On 2 Aug 2005 at 20:43, Joanna Boulter wrote:
> I got myself involved with a writing group some time ago, led by a woman who
> regards herself as a formalist. She wanted us to try sonnet form -- you
> know -- here's the rhyme scheme, and it's iambic pentameter, off you go. So
> I come back with one that gets me my knuckles severely rapped, because out
> of my 14 lines one has 11 syllables and one has 9. Never mind that the two
> extra are both so light as to count as two halves; never mind that the
> 'short' line conatins a syllable which is so long and weighty that it needs
> an entire foot to itself. She rewrote the thing so as to 'correct' the
> metre, and ended up with most of the stresses on weak syllables, while I sat
> and growled. But I refused to alter it.<
Good for you -- there's where the ear Lawrence was talking about
comes in.
I, too, deplore that little hitlers who try to use form and format to create
their own little emotional empires over which they rule with a whim of
iron. The point of such folk is not to encourage you or anyone to write
poetry; it's to exercise the control over you that she tried to exercise by
re-writing your work! Who can blame you for growling?
> I don't mean that 10 syllables ought not to be done, but I do think the
> stresses ought to be handled with awareness. Otherwise you're writing
> syllabics, and that's a whole nother animal.
Maybe so, but syllabics are meter, too.
Marcus
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