This motherfucker... -James Joyce content-

[theavondon]

That was bafflingly entertaining to read.

Also, I got a 4 on my AP Lit exam. HA!

[dubkitty]

i suspect that Kafka really suffers in the process of being translated into English...there's a kind of surreal fucked-upness about his writing that reminds me of Lovecraft, Poe, and Moby Dick, but it didn't seem to come into full focus in the translation i read. i love Conrad to pieces; since he came from Poland, he has a European storytellers' sensibility but wrote in English and thus avoids the translation problem.

i'm really sensitive to meter, perhaps because i've been singing since i was dragooned into the church choir by my choir-director Mom at an early age. just last night i was bitching because i heard somebody on TV say "you're so full of shit your eyes are brown" and i was all "no, no, NO; the expression is 'you're so full of shit your eyes are turning brown'...when you say 'your eyes are brown' it totally fucks up the rhythm. people these days have no idea how to do invective. even rappers, who you'd think would have some skill in this area..." perhaps the best way to get hip to meter is to listen to good performances/readings of Shakespeare's plays and poems, and read that stuff aloud yourself. we did a bunch of that in my college English 1A course, and it changed my whole understanding of English-language literature. A Midsummer Night's Dream is great for iambic pentameter, and will also make you ROFL repeatedly.

[StudioShutIn]

i suspect that Kafka really suffers in the process of being translated into English...there's a kind of surreal fucked-upness about his writing that reminds me of Lovecraft, Poe, and Moby Dick, but it didn't seem to come into full focus in the translation i read. i love Conrad to pieces; since he came from Poland, he has a European storytellers' sensibility but wrote in English and thus avoids the translation problem.

i'm really sensitive to meter, perhaps because i've been singing since i was dragooned into the church choir by my choir-director Mom at an early age. just last night i was bitching because i heard somebody on TV say "you're so full of shit your eyes are brown" and i was all "no, no, NO; the expression is 'you're so full of shit your eyes are turning brown'...when you say 'your eyes are brown' it totally fucks up the rhythm. people these days have no idea how to do invective. even rappers, who you'd think would have some skill in this area..." perhaps the best way to get hip to meter is to listen to good performances/readings of Shakespeare's plays and poems, and read that stuff aloud yourself. we did a bunch of that in my college English 1A course, and it changed my whole understanding of English-language literature. A Midsummer Night's Dream is great for iambic pentameter, and will also make you ROFL repeatedly.

Ah..yet another person who actually pays attention to stuff like this as much as I do I also have a bit of a fascination with syntax and language construction and such (hmm..sunglasses, no...nerdglasses with tape, yes...) Though I admit I'm not nearly as well-read as your post proved you to be

[Gearmond]

no, meter is an actual thing. its just so ingrained, that we don't notice it.

take for example: there once was a man from natucket

I've just never been able to comprehend it so I just lash out

I don't get how something you should be able to infer from written text can be ingrained. If someone to whom English is foreign(but they understand) didn't know what a limerick was, how would they know what syllables are and aren't stressed. I can read anything with whatever stresses wherever the fuck I like if only for the sake of being defiant but more important for the sake of personal phrasing and sensibility. Or is it just that you should know the meter based on the genre? The whole thing makes me I enjoyed English, especially the more in depth we got, but meter always just seemed like some inside joke that was never explained to me properly.

Maybe THAT is why I only got a 3 on my AP Lit exam.

its really just putting rhythm to words.

[snipelfritz]

no, meter is an actual thing. its just so ingrained, that we don't notice it.

take for example: there once was a man from natucket

I've just never been able to comprehend it so I just lash out

I don't get how something you should be able to infer from written text can be ingrained. If someone to whom English is foreign(but they understand) didn't know what a limerick was, how would they know what syllables are and aren't stressed. I can read anything with whatever stresses wherever the fuck I like if only for the sake of being defiant but more important for the sake of personal phrasing and sensibility. Or is it just that you should know the meter based on the genre? The whole thing makes me I enjoyed English, especially the more in depth we got, but meter always just seemed like some inside joke that was never explained to me properly.

Maybe THAT is why I only got a 3 on my AP Lit exam.

its really just putting rhythm to words.

But, given solely the text, how do you know what the "correct" rhythm is? Take dubkitty's example: you're so full of shit your eyes are turning brown

Naturally, I possibly would say that(by syllable _ is unstressed, ^ is stressed): _ ^ ^ _ ^ _ ^ _ _ _ _ I'm assuming the first 3 and last 4 syllables are not "correct." However what if I wanted to emphasize the fact that that one person is full of shit? I might say it: ^ ^ _ _ ^ ^ ^ _ _ _ ^ . Maybe it's just the concept of stressed/unstressed I don't understand. It's always seemed like it really depends on context and even then the rhythms in which people speak aren't uniform.

I guess I understand what rhythms are, but I don't see how anything with the right number of syllables can't just be fit into a predetermined rhythm. Like I said, maybe I just dun get it. Excuse my hijacking. I feel I've been making a nasty habit of that lately.

[dubkitty]

there's a combination of factors in addition to the predetermined meter in which you're writing. a good writer places words so the the natural accents on syllables of the words flow with the meter; he also places words so the meter emphasizes particular words or ideas. think of the famous line from Arnold's "Dover Beach":

where ignorant armies clash by night

and note how the poem's meter (which in musical terms is 3/4 with a eighth-note pickup at the beginning of the line) emphasizes:

where | IGnorant | armies | CLASH by | NIGHT

the best way to apprehend this for a musician is to think of song lyrics. you know how some lyrics have the acCENT on the wrong sylLAble of a word? or seem to end a line with the emphasis in the wrong PLACE? those are errors in meter. song lyrics are not poems--the post-Dylan insistence on treating lyrics as poetry has helped to ruin modern songwriting IMO--but some of the same conditions apply WRT meter.