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Composition Rhetoric by Stratton D. Brooks

S >> Stratton D. Brooks >> Composition Rhetoric





(3)
_________________________________________________________________
| |
| My dear Blanche, |
| |
| Mr. Gilmore and I are planning for a little party |
| Thursday evening of this week. I hope you have no other |
| engagement for that evening, as we shall be pleased to have |
| you with us. |
| Very cordially yours, |
| Margaret Gilmore. |
| |


(4)
______________________________________________________________
| |
| My dear Margaret, |
| |
| Fortunately I have no other engagement for this |
| week Thursday evening, and I shall be delighted to spend an |
| evening with you and your friends. |
| |
| Very sincerely yours, |
| Blanche A. Church. |
| |


EXERCISE

Write the following informal notes:--

1. Write to a friend, asking him or her to lend you a book.

2. Write an invitation to an informal trolley, tennis, or golf party.

3. Write the reply.

4. Invite one of your friends to spend his or her vacation with you.

5. Write a note to your sister, asking her to send you your theme that you
left at home this morning.

6. Mrs. Edgar A. Snow invites Miss Mabel Minard to dine with her. Write
out the invitation.

7. Write the acceptance.




VII. POETRY

[Footnote: _To the Teacher._--Since the expression of ideas in metrical
form is seldom the one best suited to the conditions of modern life, it
has not seemed desirable to continue the themes throughout this chapter.
The study of this chapter, with suitable illustrations from the poems to
which the pupils have access, may serve to aid them in their appreciation
of poetry. This appreciation of poetry will be increased if the pupils
attempt some constructive work. It is recommended, therefore, that one or
more of the simpler kinds of metrical composition be tried. For example,
one or two good ballads may be read and the pupils asked to write similar
ones. Some pupils may be able to write blank verse.]

+107. Purpose of Poetry.+--All writing aims to give information or to
furnish entertainment (Section 54). Often the same theme may both inform
and entertain, though one of these purposes may be more prominent than the
other. Prose may merely entertain, or it may so distinctly attempt to set
forth ideas clearly that the giving of pleasure is entirely neglected. In
poetry the entertainment side is never thus subordinated. Poetry always
aims to please by the presentation of that which is beautiful. All real
poetry produces an aesthetic effect by appealing to our aesthetic sense;
that is, to our love of the beautiful.

In making this appeal to our love of the beautiful, poetry depends both
upon the ideas it contains and upon the forms it uses. Like prose, it
may increase its aesthetic effect by appropriate phrasing, effective
arrangement, and subtle suggestiveness, but it also makes use of certain
devices of language such as rhythm, rhyme, etc., which, though they may
occur in writings that would be classed as prose, are characteristic of
poetry. Much depends upon the ideas that poetry contains; for mere
nonsense, though in perfect rhyme and rhythm, is not poetry. But it is not
the idea alone which makes a poem beautiful; it is the form as well. The
merely trivial cannot be made beautiful by giving it poetical form, but
there are many poems containing ideas of small importance which please us
because of the perfection of form. We enjoy them as we do the singing of
the birds or the murmuring of the brooks. In fact, poetry is inseparable
from its characteristic forms. To sort out, re-arrange, and paraphrase
into second-class prose the ideas which a poem contains is a profitless
and harmful exercise, because it emphasizes the intellectual side of a
work which was created for the purpose of appealing to our aesthetic
sense.

+108. Rhythm.+--There are several forms characteristic of poetry, by the
use of which its beauty and effectiveness are enhanced. Of these, rhythm
is the most prominent one, without which no poetry is possible. In its
widest sense, rhythm indicates a regular succession of motions, impulses,
sounds, accents, etc., producing an agreeable effect. Rhythm in poetry
consists of the recurrence of accented and unaccented syllables in regular
succession. In poetry, care must be taken to make the accented syllable of
a word come at the place where the rhythm demands an accent. The regular
recurrence of accented and unaccented syllables produces a harmony which
appeals to our aesthetic sense and thus enhances for us the beauty of
poetry. Read the following selections so as to show the rhythm:--


1.

We were crowded in the cabin;
Not a soul would dare to speak;
It was midnight on the waters
And a storm was on the deep.

--James T. Fields.


2.

Break, break, break,
At the foot of thy crags, O sea!
But the tender grace of a day that is dead
Will never come back to me.

--Tennyson.


3.

Ah, distinctly I remember, it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor

--Poe.


4.

Sweet and low, sweet and low,
Wind of the western sea,
Low, low, breathe and blow,
Wind of the western sea!

Over the rolling waters go,
Come from the dying moon and blow,
Blow him again to me;
While my little one, while my pretty one sleeps.

--Tennyson.


5.

Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage;
Minds innocent and quiet take
That for a hermitage.

--Lovelace.


6.

Merrily swinging on brier and weed,
Near to the nest of his little dame,
Over the mountain side or mead,
Robert of Lincoln is telling his name:
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,
Spink, spank, spink,
Snug and safe is this nest of ours,
Hidden among the summer flowers.
Chee, chee, chee.

--Bryant.


7.

Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be,
The last of life, for which the first was made:
Our times are in His hand
Who saith, "A whole I planned,
Youth shows but half; trust God: see all, nor be afraid!"

--Browning.


+109. Feet.+--The metrical effect of the preceding selections is produced
by the regular recurrence of accented and unaccented syllables. A group of
accented and unaccented syllables is called a foot. There are four regular
feet in English verse, the iambus, the anapest, the trochee, and the
dactyl. Three irregular feet, the pyrrhic, the spondee, the amphibrach,
are occasionally found in lines, but not in entire poems, and are often
considered merely as substitutes for regular feet. For the sake of
convenience the accented syllables are indicated thus: _, and the
unaccented syllables thus: U.

_An iambus_ is a foot consisting of two syllables with the accent on the
last.


U _| U _| U _| U _| U _|
Let not ambition mock their useful toil.

--Gray.


U _|U _| U _|U _|
He prayeth best who loveth best

U _| U _| U _|
All things both great and small;

_ U | U _| U _|U _|
For the dear God who loveth us,

U _| U _|U _|
He made and loveth all.

--Coleridge.


_An anapest_ is a foot consisting of three syllables with the accent on
the last.


U U _| U U _|U U _|
I am monarch of all I survey.
U U _ | U U _ | U U _ |
I would hide with the beasts of the chase.


_A trochee_ is a foot consisting of two syllables with the accent on the
first.


_ U | _ U | _ U | _ U|
Double, double, toil and trouble.

--Shakespeare.


_ U | _ U |_ U |_ U |
Let us then be up and doing,
_ U| _ U | _U | _ |
With a heart for any fate,
_ U |_ U | _ U|_ U |
Still achieving, still pursuing,
_ U | _ U |_ U | _ |
Learn to labor and to wait.

--Longfellow.


_A dactyl_ is a foot consisting of three syllables with the accent on the
first.


_ U U | _ U U |
Cannon to right of them,
_ U U | _ U U |
Cannon to left of them,
_ U U | _ U U |
Cannon in front of them,
_ U U |_ U |
Volleyed and thundered.

--Tennyson.


It will be convenient to remember that two of these, the iambus and the
anapest, have the accent on the last syllable, and that two, the trochee
and the dactyl, have the accent on the first syllable.


_A spondee_ is a foot consisting of two syllables, both of which are
accented about equally. It is an unusual foot in English poetry.


U _ | _ _ | U _| U _ |
Come now, blow, Wind, and waft us o'er.


_A pyrrhic_ is a foot consisting of two syllables both of which are
unaccented. It is frequently found at the end of a line.


U _ | U _ | U _|U U
Life is so full of misery.


_An amphibrach_ is a foot consisting of three syllables, with
the accent on the second.


U _ U U _ U| U _ U| U _ |
Creator, Preserver, Redeemer and friend.


+110. Names of Verse.+--A single line of poetry is called a verse. A
stanza is composed of several verses. When a verse consists of one foot,
it is called a monometer; of two feet, a dimeter; of three feet, a
trimeter; of four feet, a tetrameter; of five feet, a pentameter; and of
six feet, a hexameter.

_ U
Monometer. Slowly.


_ U U| _ U U |
Dimeter. Emblem of happiness.


_ U| _U| _ U |
Trimeter. Like a poet hidden.


_ U| _ U| _ U | _ U |
Tetrameter. Tell me not in mournful numbers.


U _ |U _ |U _| U _ | U _ |
Pentameter. O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath.


_ U U | _ U U | _ U U | _ U U | _ U
Hexameter. This is the forest primeval; the murmuring pines and
U | _ U |
the hemlocks.


When we say that a verse is of any particular kind, we do not mean that
every foot in that line is necessarily of the same kind. Verse is named by
stating first the prevailing foot which composes it, and second the number
of feet in a line. A verse having four iambic feet is called iambic
tetrameter. So we have dactylic hexameter, trochaic pentameter, iambic
trimeter, anapestic dimeter, etc.


EXERCISES


_A._ Mark the accented and unaccented syllables in the following
selections, and name the kind of verse:--

1.

Build me straight, O worthy Master!
Stanch and strong, a goodly vessel
That shall laugh at all disaster
And with wave and whirlwind wrestle.

--Longfellow.


2.

I know not where His islands lift
Their fronded palms in air,
I only know I cannot drift
Beyond His love and care.

--Whittier.


3.

For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crossed the bar.

--Tennyson.


4.

Chanting of labor and craft, and of Wealth in the pot and the
garner;
Chanting of valor and fame, and the man who can, fall with the
foremost,
Fighting for children and wife, and the field which his father
bequeathed him,
Sweetly and solemnly sang she, and planned new lessons for
mortals.

--Kingsley.


5.

Have you read in the Talmud of old,
In the Legends the Rabbins have told,
Of the limitless realms of the air,
Have you read it,--the marvelous story
Of Sandalphon, the Angel of Glory,
Of Sandalphon, the Angel of Prayer?

--Longfellow.


_B._ 1. Find three poems written in iambic verse, and three written in
trochaic verse.

2. Write at least one stanza, using iambic verse.

3. Write at least one stanza, using the same kind of verse that you find
in Tennyson's "Charge of the Light Brigade."

4. Write two anapestic lines.


+111. Variation in Rhythm.+--The name given to a verse is determined by
the foot which prevails, but not every foot in the line needs to be of the
same kind. Just as in music we may substitute a quarter for two eighth
notes, so may we in poetry substitute one foot for another, provided it is
given the same amount of time.

Notice in the following that the rhythm is perfect and the beat regular,
although a three-syllable anapest has been substituted in the second line
for a two-syllable iambus:--


U _ | U _ | U _ | U _ | U _ |
Beneath those rugged elms, that yew tree's shade,
U _ | U _ | U _| U U _ | U _ |
Where heaves the turf in many a moldring heap,
_ U | U _ | U _ | U _ |U _ |
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
U _ | U _ | U _ | U _ | U _ |
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.


The following from _Evangeline_ illustrates the substitution of trochees
for dactyls:--


_ U U | _ U | _ U U | _ U U | _ U U | _ U |
Waste are those pleasant farms, and the farmers forever departed.

_ U U | _ U | _ U U | _ U | _ U U|_ U
Scattered like dust and leaves, when the mighty blasts of October

_ U U | _ U U |_ U | _ U U | _ U U |_ U |
Seize them and whirl them aloft, and sprinkle them far o'er the ocean.

_ U U | _ U U | _ U U | _ U U | _ U U | _ U
Naught but tradition remains of the beautiful village of Grand-Pre.


It is evident that one foot can be substituted for another if the accent
is not changed. Since both the iambus and the anapest are accented on the
last syllable, they may be interchanged. The trochee and the dactyl are
both accented on the first syllable and may, therefore, be interchanged.

There are some exceptions to the general rule that in substituting one
foot for another the accented syllable must be kept in the same part of
the foot. Occasionally a poem in which the prevailing foot is iambic has a
trochee for the first foot of a line in order that it may begin with an
accented syllable. At the beginning of a line the change of accent is
scarcely noticeable.


_ U | U _ | U _ |U _ |
Over the rail my hand I trail.

_ U | U _ | U _ | U _ |
Silent the crumbling bridge we cross!


But if the reader has once fallen into the swing of iambic verse, the
substitution of a trochee will bring the accent at an unexpected place,
interrupt the smooth flow of the rhythm, and produce a harsh and jarring
effect. Such a change of accent is justified only when the sense of the
verse leads the reader to expect the changed accent, or when the emphasis
thus given to the sense of the poem more than compensates for the break in
the rhythm produced by the change of accent.

Another form of metrical variation is that in which there are too few or
too many syllables in a foot. This generally occurs at the end of a line,
but may occur at the beginning. If a syllable is added or omitted
skillfully, the rhythm will be unbroken.

When the feet are accented on the last syllable,--that is, when the verse
is iambic or anapestic,--an extra syllable may be added at the end of a
line.


U _ |U U _ |U _ | U
I stood on the bridge at midnight,

U U _ | U _ |U U _ |
As the clocks were striking the hour;

U U _ | U _ | U _|U
And the Moon rose o'er the city,

U _ | U _ | U _ |
Behind the dark church tower.

--Longfellow.


U _ | U _ |U _ | U _ | U _ | U _ |
Girt round with rugged moun[tains], the fair Lake Constance lies,

U _ | U _ | U _ | U _ | U _ |U _ |
In her blue heart reflect[ed] shine back the starry skies;

U _ | U _ | U _ | U _ |U _ | U _ |
And watching each white cloud[let] float silently and slow,

U _ | U _ | U _ | U _| U _ | U _|
You think a piece of heav[en] lies on our earth below.

--Adelaide A. Procter.


In the second illustration the extra syllables have the same relative
position in the metrical scheme as in the first, though they appear to be
in the middle of the line. The pauses fill in the time and preserve the
rhythm unbroken.

When the feet are accented on the first syllable--as in trochaic or
dactylic verse--a syllable may be omitted from the end of a line as in the
second and fourth below.


_ U U | _ U U | _ U U| _ U |
Up with the lark in the first flush of morning,

_ U U | _ U U | _ U U | _ |
Ere the world wakes to its work or its play;

_ U U| _ U U | _ U U | _ U |
Off for a spin to the wide-stretching country,

_ U U | _ U U | _ U U|_ |
Far from the close, stifling city away.


Sometimes we find it necessary to suppress a syllable in order to make the
rhythm more nearly perfect. Syllables may be suppressed in two ways: by
suppressing a vowel at the end of a word when the next word commences with
a vowel; by suppressing a vowel within a word. The former method is termed
elision, and the latter, slurring.


U _ | U _ |U _ | U _ | U _ |
Thou glorious mirror where the Almighty's form
U U

_ U |U _| U _ | U
Glasses itself in tempests.

--Byron.


An accented syllable often takes the place of an entire foot. This occurs
most frequently at the end of a line, but it is sometimes found at the
beginning. Occasionally whole lines are formed in this way. If a pause or
rest is made, the rhythm will be unbroken.


u _ | u _ | u _ |
Break, break, break,

U U _ | U _ | U _ |
On thy cold gray stones, O sea!

U U _ | U U _ | U _|U
And I would that my tongue could utter

U _ | U U _ |U _|
The thoughts that arise in me.

--Tennyson.


We frequently find verses in which a syllable is lacking at the close of
the line; we also find many verses in which an extra syllable is added.
Verse that contains the number of syllables required by its meter is said
to be acatalectic; if it contains more than the required number of
syllables, it is said to be hypercatalectic; and if it lacks a syllable,
it is termed catalectic. It is difficult to tell whether a line has the
required number of syllables or not when it is taken by itself; but by
comparing it with the line prevailing in the rest of the stanza we are
enabled to tell whether it is complete or not. Shakespeare's _Julius
Caesar_ is written in iambic pentameter verse. Knowing this, we can detect
the hypercatalectic and catalectic lines.


U _| U _ | U _| U _| U _ |
You all did see that on the Lupercal

U _ | U _| U _ |U _| U _|
I thrice presented him a kingly crown

U _| U _ |U _ | U _ | U _| U
Which he did thrice refuse. Was this ambition?

U _| U _ | U _ | U _ | U
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious.

--Shakespeare.


+112. Cesura.+--Besides the pauses caused by rests or silences there is
the cesural pause which needs to be considered in reading verse. A cesura
is a pause determined by the sense. It coincides with some break in the
sense. It is found in different parts of the verse and may be entirely
lacking. Its observance does not noticeably interfere with the rhythm. In
the following selection it is marked thus: ||.


U _ | U _ | U _| U _ |
The sun came up || upon the left,

_ U| U _ | U _ |
Out of the sea || came he;

U _| U _ | U _| U _|
And he shone bright, || and on the right

U _ | U_ | U _ |
Went down || into the sea

--Coleridge.


Lives of great men || all remind us
We can make our lives || sublime,
And, departing, || leave behind us,
Footprints || on the sands of time.

--Longfellow.


Read the selections on page 197 so as to indicate the position of the
cesural pauses.


+113. Scansion.+--Scansion is the separation of a line into the feet which
compose it. In order to scan a line we must determine the rhythmic
movement of it. The rhythmic movement determines the accented syllables.
Sometimes in scanning, merely the accented syllables are marked. Usually
the whole metrical scheme is indicated, as in the examples on page 199.


EXERCISE


Scan the following selections. Note substitutions and
elusions.


1.

The night has a thousand eyes,
And the day but one;
Yet the light of the bright world dies
With the dying sun.
The mind has a thousand eyes,
And the heart but one;
Yet the light of a whole life dies
When love is gone.

--Francis W. Bourdillon.


2.

Laugh, and the world laughs with you,
Weep, and you weep alone;
For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth,
But has trouble enough of its own.

--Ella Wheeler Wilcox.


3.

Hear the robin in the rain,
Not a note does he complain.
But he fills the storm refrain
With music of his own.

--Charles Coke Woode.


4.

The mistletoe hung in the castle hall,
The holly branch shone on the old back wall
And the baron's retainers are blithe and gay,
And keeping their Christmas holiday.

--Thomas Haynes Bagley.


+114. Rhyme.+--Rhyme is a regular recurrence of similar sounds. In a broad
sense, it may include sounds either terminal or not, but as here used it
refers to terminal sounds.

Just as we expect a recurrence of accent in a line, so may we expect a
recurrence of similar sounds at the end of certain lines of poetry. The
interval between the rhymes may be of different lengths in different
poems, but when the interval is once established, it should be followed
throughout the poem. A rhyme out of place jars upon the rhythmic
perfection of a stanza just as an accent out of place interferes with the
rhythm of the verse.

Not only should the rhymes occur at expected places, but they should be
the expected rhymes; that is, real rhymes. If we are expecting a word
which will rhyme with _blossom_ and find _bosom_, or if we are expecting a
rhyme for _breath_ and find _beneath_, the effect is unpleasant. The
rhymes named above are based on spelling, while a real rhyme is based on
sound. A correct rhyme should have precisely the same vowel sounds and the
final consonants should be the same, but the initial consonant should be
different. For example: _death, breath; home, roam; tongue, young;
debating, relating_.

Notice the arrangement of the rhymes in the following selections:--


1.

My soul to-day is far away,
Sailing the Vesuvian Bay;
My winged boat, a bird afloat,
Swims round the purple peaks remote.

--T. Buchanan Read.


2.

I come from haunts of coot and hern,
I make a sudden sally,
And sparkle out among the fern,
To bicker down the valley.

By thirty hills I hurry down,
Or slip between the ridges,
By twenty thorps, a little town,
And half a hundred bridges.

--Tennyson.


3.

I know it is a sin
For me to sit and grin
At him here;
But the old three-cornered hat
And the breeches, and all that,
Are so queer!

--Holmes.


4.

The splendor falls on castle walls
And snowy summits old in story;
The long light shakes across the lakes
And the wild cataract leaps in glory.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying;
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

--Tennyson.


5.

Breathes there a man with soul so dead
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land!
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned
As home his footsteps he hath turned
From wandering in a foreign strand!
If such there be, go mark him well:
For him no minstrel raptures swell;
High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim:
Despite those titles, power, and pelf,
The wretch concentered all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust from whence he sprung,
Unwept, unhonored, and unsung.

--Scott.


+115. Blank Verse.+--When rhyme is omitted, we have blank verse. This is
the most dignified of all kinds of verse, and is, therefore, appropriate
for epic and dramatic poetry, where it is chiefly found. Most blank verse
makes use of the iambic pentameter measure, but we find many exceptions.
Read the following examples of blank verse so as to show the rhythm:--


1.

So live, that when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan that moves
To the pale realms of shade, where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not like the quarry slave at night
Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach the grave
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.

--Bryant.


2.

I stood upon the steps--
The last who left the door--and there I found
The lady and her friend. The elder turned
And with a cordial greeting took my hand,
And rallied me on my forgetfulness.
Her eyes, her smile, her manner, and her voice.
Touched the quick springs of memory, and I spoke
Her name. She was my mother's early friend
Whose face I had not seen in all the years
That had flown over us, since, from her door,
I chased her lamb to where I found--myself.