Scansion
Scansion
by Bryan Lucky, Hazkel Rinaldi
Scansion is the process of analyzing poems into stanzas, lines, pauses, rhythm, rhyme and syllables.
Stanza and Lines
A stanza is a division of four or more lines having a fixed length, meter, or rhyming scheme. Basically a stanza is a group of lines in a poem that have some similarities.
Pauses
When you analyze people reading in a poem it is very important to know why they pause in some lines of the poem. People pause reading a poem to emphasize the line or the word in that poem. People pause so they can give an emotional effect to people who are hearing them. When we are going to analyze a poem by hearing it we should never forget that pausing has meaning behind it.
Rhythm
Rhythm is a literary device that demonstrates the long and short patterns through stressed and unstressed syllables, particularly in verse form. A rhythm is a very important part of poetry. When someone reads a poetry they need to have the perfect rhythm for that poem. In a sad poem people will have a slow rhythm. In a motivational poem people tend to have a faster rhythm than in a sad poem.
Types of rhythm :
1. Random
2. Progressive
3. Regular
4. Flowing
Syllables
Unstressed Syllables = A half circle (U)
An unstressed syllable is the part of the word that you don't emphasize or accent
Stressed syllables = Small line (‘)
Word stress is the idea that in a word with more than one syllable, one (or more than one) syllable will be stressed or accented
Meter
Definition of Meter
Meter is a stressed and unstressed syllabic pattern in a verse, or within the lines of a poem. Stressed syllables tend to be longer, and unstressed shorter. Meter is a poetic device that serves as a linguistic sound pattern for the verses, as it gives poetry a rhythmical and melodious sound. For instance, if you read a poem aloud, and it produces regular sound patterns, then this poem would be a metered or measured poem. The study of different types of versification and meters is known as “prosody.”
Types of Meter
English poetry employs five basic meters, including:
1. Iambic meter (unstressed/stressed)
2. Trochaic meter (stressed/unstressed)
3. Spondaic meter, (stressed/stressed)
4. Anapestic meter (unstressed/unstressed/ stressed)
5. Dactylic meter (stressed/unstressed/unstressed)
Qualitative Meter
Qualitative meter contains stressed syllables with regular intervals, such as iambic pentameter containing even numbered syllables.
Quantitative Meter
Quantitative meter, however, is based on syllabic weight, and not stressed patterns such as dactylic hexameters of classical Greek and classical Latin. However, classical Arabic and Sanskrit also have used this meter. Poets like Virgil used quantitative meter in Aeneid, and Homer used it in Iliad.
Iamb Meter
Iamb meter has the first syllable unaccented and the second accented. Here are examples:
· That time l of year l thou mayst l in me l behold
Trochee Meter
Trochee meter has the first syllable accented and the second unaccented. Here are examples:
· Tell me | not in l mournful l numbers
Dactyl Meter
Dactyl meter has the first syllable accented and the second and third unaccented. Here are examples:
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volley'd and thunder'd; - Alfred Lord Tennyson's "The Charge of the Light Brigade"
Anapest Meter
Anapest meter has the first two syllables unaccented and the third syllable accented. Here are examples:
· And the sound l of a voice l that is still
Spondee
A metrical foot, spondee is a beat in a poetic line that consists of two accented syllables (stressed/stressed) or DUM-DUM stress pattern.
Examples of Spondee in Literature
Example #1: The Song of Hiawatha (By Henry Wordsworth Longfellow)
“By the shore of Gitche Gumee,
By the shining Big–Sea–Water,
At the doorway of his wigwam,…
All the air was full of freshness,
All the earth was bright and joyous,
And before him, through the sunshine,
Westward toward the neighboring forest…
Burning, singing in the sunshine.”
Longfellow has written this poem in tetrameter, which means the lines of this poem contains four beats, in which three beats are of spondee and one of trochee. Here, the spondaic feet are underlined.
Rhyme
A rhyme is a repetition of similar sounding words, occurring at the end of lines in poems. There are types of rhyme. There are :
· Internal rhyme : When words within the same line rhyme (Ex : Napping and Tapping)
· Masculine rhyme : Rhyme on one syllable only (Ex : Beaver and Silver)
· Feminine rhyme : Rhyme on two syllable (Ex : Suspended and Defended)
· Ear rhyme : A true rhyme when spoken aloud, but looks as if it shouldn’t be by its spelling (Ex : Cough and Off)
· Eye rhyme : A rhyme that looks like as if it should rhyme from spelling but doesn’t (Ex : Rough and Cough)
Analysis :
- She uses flowing rhythm
- She uses stressed syllables in some of the words (Home, Thunder, I would burn you, etc)
- The 1 and 5 line is one stanza
- She uses masculine rhyme (Blush, Touch)(Me, Need)
- She pauses before the end to emphasize the line (don’t come here with expectation) she emphasize it because she wants men to know that woman doesn’t need to fulfill the men expectation
If you forget Me – Pablo Neruda
‘ ‘ U ‘ ‘
I want you to know
U U
one thing.
U ‘ ‘ U ‘
You know how this is:
‘ U U
if I look
‘ ‘ ‘ U ‘ ‘ ‘ U U
at the crystal moon, at the red branch
‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ U ‘ U U ‘
of the slow autumn at my window,
‘ U U
if I touch
‘ ‘ U
near the fire
‘ ‘ U ‘ U ‘
the impalpable ash
‘ U U ‘ ‘ U ‘ U U
or the wrinkled body of the log,
U ‘ U U ‘ U ‘ U
everything carries me to you,
‘ ‘ U ‘ U U ‘ U
as if everything that exists,
‘ ‘ U U ‘ U
aromas, light, metals,
‘ U ‘ U
were little boats
‘ ‘
that sail
‘ U ‘ ‘ ‘ U ‘ ‘ U U
toward those isles of yours that wait for me. .
Scansion using Stressed and unstressed syllables
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