed,And every fair from fair sometime declines,By chance, or nature’s changing course untrimmed.
Sonnet 18 Cont.
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,Nor shall death brag thou wand’rest in his shade,When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st,So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
The Sound of Shakespeare
• ***ALL of Shakespeare’s Sonnets (over 300!) use Iambic PentaMETER.
• Why? Because it mimics the human heartbeat!
• daDUM daDUM daDUM daDUM daDUM.• Heartbeat = LOVE! Love poetry!
More on Meter:
• Some poets try to avoid a singsong effect by varying the basic pattern from time to time.
• Try reading aloud the following lines from a famous poem called The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Can you hear that each line has four stressed syllables alternating with four unstressed syllables? Scan the poem as you read.
Day after day, day after day,We stuck, nor breath nor motion;As idle as a painted shipUpon a painted ocean.
Free Verse
• Some poets abandon a strict meter form altogether, opting instead to use free verse; poetry that is written without having a regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables. Free verse sounds just like ordinary speech.
Rhyme
• Rhyme is the repetition of the sound of a stressed syllable and any unstressed syllables that follow: – sport and court– smother and another– sputtering and muttering
• The echoing effect of rhyme gives us pleasure. It makes us look forward to hearing certain sounds throughout the poem.
Placement of Rhyme
• Rhymes like motion/ocean in Coleridge’s verse are called end rhymes because they occur at the ends of lines.
Internal Rhyme
• Internal rhymes occur within lines, as in this line from the same poem:
The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew, and the furrow flowed free.
Rhyme Scheme
• Poets will often use a pattern of rhymes, called a rhyme scheme. To describe a rhyme scheme, assign a new letter of the alphabet to each new end rhyme.
There are Too Many Kids in the Tub by Shel Silverstein
There’s too many kids in the tub, AThere’s too many elbows to scrub. AI just washed a behind that I’m sure wasn’t mine, BThere are too many kids in the tub. A
