Form Flashcards
(female) complaint
poem of protest and lament, typically at amorous disappointment, betrayal or desertion; in the decades around 1600 deeply caught up with the epyllion and sonnet-sequence, not least in Shakespeare
Alexandrine
In English an iambic hexameter
In French a line of 12 beats and the staple form
Arch-rhyme/chiasmic rhyme
A rhyme scheme with mirror symmetry, as abba
Blank verse
Unrhymed iambic pentameter
Burden/refrain
Line/lines are repeated
Canto
Numbered section into which longer poems are commonly divided
canzone
65 lines, 5 douzaines + pentain, uses only 5 end words
caudate (tailed) Sonnet
adding one or more tercets
clerihew
quatrain of 2 unequal couplets, first line always someones name
Closed
Of a couplet - second line end-stopped
common metre/ ballad metre/ ballad stanza
iambic quatrain a8b6c8b6
country-house poem
primarily, a substantial group of 17thC poems describing and usually lauding a landowning patron’s house and grounds, but extending to later poems centrally featuring such houses and grounds.
couplet-rhymed quatrains
aabb
Cross-rhymed quatrains
abab
envoi
a shorter terminal stanza, such as the tercet in villanelles or pentain in canzoni
fourteeners
couplets in iambic heptameter
haiku
lines of 5,7,5 syllables with volta after 1st or 2nd lines
heroic quatrains
iambic pentameters rhyming ABAB
isometric vs heterometric stanzas
constant vs varied line-length
lyric
classic mode: at first musically accompanied.
Now - most short, non-narrative, non-dramatic verse
mock-epic
a poem comically or satirically dressed in epic conventions for which its subject and/or manner are inappropriate
mono rhymed quatrains
(rare) one rhyme throughout (aaaa)
ode
formal poem of some dignity or length (Alcaic, Sapphic, Pindaric and Horation)
open form
of form - variable
of couplets - 2nd line enjambed to first line of next couplet/other form
ottava rima
Stanza of 8 lines
Iambic pentameter
Abababcc
pastoral
a mode or genre, classically until Renaissance - ft. leisure-time rusticity of the high-born
v highly stylised, with designated roles and role-names for amorous play and witty debate.
urban pastoral - but latterly used as a means of considering class-issues and post-industrial geography
Petrachan
sonnet - octave abbaabba, sestet cdecde
rhyme royal
stanza of 7 lines, iambic pentameter, ababbcc (now you get down on one knee)
rubai/ Khayyam stanza
AABA
satire, satiric
a classical mode, initially meaning a mixed sequence or form (as late as Renaissance)
later - loose collective term for all art that mocks or otherwise ridicules to urge correction and reform.
sestina
39 lines, 6 sests + terct, abcdef faebdc cfdabe ecbfad deacfb bdfeca eca ot ace (and must also use b, d, f word sin the tercet - envoi or tornada)
Shakespearean sonnet
abab cdcd efef gg
single-rhymed
only one pair of rhyming lines e.g.. abcb or abac
Spenserian sonnet
rhyming ABABBCBCCDCDEE
stanzaic
lines grouped in stanzas - ‘room or stopping place (in Italian)’
stichic (as opposed to being stanzaic e.g. Spencerian sonnet)
simple sequence of lines
terza rima
successive tercets rhyming aba bcb cdc etc.
verse-paragraphs
in blank verse operate as units of argument or emotion
villanelle
19 heroic lines, 5 tercets + quatrain, a1ba2 aba1 aba2 aba1 aba2 aba1a2
what are the two 3 line forms
triplet (aaa)
tercet - one or more lines don’t rhyme (aab, aba, abb, abc)
Spenserian stanza
8 iambic pentameters + a hexameter (alexandrine) ababbcbcc
