The Ode Less Travelled Unlocking the Poet Within

by Fry, Stephen

• ISBN13: 9781592402489
• ISBN10: 1592402488
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-08-17
• Publisher: Gotham

Summary

I have a dark and dreadful secret. I write poetry... I believe poetry is a primal impulse within all of us. I believe we are all capable of it and furthermore that a small, often ignored corner of us positively yearns to try it. —Stephen Fry, The Ode Less Travelled Stephen Fry believes that if one can speak and read English, one can write poetry. Many of us have never been taught to read or write poetry and think of it as a mysterious and intimidating form. Or, if we have been taught, we remember uncomfortable silence when an English teacher invited the class to "respond" to a poem. In The Ode Less Travelled, Fry sets out to correct this problem by giving aspiring poets the tools and confidence they need to write poetry for pleasure.Fry is a wonderfully engaging teacher and writer of poetry himself, and he explains the various elements of poetry in simple terms, without condescension. His enjoyable exercises and witty insights introduce the concepts of Metre, Rhyme, Form, Diction, and Poetics. Aspiring poets will learn to write a sonnet, on ode, a villanelle, a ballad, and a haiku, among others. Along the way, he introduces us to poets we've heard of, but never read. The Ode Less Travelledis a lively celebration of poetry that makes even the most reluctant reader want to pick up a pencil and give it a try. BACKCOVER: Advanced Praise: Delightfully erudite, charming and soundly pedagogical guide to poetic form… Fry has created an invaluable and highly enjoyable reference book.” —Publishers Weekly A smart, sane and entertaining return to the basics… If you like Fry’s comic manner… this book has a lot of charm… People entirely fresh to the subject could do worse than stick with his cheerful leadership.” —The Telegraph(UK) …intelligent and informative, a worthy enterprise well executed.” —Observer(UK) "If you learn how to write a sonnet, and Fry shows you how, you may or may not make a poem. But you will unlock the stored wisdom of the form itself." —Grey Gowrie, The Spectator(UK) …intelligent and informative, a worthy enterprise well executed.” —Observer(UK)

Author Biography

Stephen Fry is a bestselling novelist, comedian, and actor who has appeared in such films as A Fish Called Wanda, Wilde, A Civil Action, Bright Young Things, Gosford Park, and V for Vendetta.

Table of Contents

Foreword	xiii
How to Read this Book. Three Golden Rules	xxiii
Metre
How We Speak. Meet Metre. The Great Iamb. The Iambic Pentameter. Poetry Exercises 1 & 2	1	(20)
End-stopping, Enjambment and Caesura. Poetry Exercise 3. Weak Endings, Trochaic and Pyrhhic Substitutions. Substitutions. Poetry Exercise 4	21	(34)
More Metres: Four Beats to the Line. Mixed Feet. Poetry Exercise 5	55	(22)
Ternary Feet: The Dactyl, The Molossus and Tribrach, The Amphibrach, The Amphimacer, Quaternary Feet. Poetry Exercise 6	77	(20)
Anglo-Saxon Attitudes. Poetry Exercise 7. Sprung Rhythm	97	(16)
Syllabic Verse. Poetry Exercises 8 & 9: Coleridge's `Lesson for a Boy'	113	(10)
Table of Metric Feet	120	(3)
Rhyme
The Basic Categories of Rhyme. Partial Rhymes. Feminine and Triple Rhymes. Rich Rhyme	123	(20)
Rhyming Arrangements	143	(4)
Good and Bad Rhyme? A Thought Experiment. Rhyming Practice and Rhyming Dictionaries. Poetry Exercise 10	147	(24)
Rhyme Categories	168	(3)
Form
The Stanza. What is Form and Why Bother with It?	171	(8)
Stanzaic Variations. Open Forms: Terza Rima. The Quatrain, The Rubai, Rhyme Royal, Otrava Rima, Spenserian Stanza. Adopting and Adapting. Poetry Exercise 11	179	(12)
The Ballad. Poetry Exercise 12	191	(10)
Heroic Verse. Poetry Exercise 13	201	(8)
The Ode: Sapphic. Pindaric. Horatian. The Lyric Ode. Anacreontics	209	(12)
Closed Forms: The Villanelle. Poetry Exercise 14. The Sestina. Poetry Exercise 15. The Pantoum. The Ballade	221	(26)
More Closed Forms: Rondeau, Rondeau Redouble, Rondel, Roundel, Rondelet, Roundelay, Triolet, Kyrielle. Poetry Exercise 16	247	(14)
Comic Verse: Cento, The Clerihew. The Limerick. Reflections on Comic and Impolite Verse. Light Verse. Parody. Poetry Exercise 17	261	(13)
Exotic Forms: Haiku, Senryu, Tanka. Ghazal. Luc Bat. Tanaga. Poetry Exercise 18	274	(7)
The Sonnet: Petrarchan and Shakespearean. Curtal and caudate sonnets. Sonnet Variations and Romantic Duels. Poetry Exercise 19	281	(12)
Shaped Verse. Pattern Poems. Silly, Silly Forms. Acrostics. Poetry Exercise 20	293	(14)
Diction and Poetics Today
The Whale. The Cat and the Act. Madeline. Diction. Being Alert to Language	307	(13)
Poetic Vices. Ten Habits of Successful Poets that They Don't Teach You at Harvard Poetry School, or Chicken Verse for the Soul Is from Mars but You Are What You Read in Just Seven Days or Your Money Back. Getting Noticed. Poetry Today. Goodbye	320	(9)
Incomplete Glossary of Poetic Terms	329	(22)
Appendix -- Arnaud's Algorithm	351	(2)
Acknowledgements	353	(4)
Further Reading	357