»
Main Forums
»
English Workshop
»
Help!
| English Workshop |
|
Help! |
|
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Can someone please explain the scanning system here: “The tree has entered my hands,/ The sap has ascended my arms.” The lines, which can be scanned ×– – –×– and ×;– – × –× –, are free variants on Greek Alcaic meter; for Pound, as had often been said, the line-length was the verse unit; these line-lengths sounded a note new and sweet. “The Return,” as Carne-Ross shows, adopts a dactylo-epitrite scheme – × – × – in lines like: Gods of the wingèd shoe! With them the silver hounds, sniffing the trace of air!" --I see no connection between the lines he mentions and - x system he is using. Brad |
||
| © Copyright 2001 Brad - All Rights Reserved | |||
|
Severn Member Rara Avis
since 1999-07-17
Posts 7704 |
er hum ahem I'll get back to you on this...after I bang my head on the wall several times...  Kps - what's a 'scanning system'?? I am a refugee of logic...insisting |
||
Sven
since 1999-11-23
Posts 14937East Lansing, MI USA |
well. . . good. . . I'm glad that I'm not the only one that went "huh?" when I read this. . . ---------------------------------------------------------- To the world, you may only be one person. But to one person, you may be the world. |
||
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
He doesn't even match the syllables. Is there some alternate scanning system that is intended to confuse and intimidate people even more than they already are. Very frustrated. Brad |
||
|
Skyfyre Senior Member
since 1999-08-15
Posts 1906Sitting in Michael's Lap |
I'd like to help you, Brad, but frankly I'm just as confused as you are ... I see no relation between any of those lines and their scans ... Personally I think whomever conjured up those scans was smoking something illegal ... at least that's my theory.  Linda |
||
|
Severn Member Rara Avis
since 1999-07-17
Posts 7704 |
(LINDA JUST FOR YOU - I'M YELLING HERE, (or at least - emphasising loudly). COULD SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME WHAT A SCAN IS THANK YOU VERY MUCH. I'm assuming it's the rhythm of the syllables, like the last one seems to be iambic or something? If that's the case - then the first one makes no sense...but I could be wrong, so SOMEONE (Brad or Linda specifically) PLEASE enlighten me lol... K[This message has been edited by Severn (edited 07-07-2001).] |
||
|
furlong Member
since 2001-04-08
Posts 129 |
kamla merely a system to show the metrical structure. there are presumably an infinite number of potential systems (Mary Kinzie in her book A Poets Guide to Poetry covers the subject well). there may be an infinite number of valid notations but this one that brad has shown us doesnt seem to be one of them! brad, can you perhaps show us a little more of the context? still, if you can't make sense of it i doubt if many of the rest of us will be able to! F [This message has been edited by furlong (edited 07-13-2001).] |
||
|
Ron
Administrator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-05-19
Posts 8669Michigan, US |
It has to be a typo… Earlier in that article, Lyons uses presumably the same scansion to describe a four-syllable choriamb as - + + - and that should convert to long-short-short-long. Obviously, that doesn't fit the rest. If someone could fine a copy of Carne-Ross's "New Masks for Old: A Note on Poundian Metrics" for comparison, I suspect we'd see the original interpretation has been corrupted in translation. |
||
|
furlong Member
since 2001-04-08
Posts 129 |
Thanks for the link Ron. Fascinating. |
||
|
Severn Member Rara Avis
since 1999-07-17
Posts 7704 |
Thanks for the explantation Furlong K |
||
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Thanks. I'm not completely off my rocker then? Also, sorry about not giving the link, I wrote it quickly and was so frustrated, I didn't think anyone else would care about the article itself. I'd love to get a copy of that book. My own thinking is that Pound's poetic aesthetic (like Joyce) was to listen for resonation (the stuff that makes you turn your head for the way it sounds regardless of meaning) in lines, speech, newpapers, different languages and whatnot rather than rely on a system of prosody. Anything less would be predictable. But perhaps Pound's ear is predictable. Thanks again, Brad |
||
|
Ron
Administrator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-05-19
Posts 8669Michigan, US |
It's hard to mention scansion and NOT have Pound's name come up. As one of the more prominent proponents of free verse, he did his best to convince the world that meter sucked. Though I don't think even he used quite those words.  From what I understand, Pound didn't like classical scansion (based on the length of syllables) or English scansion (based on accents), but instead advocated a system based on natural rhythm. I obviously didn't find Carne-Ross's book on the Internet, but I did look for it, and in so doing, found some other rather interesting materials. I bookmarked several… Horace transplanted by D. S. Carne-Ross On "In a Station of the Metro" (Pound's own description of the composition of his poem, along with insight from several different critics.) The Forms of Poetry by Timothy Steele (Though Pound is mentioned only briefly and only near the end, I found this a really fascinating article. Recommended!) English Versification 1570-1980: A Reference Guide This link actually takes you to the Table of Contents of an extensive pdf book (you'll need Adobe Acrobat to access it). I read chapter six, on Meter, and hope to return to other chapters. Not great, but definitely not bad. |
||
|
|
⇧ top of page ⇧ |
|
| All times are ET (US). All dates are in Year-Month-Day format. | ||
