Poems and prose texts differ from each other. A poem usually consists of a limited number of lines. The line length is not determined by the width of the paper, but by the closer. The poem is divided into a number of stanzas, which are separated by a white space. Anyone who wants to analyze a poem must be aware of the main differences between a prose text and a poetry text (poem). In addition, he must know the main characteristics of poems. That basic knowledge can be used when analyzing a poem.
Verses and stanzas
A poem consists of a number of lines of verse that are often, but not always, grouped into stanzas. The stanzas have a name: one distichon is a stanza of two lines, one aside is a three-line stanza, and a four-line stanza is one quatrain.
The stanzas of a poem often, but not always, show a system. A poet can bring regularity to his poem by dividing the poem into stanzas of equal length and construction. For example, a sonnet consists of two stanzas of four lines and two stanzas of three lines. Deviations, for example one line more, are not uncommon.
Regular stanzas are not necessary for a poem. Modern poetry does not usually involve stanzas that show similarities in terms of length and construction. A poem with a very irregular stanza structure can also be positively appreciated as a poem.
Differences between prose and poetry
Phrases or rules
A prose writer (writer of novels and stories) writes sentences that can vary widely in length, from one to more than a hundred words. The line length becomes a prose text is determined by the width of the paper. So a long sentence takes up several lines.
A poet (writer of poetry) does not write in sentences but in lines. He determines how long the lines are. The length of a line is therefore not determined by the width of the paper. To illustrate, the first stanza of a poem by Paul Rodenko from 1951:
The city is quiet.
The streets
have broadened.
Kangaroos look through the window holes.
A woman passes by.
The echo calls out in a hurry
her steps on.
Paragraphs or stanzas
A prose writer usually divides his text into paragraphs that can be shorter or longer. In this way he can entrust his thoughts to the paper in an orderly fashion. A poet often, but not always, chooses a division into stanzas. The stanzas of a poem are often evenly matched in length. A stanza is not only a unit of thought, like a paragraph in a prose text, but also a rhythmic unit, often reinforced by rhyme.
The presence of rhyme
There is usually no rhyme in prose texts. After all, a prose writer works with sentences, not rules. Rhyme often, but not always, occurs in a poem. So a poem does not have to rhyme! Rhyme is a striking similarity of sound in stressed syllables. The rhyme often occurs at the end of the line of verse (end rhyme), as in:
and it is three o’clock.
Metric
Metrics often occur in poetry. Meter (bar) is the alternation of stronger and weaker stressed syllables, for example: A new spring, a new sound. Metrics hardly ever occur in prose.
Extent and degree of concentration
A visible difference between a prose text and a poem is the size. A poem is often no longer than 150 words, while a novel often has more than 40,000 words. Hence, poetry is much more concentrated than prose. The poet often says a lot in few words. Moreover, the words used by the poet often have several meanings. There is no room for an explanation, if the poet so wishes. That makes poems often difficult to understand.
A writer of a prose text can explain his thoughts or events described by him, often many pages long, and he can also explain words with multiple meanings. In addition, the reader can often deduce the meaning of a prose text from the context. So a prose text is more explicit than a poem.
The analysis of a poem
When analyzing a poem, the following aspects can be considered: narrative situation, style, time, space, sound, rhyme, content and meaning.
Storytelling situation
Poems are almost always monologues. In many poems an I is speaking. Sometimes the ‘I’ is hidden in the word ‘my’ or the plural ‘we’ or ‘us’. Sometimes an I-narrator is missing, as in Park in winter by Bertus Aafjes, but the poet still expresses the impressions of an ego.
and around the black groove of the branches
floats the flight of snow like a lasso village.
the small pond is pitch black and quiet
as if he, a jewel, tended the mud.
The summer boat, like a death bark,
lies by the garden house, just black and quiet.
Style
The expressive style suits many poems. The poet is not looking for communication, but for self-expression. The poem confronts the poet with himself. Expressing his problems can mean liberation for the poet.
Time
A poem speaks of congealed time. The reader is not confronted with a series of events that take place in a specific time, such as in a novel or in a movie. A poem can be compared to looking at a slide.
A poet does not tell about a series of events in the outside world that take place during a certain time, as a novelist does, but about his feelings, dreams, reflections, ideas, ideals, etc., in short about ‘events’ in his inner life. Since it is a snapshot, poems are usually written in the present tense.
By the way, poems regularly talk about time aspects: summer, winter, morning, evening, youth, old age, and so on. Time usually plays a subordinate role in the background in poems. Time in poems can also have a symbolic function: the winter evening as a symbol of old age.
Space
In a novel, spaces are often explicitly described. In poems the description of the space can sometimes be completely absent. Usually the description of the room is very superficial:
If there are concrete indications of the space, they sometimes have a symbolic value: inside can mean safe and outside can mean danger.
Sound
The poet can use sounds to emphasize something cheerful or sad. The O and the oo have a dark, heavy sound, as can be seen from the following line by JFW Werumeus Bunnig:
Rhyme
Rhyme is the similarity in sound in (not too far apart) stressed syllables.
There are several types of rhyme:
- Initial rhyme: … crockery, brittle from the brown fractures (JC Bloem).
- End Rhyme: The words rhyme at the end of the line of verse. Both the vowels and the consonants are the same from a certain sound (house-mouse)
- Vowel rhyme (assonance): only the stressed vowels are equal to each other (diepniet)
- Consonant rhyme (alliteration): only the stressed consonants are the same (die droge dag)
- Orphan rhyme: if the similarity does not concern the vowels or consonants, but mainly the spelling, as in this verse by Kees Stip:
A cow in Moscow spoke: a cowbell
costs one and a half rubles.
And do you know what I discovered?
A peculiar chime effect is achieved by using three bells
great to wobble.
Often the sounds are in a certain order at the end rhyme. There are several types of rhyme schemes:
- crossed rhyme: abab
- embracing rhyme: abba
- paired rhyme: aabbcc
the following poem by Jan H. de Groot has crossed rhyme:
Not a week ago I came here (a)
and saw a city full of delirious life. (b)
Now I look out the door again: (a)
“damn, where did Berlin go?” (b)
Content and meaning
Poems, as already noted, are highly concentrated, both in content and form. The theme of a poem is expressed in a limited number of lines. In addition, the words used by the poet often have multiple meanings. His description of a nature scene, his feelings or opinion forms the surface layer of a poem. The text of a poem often has a meaning that lies beneath the surface layer, a meaning that the reader must discover.
The content and meaning of a number of poems are unraveled on the website poetinhetweb.nl.
