Thanks, Jody, for the further explanation. I’m aware of course that English accentual patterns based on classical meters and stanza forms don’t map their originals directly, but involve compromise. I was focusing more on the pattern I believe is the generally accepted one for sapphics in English, a pattern I assume (admittedly without having researched this) was arrived at after much experiment and discussion.
For me the English sapphic as used by Swinburne (three lines of ^-^-^--^-^- and one of ^--^-) seems a proven template, while the English sapphics that move the dactyl (or the choriamb) around or introduce other variations strike me as less successful.
Brave effort to write English verse with runs of three stressed syllables, as in your example! But why go to Horace’s Latinized sapphics for a model when we have one that is probably rather closer to the Greek original in spirit?
As for the foot terminology, those ambiguities illustrate that there are different ways of skinning a cat or slicing up a line. Though I see Chris’s point about choriambs and history, I favour sticking to the more familiar terms in discussing English meter.
Henry
|
Threaded Mode
