Simple Example
An iambic foot is an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable. The rhythm can be written as:
da DUMThe da-DUM of a human heartbeat is the most common example of this rhythm.
A standard line of iambic pentameter is five iambic feet in a row:
da DUM da DUM da DUM da DUM da DUMThe tick-TOCK rhythm of iambic pentameter can be heard in the opening line of Shakespeare's Sonnet 12:
- When I do count the clock that tells the time
It is possible to notate this with a "/" marking ictic syllables (experienced as beats) and a "×" marking nonictic syllables (experienced as offbeats). In this notation a standard line of iambic pentameter would look like this:
× / × / × / × / × /The following line from John Keats' To Autumn is a straightforward example:
- To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
The scansion of this can be notated as follows:
× / × / × / × / × / To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shellsRead more about this topic: Iambic Pentameter
Famous quotes containing the word simple:
“Meantime the education of the general mind never stops. The reveries of the true and simple are prophetic. What the tender poetic youth dreams, and prays, and paints today, but shuns the ridicule of saying aloud, shall presently be the resolutions of public bodies, then shall be carried as grievance and bill of rights through conflict and war, and then shall be triumphant law and establishment for a hundred years, until it gives place, in turn, to new prayers and pictures.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“His character as one of the fathers of the English language would alone make his works important, even those which have little poetical merit. He was as simple as Wordsworth in preferring his homely but vigorous Saxon tongue, when it was neglected by the court, and had not yet attained to the dignity of a literature, and rendered a similar service to his country to that which Dante rendered to Italy.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)