The Principles of English Versification

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THE PRINCIPLES OF ENGLISH VERSIFICATION

BY

PAULL FRANKLIN BAUM

[Illustration]


CAMBRIDGE

HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS

1924


LONDON: HUMPHREY MILFORD

OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS


COPYRIGHT, 1922

BY HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS


_Third printing_


PRINTED AT THE HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS
CAMBRIDGE, MASS., U. S. A.

  +--------------------------------------------------------------+
  |                      Transcriber's note                      |
  |                                                              |
  | The following symbols have been used in the text:            |
  |                                                              |
  | ‸    CARET a musical rest                                    |
  |                                                              |
  | ◡   LOWER HALF CIRCLE an unstressed syllable                |
  |                                                              |
  | _̷    COMBINING SHORT SOLIDUS OVERLAY a stressed syllable     |
  |                                                              |
  | ^{x} superscript x                                           |
  |                                                              |
  | [`]  grave accent over the preceding unstressed syllable     |
  +--------------------------------------------------------------+


TO
C. H. N. B.




PREFACE


Most of the older discussions of English versification labored under two
difficulties: an undue adherence to the traditions of Greek and Latin
prosody more or less perfectly understood, and an exaggerated formalism.
But recently the interest and excitement (now happily abated) over
free-verse have reopened the old questions and let in upon them not a
little light. Even today, however, a great deal of metrical analysis has
wrecked itself on the visible rocks of a false accuracy, and it is
therefore not only out of caution but also out of mere common sense that
we should eschew the arbitrary, even at the risk of vagueness and an
'unscientific' admission of uncertainty. For the only great and
annihilating danger of writing on versification is dogmatism. Our
theorists, both old and new, are first tempted and then possessed with
their theories--all else becoming wrong and intolerable. In the
following pages I have perhaps erred in a too frequent insistence on
doubts and perplexities; perhaps also, on occasion, in a too plain
statement of opinion where judgments are bound to differ--_sic se res
habent_.

Now it is plain that rhythm is one of the ultimate facts of nature and
one of the universal principles of art; and thus versification, which
is the study of the rhythms of verse, is both a science and an art. But
it differs from the other sciences in that its phenomena are not
'regular' and reducible to law, but varying and subject to the dictates,
even the whims, of genius; inasmuch as every poem involves a fresh fiat
of creation. Of course, no poet when he is composing, either in the
traditional "fine frenzy" or in the more sober process of revision,
thinks of prosody as a science, or perhaps thinks of it at all. If he
did he would go mad, and produce nothing. But the phenomena remain,
nevertheless, and the analysis of them becomes for us a science.

This analysis has what Bacon would call two inconveniences. The first is
complexity. The various ways in which the formal rhythms of verse
combine with the infinitely modulated rhythms of natural prose produce a
resultant which is complicated to the last degree and which almost
precludes orderly exposition. No system has been devised to express it.
The simpler ones fail through omission of important difficulties, the
more elaborate totter under their own weight. And thus the Gentle Reader
is either beguiled by false prophets--looks up and is not fed--or loses
heart and saves himself by flight. There is, to be sure, an arcanum of
prosodic theory which is the province of specialists. It has its place
in the scheme of things; but it is no more necessary for the genuine
enjoyment of Milton (or the 'moderns') than a knowledge of the formulae
for calculating the parallax of Alpha Leonis is necessary for enjoying
the pillared firmament. We must then compromise with a system which
reveals the existence of all the phenomena and tries to suggest their
interrelated workings.

The other inconvenience is that of seeming to deny the real poetry by
our preoccupation with its metrical expression. "Under pretence that we
want to study it more in detail, we pulverize the statue." This is an
old charge, and our answer is easy. For, however it may be with the
statue, a poem is never pulverized; it is still there on the page! No
amount of analyzing can injure the poem. If we think it has injured us,
even then we err, and need only recall our natural aversion to hard
labor.