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| Home > Forms of Literature > Poetry
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| | Poetry - Forms of Literature
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A poem can be defined as composition usually written in verse. Poems use imagery, metaphors, and may take the form of measures consisting of patterns of stresses (metric feet) or of patterns of different length syllables as in classical prosody, usage of rhyme is optional. Metre is dependent on syllables and on rhythms of speech. Rhyme and alliteration depend on words that have similar pronunciation.
Poetry perhaps predates other forms of literature for e.g the Sumerian epic of `Gilgamesh` (dated around 2700 B.C.) parts of the Bible and the surviving works of Homer (Illiad and Odyssey). Early civilizations was primarily based on oral tradition thus the formal characters of poetry had mnemonic functions and important texts, legal, genealogical or moral may appear in verse form.
Poetry uses special forms; the haiku, the limerick or sonnet form e.g. a haiku must have 17 syllables distributed over 3 lines in groups of 5,7 and 5 and must have an image of a season or something related to nature. A limerick has 5 lines, the rhyme scheme of AABBA and the line lengths of 33223 stressed syllables. Poetic norms are often characterized by the language and tradition - Persian poetry always rhymes whereas Greek poetry rarely does so, Italian and French poetry often does. English and German can go either way.
Perhaps the most paradigmatic style of English poetry, blank verse consists of unrhymed Iambric Pentameter (a line consisting of 5iambic feet) was exemplified in the works of Shakespeare and Milton. Some structural connections are result of historical accidents, where many speakers of a language associate good poetry with verse form preferred by a particular popular poet.
Theatrical works traditionally took verse form now it survives only in Opera and musicals, although some people argue that the language of drama remains intrinsically poetic.
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