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Iambic rhythm, Table I., is more regular than trochaic with respect to length of foot and syllable for only two of the four readers. The other two read trochaic more regularly in this respect. With respect to ratio neither of these rhythms is more regular than the other. Neither do rising and falling 3-syllable verses, Tables III. and IV., show any differences in stability in time or proportion. The 3-syllable type is as regular in length of foot as the 2-syllable but its separate syllables are more variable. A fair comparison of ratios is not feasible, but if the 3-syllable form be considered as a more complex 2-syllable verse its ratios are very nearly as stable as those of the simpler forms. On the whole all the rhythms attain about the same degree of stability.

The amount of variability in time and ratio shown by the nonsense verse being fairly constant and being based on a fairly large number of observations establishes a norm for spoken rhythms in general. Meaningful verse shows higher variability. This is to be attributed to the greater difficulty of enunciation and to interference from the side of the intellectual content of the line; and, in part, to an increase of the error of reading the record due to its greater complexity.

Syllables, feet and ratios all vary more in poetry than in nonsense verse. The comparison can not be made statistically but a comparison of the variation in Table XV. with those from the same reader, H, in Table I., shows that the excess of the former, item by item, is not great. Such a comparison of any other of the analyzed verses with its corresponding type in the schematic verses will show a similar condition. Poetic verses thus compared with empty spoken rhythms are tolérably regular in every feature. No matter how irregular the verse pattern itself, it is adhered to with great fidelity time after time in repetition, as is seen in Table XXXIV. The structural irregularity of the verse is not therefore a chance. affair. If it were, the temporal arrangement would probably be different with each repetition. As the pattern becomes more complex the variability increases but it never exceeds an amount which is surprisingly low if one considers the enormous complexity of the motor performance involved.

In poetic verse there is no evidence that the presence of accent reduces variability, but it is true here as in nonsense verse that short syllables are generally the more variable. The introduction of pauses due to the meaning does not add appreciably to the variability of those syllables with which they are connected.

CHAPTER VII

SIGNIFICANCE OF RESULTS FOR METRICAL THEORY

THERE are six theories of English verse structure which can be clearly distingiushed.

1. There is the classical or quantitative theory which neglects accent and treats the verse as made up of syllables long and short, the former being theoretically twice as long in time as the latter.

2. The strict time theory, which makes the syllables correspond to notes in music, the feet being treated as measures.

3. The conventional English scansion which makes the rhythm depend on the regular succession of accented and unaccented syllables according to a numerical scheme but without regard to time or quantity.

4. The beat theory of Coleridge which requires a certain number of accents to every line but disregards both the time and the number of syllables intervening between those accents. In this theory the accent may fall on a syllable which is either long or short in time.

5. The "section" or "centroid" system in which an accent is treated as a point of maximum stress in a short phrase.

6. The interval of time between two successive beats is held to be constant and the form of the rhythm is determined by the number of intervening syllables.

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Without hesitation we can dismiss some of these theories. measurements of actual verses show nothing corresponding to the long and short syllables of the classical scheme. To be sure, some syllables are long and some short, but there are all gradations between and none of the verses which have been examined shows any systematic arrangement of the longer and shorter elements. Table XXI. illustrates this point no better than many of the others. Here the second line instead of reading as it should according to quantity:

Short, long short short, long short short, long short short, long; reads

Short, long long long, long short long, short short long, long.

The analogy between verse and music has been shown to fail in both its essential features. Highly rhythmical verse if made up of sensible words can not be divided into feet of equal length to correspond to musical measures. And even if these inequalities of

the feet are overlooked in view of the fact that the measures in music itself are not rigidly equal, the analogy still fails for want of any definite element bearing definite relations to other elements within the measure. There is no syllable in verse which takes the place of the standard half or quarter note in music. On the contrary every syllable has its own peculiar time value, and it very frequently occurs that syllables which would be short in the musical plan of the line according to such a scansion as Lanier's are really longer than the theoretically long syllables.

Even in the nonsense syllables every reader must be allowed to have a verse music of his own for not only do different readers have different tempos (which might happen even in music were the latter not highly conventionalized) but each one has his own private ratio between long and short sounds. There is nothing left of the musical analogy if it must be interpreted so freely as to cover all these anomalies.

So much then for the two metrical theories which make time the essential factor in versification. Such relations of duration as they posit are not found in actual verse. The evidence is positive that the regularity of verse does not lie in its time structure. Nevertheless what has been said of the remarkable self-consistency of the complicated verse patterns must not be lost sight of. Time must be more than an incidental feature in rhythm or the repetitions of a verse would differ more from one another in time relations. True as it is that the elements of the verse do not arrange themselves regularly in time yet their arrangement is invariable, and that invariability of the time structure of the rhythm points to the fundamental function of time in the verse rhythm. This argument must, however, take into account the fact that the same verse may have a different rhythmic pattern for different persons.

With the conventional English scansion by number we have nothing directly to do; it must ultimately break down under the logic of its own claim that nothing is right rhythmically but what has the right number of syllables. To say that is to say that some of our best poetry is not good verse. We know that the better the poetry in many cases the better the rhythm of its verse sounds despite its irregularity. Lack of numerical regularity does not destroy the rhythm and the latter can not be grounded on numerical regularity alone.

Of the three remaining theories one calls for a constant number of accents arranged without system in a line; another for an indefinite number of centers of stress. The result is in either case to shift the rhythmic unit from the verse foot to the verse itself. That

there is a rhythm in which the verses are units can not be denied. Its function in poetry is of fundamental importance. But the recognition of this larger rhythm ought not to obscure the existence of rhythm within the verse. Neither of these conceptions of verse make any provision whatever for verse rhythm proper-for that rhythm which we call 2-syllable or 3-syllable, rising or falling.

The sixth and last theory of versification attempts to return to a conception of regularity and supplement the inadequacy of the two last mentioned by reintroducing the factor of time. The conditions of the present set of experiments do not allow of a critical discussion of this point because as has been explained the point of greatest stress could not be recorded. There are, however, certain cases where it is evident that the interval between accents must be far from equal. No matter how much leeway is given to the accent within the stressed syllable of such verses as those in Table XXII., it is not possible to find an arrangement which will leave equal intervals between them. Such cases are, however, rare and there is some reason to believe that if the true points of emphasis could be determined the intervals between them would be found considerably more regular than the conventional feet.

The empirical facts leave no room for a theory of verse rhythm based merely on time. Nor will a close study of the analyzed verses confirm one in a prejudice for any of the formal systems of versification. Here and there there are points in favor of one or another, but none of them are born out in detail. The conclusion must be that a theory of versification which will cover the facts has to begin anew-taking into account all the factors, time, accent, and tone, which can possibly support the rhythmic structure.

Our facts mean simply that time alone will not support the rhythm. There is no reason, however, to suppose that any of the other factors alone can support it. It is a small step in advance to show the inadequacy of partial theories; the more important task remains to find a substitute in the complex which shall take the place of the temporal regularity which, it has been so generally supposed, gave it unity and system.

In any case the starting point must be the rhythm which is actually found in verse. It will not do to suppose with Meumann that the enriching of verse by its content destroys the simple rhythm properly existing there and substitutes for it another-that of the intellect. Such a substitution is preposterous on the face of it. All verse rhythm is felt to be rhythmical-if it is verse at all-and the most beautiful poetic composition no less so than the most nonsensical nursery rime. But if the former rests on an intellectual

or emotional rhythm and the latter on one of sound how do we get from one to the other? Where is the stage when a simple long or loud noise is replaced by a concept of the same weight? Such a substitution will not bear a moment's consideration. Moreover, how does it happen that the sounds themselves even to the most practised ear still sound as rhythmical as ever in the poem after they have lost that pristine regularity which once made of them a rhythm? Worse yet, why is it that we take great delight in repeating the words of a poem in the metrical form even when we pay no attention to the meaning of the verse? And lastly, why do poems lacking in regularity sound rhythmical to us when recited in a foreign language? The truth is that some verse is rhythmical even in cases when it is extremely irregular. Other verse is regular in some. respects; and no more nor no less rhythmical. Other speech is fairly regular but possessed of only poor rhythm. Other speech is prose and neither regular nor appreciably rhythmical.

The common man has no difficulty in deciding for himself what is verse and what is prose-what rhythmical and what not. It may depend as Wallin has shown upon how he reads it; under some conditions it may look like prose, when printed differently, like poetry, and his reading will differ accordingly, but his judgment. will in either case be correct. When he reads rhythmically he is correct in calling it verse, and if he reads prosily he will call it prose correctly. It does not matter under what suggestion he labors or what impels him to read one way or the other.

There is, of course, a point of indifference. There are things that read so much like prose and so much like verse that no reader can decide. Such cases do not, however, affect the argument. No one has a right to set up a standard which fails to meet the conditions of experience. Nor will it do to deny the existence of an experience which is felt. When verse is read and it feels and sounds rhythmical then it is so, and its deficiencies in the light of some theory or other can not change the fact. So long as the psychological fact of rhythm retains its integrity it is a matter of small weight to the poet and lover of poetry whether its conditions are analyzable out of the objective sound series or whether it is the product of the reader's own activity as he casts the words of the language into a form which suits better his own disposition for temporal regularity and accentual symmetry. But for the psychologist it is worth while to know to what extent sequences of sounds may be objectively irregular and still acquire the rhythmic form.

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