Training in Lyric Poetry & Verse for songwriters.
With Complete Rhyming Dictionary
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CLASSICAL METRES.
The verse of the Latin and Greek poets is based upon quantity; and its structure is regulated by rules much more rigorous than the easy canons of English rhythm. In English verse time is an accessory merely, and all attempts to string together English words upon that basis only have resulted in what is neither verse nor English, for the words have to lose their proper pronunciation. Here are three lines of English words arranged on the principle of the Latin hexameter by Sir Philip Sidney:
 Spenser made similar experiments, and with like results. William Webbe, who wrote a "Discourse on English Poetry" in 1586, translated Virgil's First Gcorgic into hexameters, but with this important and necessary difference, he substituted accent for quantity. If this be done some approach to metrical effect may be attained, as |
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