Poetry

by Strachan, John; Terry, Richard

• ISBN13: 9780814797976
• ISBN10: 0814797970
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2001-03-01
• Publisher: New York University Press

Summary

Poetry: An Introduction is an accessible and clearly written introduction to the structural and methodological principles underpinning poetry and its study. It aims to equip the student, researcher, and general reader with a body of technical information that will sharpen and deepen their engagement with individual poems.Strachan and Terry provide a lively map through what might on first experience seem the most daunting aspects of poetry: poetic sound effects, rhythm and meter, the typographic display of poems on the page, the language of poetry, and the use made by poets of techniques of comparison and association. The book's discussion of poetic terminology is allied throughout to illustrative readings that show the usefulness of the terminology in approaching particular poems; its emphasis is always a practical one, demonstrating how poems actually work.Beginning with an historical overview of the development of English poetry from its earliest origins and finishing with an authoritative dictionary of poetical terms, Poetry: An Introduction is an indispensable guide to the understanding of poetry.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	vii
Introduction	1	(7)
The key words of poetry	8	(16)
What is poetry?	9	(5)
The key words of English poetic history	14	(10)
The shape of poetry	24	(25)
The aesthetics of print	24	(1)
Pictograms and concrete poems	25	(4)
Visible but unreadable	29	(3)
Layout and punctuation	32	(3)
The poetic stanza and stanzaic form	35	(14)
The sound of poetry	49	(26)
Poetic sound effects: an overview	49	(4)
Onomatopoeia	53	(4)
Sound-patterning	57	(2)
Rhyme	59	(3)
The `orthodox' rhyme	62	(1)
Some `unorthodox' rhymes	63	(6)
Some indeterminacies of rhyme	69	(3)
Rhyme and meaning	72	(3)
Metre and rhythm	75	(40)
Complexities in the study of metre	76	(1)
The key metrical units	77	(4)
Metrical regularity and variance	81	(1)
`Missing' and `extra' syllables	82	(2)
Feet	84	(1)
Iambic metre	84	(9)
Trochic metre	93	(5)
Dactylic metre	98	(1)
Anapaestic metre	99	(2)
Occasional feet	101	(1)
Metrical verse lines	102	(9)
Free verse	111	(4)
Comparisons and associations	115	(27)
Literal v. figurative	115	(1)
Metaphor and simile	116	(3)
Metonymy and synecdoche	119	(4)
Tenor, vehicle and ground	123	(5)
Conceits and extended similes	128	(5)
Dead and dying metaphors	133	(5)
Riddle poems	138	(4)
The words of poetry	142	(25)
Linguistic diversity	142	(4)
Poetic diction	146	(5)
Poetry of the everyday language	151	(2)
Creating your own language	153	(3)
Diction and argots	156	(4)
Poems about language	160	(3)
The Queen's (and other people's) English	163	(4)
A glossary of poetical terms	167	(28)
Index	195