Republic of the Philippines

MARINDUQUE STATE COLLEGE

SCHOOL OF GOVERNANCE
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Tel. No.: 332-03-23 Email Address: [email protected]
Website: www.marinduquestatecollege.edu.ph

Module 2.2

Chapter 2: Literary Genres

Literature According to Form (POETRY)

Learning Objectives:

 Differentiate/compare and contrast the various 21st century literary genres and the ones
from the earlier genres/periods citing their elements, structures and traditions.
 Infer literary meaning from literal language based on usage.
 Analyze the figures of speech and other literary techniques and devices in the text.
 Explain the literary, biographical, linguistic and sociocultural contexts and discuss how
they enhance the texts meaning and enrich the reader’s understanding.

Classification of Literature According to Form

I. POETRY

It is one of the three major types of literature. Poems are often divided into lines and
stanzas, with diverse and unique characteristics and often employ regular rhythmic patterns or
meters. Some poems are written in free verse. Most poems make use of highly concise, musical,
and emotionally charged language. Many poets make use of imagery, figurative language, and
special devices of sound such as rhyme.

Characteristics of Poetry that Stimulate Emotions/Feelings

Poetry is as varied as the nature of man-unique in some sense along with man's
eccentricities, yet clings if appreciated or if deeply imbibed by the reader. A poem is good when
used with artistic and linguistic material demanded by the poet's craft. The poet is successful in
fashioning the rich multiplicity of meaning if he changes the reader for the better. It makes him
realize through its skillful emergence of form and content, the authentic state of human
conditions. He personalizes his knowledge when applies it to his own.

Its subject matter is formidable. The author a God-driven poet arrives at peaks without
showing the strenuous effort of climbing. The insights drawn from it go simultaneously with the
blaze of the linguistic principles. The common characteristics of poetry are the following:

1. Poetry covers a range of experiences. It exposes feelings and attitudes about or on toward an
event, an issue or subject.
2. Poetry is concentrated thought and compressed ideas. It says more than ordinary language in a
special way. Poets choose words for their sense, but they also choose words for what the way
they sound and for the pictures they create. (A poem says much in little; hence, the reader should
try to anticipate that concentration. He should focus his attention on the thought and to speed the
idea.)

3. Poetry is a kind of word-music. It has a tune of its own. (In reading aloud, the reader should be
careful not to spoil the music by using a high-pitched tone or sing-song voice. He should follow
the beat naturally; give it full value, but should not force it. It plays with the sounds of words and
rhythm of phrases.)

4. Poetry expresses all the senses. It is the most memorable kind of language. It makes sense-and
sound, and rhythm and music and vision. Although poetry is written in verse, it is always more
than rhythm and rhyme. A communicated thought by the poet's choice of words; therefore, to
extract full meaning from the words, the reader should listen with all his faculties. He should
listen for the characteristics and changing sounds as well as for the descriptive and unusual
words. He should feel the power of fresh epithets and old allusions. He should smell the perfume
and taste the flavor carried by the words themselves. It uses word pictures to build sensory
impressions and creates images.

5 Poetry answers the readers' demand for rhythm. A poem beats time simply and strongly;
therefore, the reader needs to respond to it with his own natural rhythm.Not everybody is a poet
but he is rhythmical by nature, he breathes, walks, runs, cheers, dances and works in rhythm. The
poet patterns this rhythm and the reader enjoys the beat of the lines because he satisfies himself
with a deep-seated rhythmic impulse. Poetry uses the sounds of language in deliberated, special
ways.

6. Poetry is observation plus imagination. It stirs deep feelings in the reader. The poet has written
under the spell or emotional and intellectual excitement. He has been seized by some mood of
the force of some incident, and there has been conceived in him this living thing, this order out of
chaos: a poem. The reader should react imaginatively to this intense creation. He should share as
much of the emotion as possible. He will then understand not only the meaning of the poem,
butits suggestions and implications.

Moreover, poetry slyly moves on with the temper and clime of the time, revealing life as
the true essence of poetry. Poetry is characterized by its adaptability to the changing times
without negating the core culture of man's past.

Jose Garcia Villa defines poetry in his exquisitely crafted poem, "Lyric 17" (1942).

First, a poem must be magical

Then musical as a sea-gull
It must be a brightness moving
And hold secret a bird's flowering.
It must be slender as a bell
And it must hold fire as well
 It must hàve the wisdom bows
And it must kneel like a rose
It must be able to hear
The luminance of dove and deer

Elements of Poetry

 Persona or the Voice is the speaker in the poem. He is the character whose voice a reader
"hears." The speaker may be the poet, or a completely different character. Sometimes the
identity of the speaker is obvious. At other times, part of all the poems must be read
before the identity of the speaker becomes clear.

 Theme is the insight into life revealed by the poem. Sometimes the theme is stated
directly. To fully understand it, paraphrase it, or express it in own your words

 Rhyme and Rhythm

Rhyme is the repetition of sounds at the end of words. When rhyme comes at the
end of lines of poetry, it is called end rhyme. The pattern of end rhyme in a poem is called the
rhyme scheme. Letters are used to show the rhyme scheme, with each line receiving a letter. The
following stanza by Luis Dato in his " "San Juan Bridge" has a rhyme scheme of abba.

A shot the night's centurial stillness tore, (a)

The sleeping river startled from repose, (b)
A flash, then darkness, but from darkness rose (b)
Shouts that would echo far o'er Pasig shore. (a)

Some poems have internal rhyme, which is the rhyming of words within the same line.

Types and Forms

I. LYRIC POETRY. During the early years, it was referred to the kind of poetry meant to be
sung to the accompaniment of a lyre. The modern generation applies this type of poetry that
expresses emotions and feelings of the poets. They are usually short, simple and easy to
understand. It is a poet's personal thoughts and feelings in vivid and musical language. Any
subject that calls upa poet's thoughts and feelings is suitable for a lyric poem. It takes any forms
with different patterns of rhyme and rhythm.

A. Kinds of Lyric Poetry

1. Sonnet - It is one of the most enduring and influential poetic patterns in the English language.
The word sonnet derives from the Italian word sonneto which means "little song". This lyric
poem has 14 lines with a formal rhyme scheme or pattern. The following are the three major
kinds of sonnet:

a. English or Shakespearean Sonnet- This contains 3 Sicilian quartrains and one heroic
couplet at the end, with an "abab cded efef gg" rhyme scheme. The turn comes at or near line 13,
making the ending couplet quick and dramațic.

b. Italian or Petrarchan Sonnet-This sonnet is split into two parts, an octave and a
sestet. The octave is composed of two envelope quartrains rhyming "abba abba (Italian octave).
The sestet's rhyme pattern varies, though it is most often either cde cde" (Italian sestet) or "cdc
dcd" (Sicilian sestet). The turn occurs at the end of the octave and is developed and closed in the
sestet.

C. The Spenserian Sonnet- This lyric poem was named after the English poet Edmund
Spenser. It is divided into three quartrains and a closing couplet with a rhyme scheme of "abab
bcbc cdcd ee."

Gems for the Thought

The earliest sonnets date from about 1200 and were probably sung as expressions of
romantic love in Italian courtyards. The 14-line form was popularized by Petrarch in the 14 th
century with his work "Canzoniere'a sequence of 366 poems, most of which were dedicated to an
idealized lover. Petrarch's works influenced many European writers such as Dante and Boccaccio
and eventually spread to England influencing Chaucer. The Italian version has the octave, sestet
structure.

In Shakespeare's time, the English version of the sonnet had diverged slightly from the
Italian breaking the poem into three quartrains, or four-line units. The quartrains are followed by
a couplet, two rhyming lines. Each quartrain usually contains a main idea, with the couplet
summarizing the entire sonnet and stating the theme.

Sonnets were originally in Italian and were love poems. Though the sonnet is a form that
can be experimented with, it has remained true to its original length of fourteen lines and its
Anglicized meter of iambic pentameter. Petrarch developed the sonnet to one of its highest levels
during the Renaissance Italy, but it wasn't translated into English language until the sixteenth
century. From there, Shakespeare made the sonnet famous in England and others followed his
lead.

Both varieties usually contain a shift in tone, stance or viewpoint, called a volta, after
th
the 8 line, and sometimes in the final couplet in the Shakespearean version.

The sonnet is a wonderful vehicle to explore shifts in tone, viewpoint or arguments. It

allows the poet to develop a position or mood in the first eight lines and shift to a different
mood or position in the last part of the poem. The structure's ability to develop a story is offset
by the musical nature of the rhyme scheme creating an interesting tension between narrative
and lyricism.
2. Elegy- This is a lyric poem which expresses lament and mourning for dead, feelings of grief
and melancholy. Its theme is death.

3. Ode- This is a poem of noble feeling, expressed with dignity, and praises for some persons,
objects, events or ideas. It is exalted in tone formal in structure and content.

4. Songs- This is a poem with or without definite number of syllables as stanza is always
accompanied by musical instrument.

5. Psalms- This is a song praising God or the Virgin Mary and containing Philosophy in life.

6. Simple Lyric - Includes a variety of poems with varying themes and characterized by
subjectivity.

7. Pastoral - A celebration of the simple, rustic life of shepherds and farmers.The lonely farmer
or shepherd longs to wed.

II. NARRATIVE POETRY. This form describes important events in life either real or
imaginary. It is a type of poetry that tells a story. Narrative poems have a special appeal They
present dramatic events in a vivid way, using some of the same elements as short stories: plot,
characters and dialogue.

Types and Forms

 Epic. This is an extended narrative about heroic exploits often under supernatural control
or divine intervention. It may deal with heroes and gods.

1. Popular or ancient epic poetry is usually without definite author and is slow in the
development.

2. Modem epic poetry has a definite author.

 Metrical Tale. This is a narrative which is written in verse and can be classified either as
a ballad or medieval romance. It relates real or imaginary events. It has a wide scope of
subjects, characters, life situations ie. emotional experiences that can be light or serious.

1. Medieval Romance. This is narrative written in verse which deals with the adventures
of the knights wooing highborn ladies during the age of chivalry. It has spectacular events
charmed with magic and a distinct theme that is the victory of good over evil.

2. Ballad. (in narrative poems). It is a songlike poem that tells story, often dealing with
adventure and romance. Most ballads are written in four-six stanzas and have regular rhythms
and rhyme schemes. A ballad often features a refrain- regularly repeated line or group of lines.
 Gems for the Thought
Originally, ballads were not written down. They were composed orally and then sung.
As these early folk ballads passed from singer to singer, they often changed dramatically. As a
result, folk ballads usually exist in many different forms. Many writers of the modern era have
used the ballad form to create literary ballads-written imitations of folk ballads.

3. Fabliau. A comical and often grotesque verse tale with plot often hinge on the comical
treatment of bodily functions-sex, flatulence, diarrhea. It was written by the unknown writers of
the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. About two hundred of them are in their existence today.
They are at the opposite pole from the courtly poetry with its artificial pictures of knights and
ladies and its elaboration of the Subtleties of love. They describe life and people and ridicule the
absurdities and abuses of the time.

4. Social Poem. This form is either purely comic or tragic and it pictures the life of today.
It may aim to bring about changes in the social conditions.

III. DRAMATIC POETRY has elements that are closely related to the drama. It uses a
dramatic technique and may unfold a story. Its emphasis is more on the character rather than the
narrative.

1. Dramatic Monologue is a combination of drama and poetry. It presents some lines or speech
of a single character in a particular but complicated situation and sometimes in a dilemma.

2. Soliloquy is like the monologue. The speaker in the poem or the character in a play delivers a
passage. His thoughts and emotions are heard by him and by the audience.

3. Character Sketch is a poem in which the writer is concerned less with the elements o the
story. He presents his observations and comments to a particular individual.

4. Oration is formal address elevated in tone and is usually delivered on some notable occasion.

IV. SPECIAL TYPES OF POETRY

1. Concrete poetry is meant to be seen as well as heard like an ordinary poem. In a concrete
poem, the words are arranged into shape, often one that looks like the subject. The term
"concrete" refers to the specific shape or representation o. something. Concrete poems are often
lighthearted. When the words of a poem are arranged in a shape that imitates the subject or
suggests something about it, the effect is usually playful.
2. Haiku is a form of poetry that originated in Japan. A Haiku has three lines; the first and third
lines have five syllables each; the second line has seven. It depends on imagery. Each word or
phrase evokes an image. A haiku usually depicts a scene in nature and often implies a strong
feeling. It is condensed. A mere handful of words will picture the entire scene and will convey a
universal feeling, such as fear, surprise, regret, hope, or mystery. One reason that readers enjoy
haiku is that a single poem can be interpreted in different ways, and it is interesting to compare
and discuss different interpretations. It relies heavily on the power of suggestions and
connotation.

Characteristics of Haiku

Length-traditionally haiku has a form generally identified as a 17 onji poem in a 5-7-5

relationship. Onji are similar to syllables.

Season Word- in every haiku, there should be a kigo, a word which defines the season

Cutting Word - a kireji separates the poem into two parts of 12 and 5, or 5 and 12 Onji, as both
written and a spoken pause.

Most haiku closely approximate these rules. However as in all art, breaking rules Can
lead to wonderful results. The popularity of haiku throughout the world has generated a strong
opinion that some rules are closely tied to Japanese experience of lite, and not appropriate for
international haiku.

Shiki Masaoka (1867-1902) - The last of the great masters of traditional haiku and the
first master of modern haiku. He suffered from spinal tuberculosis and died young.

Kaerimireba Inu no ko no
Yuki-aishi hito fumaete netaru
Kasumi keri yanagi kana

When I looked back The puppy asleep

The man who passed pushing his feet
Was lost in the mist against the willow-tree

-Shiki -lssa

3. Limerick has short lines, a swift, catchy rhythm and heavily stressed rhymes. There are three
beats in the first, second, and fifth lines which rhyme, and two beats in the third and fourth lines,
which also rhyme. Most limericks follow the rhyme scheme aabba.

4. Epigram is a short rhyming poem with some sort of satirical content. It is also a succinct,
pithy saying.
Chapter Exercises 2.2
Essay Type

Direction: Choose and explain any three (3) of the characteristics of poetry.

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Explain any two (2) lines of Jose Garcia Villa’s “Lyrics 17”.

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