Actually, Caleb, it is precisely the diction and syntax that Hardy deliberately left the rough edges on, not, of course, his meters. For instance, he says, in one preface, "Whenever an ancient and legitimate word of the district for which there was no equivalent in received English, suggested itself as the most natural, nearest, and often only expression of a thought, it has been made use of, on what seemed good grounds." (Actually, this could as well be a preface to Seamus Heaney's work...) Anyway, I think Hardy will grow on you.
Mezey is merely saying that poets COMPOSE in lines rather than feet (and so are not so deliberate/conscious about "substitutions" etc., as a statistical analysis might suggest). This is surely true. Analysis and composition are opposite processes. We lack much in the way of good alternatives to the Greek terms, which bring so much baggage with them, so they must suffice. Even the very useful & much-needed term "loose iambics" (a Frost coinage?) seems to me somewhat misleadling. Perhaps this should be called a "swinging tetrameter" or somesuch.
Alicia
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