Why Is Poetry Broken into Lines? (And How I Figured it Out)
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 6 มิ.ย. 2024
- Poetry is easily recognizable for the way it's broken into lines--but why it's broken into lines is more of a mystery. In this video, I tell you about how I first learned how lines work in poetry, and I show you an exercise to help you start thinking about your lines more intentionally.
0:00 Introduction
3:05 From Bad Lines to No Lines
4:39 Epiphany
5:43 Working with Better Lines
10:09 Conclusion
![[Teaser EP.2] “MasterChef Junior Thailand Season 3” วันอาทิตย์ที่ 9 มิ.ย. นี้ 6 โมงเย็น ทางช่อง 7HD](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/KojBzrifbWg/mqdefault.jpg)
If they're talked about this stuff at school i might not have been an engineer after all. Fascinating glimpse into the alchemy of expressive writing
Thanks for this!! “Top amateur poetry mistakes” and also mixed metaphors would be helpful to learn more about!!
Ooh, thanks for the ideas!
I don't know how a poetry video ended up as a suggestion when I was deep into F-Zero 99 highlights, but now I'm 4 videos deep into understanding and appreciating poetry. I fell asleep last night both brainstorming a poem and humming the Mute City theme!
lol, that's a winning combo 😂
I’ve recently watched several of your videos, and this one was especially thought-provoking. As a poet, I often drive myself crazy wondering where I should break the lines (if it’s free verse)… 😅😩
It's the conundrum that keeps on giving 😅
haha the i have to admit the takes are funny. Skullie was right to keep them in haha. On another note, I feel the same about shorter lines tend to have more energy. I will have to write a prose poem and break it up into lines. Great video!
Thanks all around--and, yes, do it!
Just discoverd your channel and I am amazed!Fantastic content!
Thanks so much--I really appreciate that!
Me too. I can't get enough!!
This particular video inspired me to write a piece of prose poetry, which I haven't even considered doing since school (which I left in 1996!) just so I could try rearranging it into lines.
That bit I am failing miserably with, but then I only really took an interest in poetry yesterday, when I found this channel. I guess I have some reading to do first.
Thanks for this Andrew. You are a blessing.
Aw, thank you!
Love this channel and very grateful for the lessons learned from it.
Thanks, I appreciate that!
Thank you for the channel and the content on poetry, it has been very helpful 😊
You're very welcome--I'm happy to hear it!
Hi Andrew! I always appreciate your patience and explanation in detail about educational topics that you have done weekly basis. It has been eyes opening moments in each video. 🙌 😊 Thank you so very much for your and your teams. 😊 Please Keep Up the Great work. 🎉
Thanks a lot--I'm happy to hear that you've been enjoying them!
How is this?
I woke up too early
For a Saturday
Tight-coiled pain seething
Along the curve of my skull
Into my neck
The pain hollowed out by Aspirin
I settle into the love seat
The water sloshes
The dryer bumps and hums
From the other room
Robins and sparrows chatter
Outside in the trees
Under a light blanket's
Easy warmth
I close my eyes
Willing to surrender
A few minutes of sleep
Before getting to work
I wait
Watching the lightening
And darkening
As patchy clouds slide beside the sun
And still
Still
I wait
Cool restructure!
The chill presentation is pure bliss
Thanks, chill is what we're after
Useful ideas.
I love your channel!!
Thanks so much!
I was wondering if people mix long and short lines. I know I do. Is this a good way to do it. I also do it the way you have described. I did learn a lot form this video of yours.
Glad to hear it! I'm not sure that I can think of someone who does it off the top of my head, but I know it happens. It's an aesthetic choice that can sometimes be perceived as creating a more erratic/dynamic feel (at least, that's how I tend to read it)
Thank you very much! You have helped me to enjoy reading and listening to poetry in English a lot more and understand it. I'm an African and anything that was not in the Gospels in the Catholic schools I attended was regarded as pagan and forbidden. Your lessons are liberating.
Glad you're enjoying it!
I always thought poets were being annoying but now I get it 😅thank you
Haha, sometimes I think a few of them are trying to be annoying--but I'm glad it helped 😂
Hello Andrew, I find your presentations so informative and helpful . The skull is so distracting. I find myself wearing an eye mask because every time ‘it’ interrupts you my mind goes off course. It is my preference to just listen to your voice and to be fully attentive to what you are saying. Is there any reason why you use it as a prop? Just a friendly question - not a gripe. Thank You for your videos. XX Pd in the UK.
The motives have shifted over the years, but there are a handful, including serving as a reminder to avoid the terminal self-seriousness that afflicts so many academics
I have something like 1,500 poems piled up in notebooks of various shapes and sizes. I've always wondered if the contours of the poem were unduly influenced by the dimensions of the page. I'll try your exercise tomorrow and I'll return with a full report.
Can't wait!
Poem broken into lines
Anyone who knows anyone
who did what she did
knows that no man, no woman,
no nothing caused her death
but what was within her, and
what she had tried to do before,
she would try again,
and eventually succeed
no matter the transgressions against her,
or no transgressions at all, and
those left behind cannot sleep,
no, they cannot sleep,
though they cannot speak of their sleeplessness,
of black sleep,
dreams wiped to save the conscious mind
from breaking,
no, even those at the greatest distance from her--
them--in geography, or friendship or family--
anyone at any distance from anyone who did what she did,
blames themselves because blame is not a thought,
or a set of reasons,
but a feeling that never goes away.
Ramble, ramble, say I'm rambling,
but I know, I know what I should not know,
and maybe I should just have said from the outset
what one of them once said:
"Oh, well, whatever, never mind."
Original prose poem
Anyone who knows anyone who did what she did knows that no man, no woman, no nothing caused her death but what was within her, and that what she had tried to do before, she would try again, and eventually succeed no matter the transgressions against her, or no transgressions at all, and those she leaves behind--they leave behind--those left behind cannot sleep, no, they cannot sleep, though they cannot speak of their sleeplessness, of black sleep, dreams wiped to save the conscious mind from breaking, no, even those at the greatest distance from her--them--in geography, or friendship or family--anyone at any distance from anyone who did what she did, blames themselves because blame is not a thought, a set of reasons, but a feeling that never goes away. Ramble, ramble, say I'm rambling, but I know, I know what I should not know, but maybe I should just have said from the outset what one of them once said, "Oh, well, whatever, never mind."
It didnt occur to me that line structure could have so much effect on the meaning and reading experience!
It really is surprising how much it can change!
Gentle Sir, once I read in an introduction to a book of children's poetry, that poetry is to read aloud not silently. Is this true? Or is it truer for children's poetry and not poetry as a whole?
Poems can be read silently, but I think we'll always get a better handle on them if we can read them out loud: the sounds of language matter a lot to poets, and they're easier to catch when we actually say them
Thank you for the lessons. Does the skull accompany you to the classroom. Everyone needs comic relief.
It seems weird to cover this subject and see the subheading ‘earliest lines’ and have no discussion of poetry’s history.
Homer was writing in lines. It’s something that probably comes from pre-literate oral traditions, regular cadence can aid memorisation, etc.
Yep, 100%
value of lines in Greek plays demonstrated usefulness of this stratagem to other and future cultures?
How you can break a poem down like you do, boggles my mind…I don’t how I’ll ever get there…
For most of my time in school, I felt like I was fumbling my way through it. It's all practice, and I bet you're doing better than you think 🙂
I earned an MFA in poetry in 1977 at what is considered one of the top two schools for this kind of program. I studied with a couple of the greats. One day someone in class said, "what IS poetry, anyway?" and our program chair said, "poetry is a statement in lines." Many years later, I'd say I agree on one level but not on others....
Well, isn't that *the* question!
how does this work in metric poetry? (since line breaks are when you have the meter)
More or less. Obviously, meter plays a a major role--but how much better if those lines are also doing something more interesting than just counting out beats?
One of my favorite prose poems has lines of a sort. At the Clothesline by James Tate, ha.
Thanks, Andrew.
Ooh, I'll have to check it out!
Nice
Thanks
there is water
and
there is earth
but
what is wind
and
what is fire
Now do Stanzas please
It's like you're reading my mind. All in good time...
the metric laws have scared me and I avoided to write poetry because that
They can get pretty intense! They're worth knowing, but they don't need to be the first thing you learn. Focus on good imagery and specificity, and those will make a bigger difference early on than a detailed knowledge of meter will 🙂
how does one "went on to poetry school"
Applying to one and getting accepted (poetry school = MFA program 🙂)
Now? It's already a thing since the time of angels and saxons like bible or holy scriptures in any languages were written in alliteration atleast or Jennings as to make it easy to remember long narratives. Even William J. Long has written same thing about Northumbrian poetry. This fact of rhyming making remembering easy is so old.
Yep--that's why I mentioned it. The point, however, is that that isn't usually the driving force behind lineation decisions in modern poetry
@@WritingwithAndrew yes I watched your video. It's great. I like how you talked about multiple meanings. Video is really good. I watched it. People without literary background would know the basics and deeper part you discussed about. Thank you for it.
Anytime
"Older forms of poetry like the Greek epics were marked by rhythmic patterns that helped people to memorize and remember culturally important texts with the regularity of the rhythmic patterns"
So you mean actual poems? Not just half-baked failed song lyrics? ACTUAL poems. Is that what you are talking about?
Lines are essential in poetry. Look at that example : "I thank the universe for taking everything it has taken, and giving to me everything it is giving". Boring ? Not interesting ? But wait, if you write it like that :
I thank the universe
for taking
everything it has taken
and giving to me
everything it is giving
and you sign Rupi Kaur, then you can use a full white page for only 18 words, and you'll be considered as a great poet. Especially if you're a feminist.
(Added) And now compare it with that stanza :
"(...) It was a spring that never came,
But we have lived enough to know
What we have never had, remains;
It is the things we have that go."
This was Sara Teasdale. This is poetry. Sure, she was not Indian, and I don't care whether she was a feminist or not. But she knew how to write a poem.
hmmm you are not into music are you....
That would probably depend a lot on your definition of "into"...
@@WritingwithAndrew i mean... have you explored if the format might be an outcome of oral traditions of singing which came long before writing script were even developed....
@@BSMArtnLit Lines certainly have roots in oral traditions--but so much of historical and contemporary literary poetry has been written without any intent to set it to music, so a connection to music can't explain the way those poets are thinking about lines. Whatever role music may have played in the earliest days of poetry, it can't be the reason poems are still broken into lines.
@@WritingwithAndrew the reason might be just they just didn't discontinue from the older lyrical format of song writing based on notes. Clearly poems are a discontinued form of song writing that has mutated into poems. The origin would be from older languages like say Latin or Greek or Sanskrit or Hebrew.
@@BSMArtnLit Sure! And I'm not denying the relationship between music and poetry, just recognizing that "follow the musical phrase" isn't helpful advice for people trying to write poetry now since there isn't music in many or most cases, so poets need to find different ways of giving their lines integrity. Of course, though, the music of language is another thing entirely...but that's a subject for another time
Please,PLEASE HELP ME WITH TIME LIMITS
*types aggressively*
ÆÇẞⱤĦÎŶÞ-