What's wrong with free verse?
Vader9182
poetry MUST rhyme and the free verse is wrong. Why?
Bruce Chand
Peikoff maintains that, by definition, poetry must have a meter and rhyme,
but that's it.
A free verse can be art, and it can be good or bad art, but just do not call
it poetry.
That's all that Peikoff advises.
"Vader9182" <vade...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20010703233534...@ng-mo1.aol.com...
David Friedman
Bruce Chand <bch...@aol.com> wrote:
> I have heard him speak about this in person, and you are only partly right.
> Peikoff maintains that, by definition, poetry must have a meter and rhyme,
> but that's it.
It has to have both? So "To be or not to be," and almost everything else
in Shakespeare's plays, isn't poetry?
Are you sure it isn't meter or rhyme? And do you have any idea how he
defines meter? In English language poetry, meter is defined by stress on
syllables, but that isn't true in general.
--
David Friedman
www.daviddfriedman.com/
Mar...@lara.pathlink.com
In ancient Greek, verse had very definite METER, but not rhyme.
In Latin, rhyme and meter were both important, but you could sacrifice meter to
maintain rhyme, thus the hiatus of the caeseron where you hold a syllable long
to fill out the foot.
In Anglo-Saxon, poetry was alliterative. The repetition of the initial (or
medial) consonants provided pleasing proportions and banished the bumping and
banging of Greek feet.
English is a rich language -- perhaps the richest ever and not likely to be
soon
eclipsed. Poetry in modern English rhymes and maintains its meter.
Blank verse is to poetry what a sketch is to a painting. Sketches are valid as
art forms, but they are not paintings, and cannot be passed off as such. Then
we get into mixed media -- can I wash the sketch with water color and hight
light
it with ink? Art is what it is to the beholder. Period.
The artist beholds their own work, but has no control over the minds of others
who may or may not perceive in the work what the artist intended for better or
for worse. Regarding television, Rand found heroism in the Avengers and
Charlie's Angels, independent of what the producers, directors, and writers
intended. To say that poetry is this or must be that is fine, perhaps, for
someone who has put bread on their table as a poet. I have; has Peikoff? (Mine
rhymed and scanned, by the way: I followed the rules; it was my choice to do
so.)
Mar...@lara.pathlink.com
>I have encountered a few times in Peikoff's works words to the effect that
>poetry MUST rhyme and the free verse is wrong. Why?
(See my earlier post on why Peikoff doe not know jack about poetry.)
Then on the other hand, you have the fact that people who actually use the
English language well really work hard at saying exactly the right thing with
exactly the right words in a framework that rhymes and scans to support the
IDEA
communicated by the poem. Opposed to this you have non-conceptual whiners who
pour their incoherent feelings out on paper with no thought. People of the
former sort write poetry; people of the latter write free verse.
It galls me further because technically FREE VERSE has meter, but no rhyme,
like
ancient Greek poetry. That is forgotten by the unrational emotionalists who,
having dispensed with rhyme leave meter behind as well.
David Friedman
1. It sounds as though you are confusing free verse with blank verse;
the latter is unrhymed iambic pentameter.
2. By your definition, almost everything in Shakespeare's plays is free
verse (actually blank verse). Does he count as a "non-conceptual
whiner(s) who pour ... incoherent feelings out on paper with no thought?"
--
David Friedman
www.daviddfriedman.com/
Mar...@lara.pathlink.com
>1. It sounds as though you are confusing free verse with blank verse;
>the latter is unrhymed iambic pentameter.
>2. By your definition, almost everything in Shakespeare's plays is free
>verse (actually blank verse). Does he count as a "non-conceptual
>whiner(s) who pour ... incoherent feelings out on paper with no thought?"
It was a sweeping generalization and was not the sum of my thoughts on the
subject. I pointed out that blank verse is one way that poetry worked well in
classical times. And I have no problem per se with formats such as haiku which
often lack subjects and verbs and therefore technically complete thoughts but
which still convey deep meaning by work association in a clever way.
By "Shakespeare" I assume you mean the Earl of Oxford, not the glovemaker. I
personally like Shakespeare. I understand Rand's condemnation and I have to
agree with her criticim -- as far as it goes. However, to complain that
Shakespeare did not create Romantic heros is to complain that Gilbert did not
build a generator or that Harvey never did bypass surgery. They did what they
did when they did it. I have to admit that whereas Oedipous Tyrannos might
himself be a Rational Man, he gets hit pretty hard and certainly does not t
rimph
because of his passionate adherence to his rational values. So, theater is
what
it is and was when it was.
The Earl of Oxofrd, writing as "Shakespeare" was brilliant. He used the
language in a manner unsurpassed since. He told good stories. Modern Dress
takes away a lot, or can, but I was stunned by Julius Caesar in Modern Dress.
Boardroom drama; presidential palace. Fascinating.