Follow up thoughts on prosody

I know that scansion isn't the easiest thing in the world to do.  It's even harder to talk authoritatively about it.  I'll wager that it's hardest of all to write a poem in metrical feet and still have it sound like normal English.  

Or maybe it's not that hard.  Keats probably wasn't that concerned about counting lines or whether or not opiate had two syllables or three.  Rather, he could likely hear the way the poem was supposed to sound as he was writing it--poets have a knack for not having to think about it.  I think we can hear the way the poem sounds, but when we try to dissect each line the rhythm tends to disappear.  Also if we think too scientifically about it, it takes all of the life out of the poem--like dissecting a live frog.

So, when we do prosody, what are we looking for?  Why not just enjoy the rhythm?  I'm not sure.

Helen Vendler says, "You can experience a poem with great pleasure as a general reader; or you can also learn how to explore it, to gain the more experienced pleasure that a student of architecture feels inside a Renaissance palace, or that an engineer feels looking at the San Francisco Bay Bridge.  In every case study adds to what you are able to perceive...[Poems] keep you company in life."

I bet she has had to convince lots of students of why prosody is important.  I agree that sometimes paying attention to prosody can lead to a greater appreciation of a poem.  I think  "Ode to a Nightingale" is one such poem.

Writing Prompt for Blogs due 1/30

In class we talked quite a bit about aesthetics--what Helen Vendler calls analytical shapes.  Pick a poem from the anthology section of Poems Poets Poetry (starts on p. 370) and comment on the aesthetics of the poem.  Include some thoughts about why you think the poet made the decisions regarding aesthetics he or she did.

Blog Assignment Sheet

Blog Assignment

English 210.003

Due Mondays in hard copy at the beginning of class starting 1/30

Lowest two (2) grades to be dropped

Your weekly blog is designed to help you reflect on a week of class work as well as to hone your thoughts about the readings we are covering.  This is not solely a summary or a rehash of what we covered in class during the week, or a paraphrase of what we read in a given week or how we read it.  Instead, it should consist of your own unique insight into the topics covered during the week.  Because our class work will depend largely on close reading of specific texts or specific passages from texts, your assignment should exhibit your skills as a good close reader—that is a reader who is able to derive an interpretation of a piece of literature based on close examination of the form and content of the work and not based on the reader’s own biases or the biases of the author.

One good strategy would be to concentrate on a passage or text that we didn’t fully cover in class and use the strategies we practiced in class to conduct a reading of that passage or text.  For example, you might choose a poem from the end of one of the Vendler chapters that she doesn’t discuss in the text or that we didn’t discuss in class and perform your own close reading on the poem or a portion of the poem using the strategies she or we used on a different poem. This doesn’t mean that you need to make decisive statements about what the poem means, but you should at least be able to come up with provocative observations about the most important features in the poem.

I will post optional writing prompts for each Monday’s post by the Wednesday of the week prior on my own Blogger blog which you can find at http://nelsenglish210.blogspot.com/

Keep in mind that you do not have to write on these prompts.

Your response should be between 350 and 700 words (1 to 2 double spaced pages with one inch margins).