Fanny Howe most often 'caps' the inital letter of each line.
I have an intuitive,no doubt wrong suspicion, that typographers at one early time could lay out long preliminary lines of type (without breaking them into verse lines) but would indicate the breaks from the eventual lines with a Capital letter.
OR, may the Cap, in terms of verse as a kind of line by line music, helped initiate, say, the initial iambic beat of the line.
Or, maybe it just helped the poem, say a sonnet, look monumental similar to the edge of a rococo column with those neatly chiseled Caps scintillating down the margin side.
Yes, maybe it was a sign that Poetry (when found in print and book) was a Significant Presence in the Culture - a Portal and Oracle from which we was graced by News from the Muse(s)
(those happy and/or serious goddesses that curl our hair while - when we are lucky - we get to write down their messages/visions that they whisper or sometimes shout in our ears).
I sometimes use caps to start each line just to call attention to the idea that you can read, maybe ought to read the poem, in a way different than reading straight prose. Like listen for the music, pause for thought, or 'these words are material in the way of construction - of sound, etc."
Stephen V
--- On Mon, 6/15/09, Douglas Barbour <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
From: Douglas Barbour <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: initial capitals
To: [log in to unmask]
Date: Monday, June 15, 2009, 5:53 PM
Hal's answer is much better than mine,Max. I suspect Wikipedia might
help. Anyway, I dont know why they were there, nor when it became de
rigeur, but I do know that I felt terribly free when I realized that
the poetry that excited me didnt demand it. I am intrigued to see, in
some books today, poems that do side by side with poems that dont.
Just another convention, with all the power that implies....
Doug
On 15-Jun-09, at 3:12 PM, Max Richards wrote:
> A friend emails me:
>
>> a friend transcribing poetry has asked me about the convention that
>> was dominant for so long of capitalizing the beginning of each line.
>> she finds it very irritating and asked me why it was so. of course I
>> didn't have a clue, and feverish examination of my library was of no
>> help. (the earliest example of not doing it that I could find was HD
>> in 1916).
>
> I emailed him back a vague reply, then said I'd ask PoetryEtc,
> expecting a deluge
> of help.
>
> Max in Melbourne
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> This email was sent from Netspace Webmail: http://www.netspace.net.au
>
>
Douglas Barbour
Latest book: Continuations, with Sheila E, Murphy
(University of Alberta Press 2006)
Is that the flesh made word
or is that the flesh-made word?
Fred Wah
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