Alexander Blok: A study in rhythm and metre [Reprint 2018 ed.] 9783111636030, 9783111253978

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ALEXANDER BLOK A STUDY IN RHYTHM A N D METRE

SLAVI STIC PRINTINGS AND REPRINTINGS

edited by

C. H. VAN SCHOONEVELD Stanford

University

XXXIII

1965

M O U T O N & CO. LONDON

• THE HAGUE •

PARIS

ALEXANDER BLOK A STUDY IN RHYTHM AND M E T R E by

ROBIN K E M B A L L

1965

MOUTON & CO. LONDON

• THE HAGUE •

PARIS

© Copyright 1965 by Mouton & Co., Publishers, The Hague, The Netherlands. No part of this book may be translated or reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any other means, without written permission from the publishers. Thesis Basle 1958

Printed in The Netherlands by Mouton & Co., Printers, The Hague.

"He was one of the first to translate the spirit of his stormy age into music. ... he felt the heartbeat of his time." (Hya Ehrenburg, of Serge Prokofiev)

"Peut-être, pour qu'il existe, de par le monde, quelques poëmes immortels, faut-il qu'il se perde ainsi des milliers d'instants semblables, qui ne seront jamais dits. C'est dans l'épais limon où ils se déposent que la poësie véritable prend racine. Et si quelques-uns sont sauvés par les poëtes, revêtus par eux de la dure carapace des mots, peut-être cet effort serait-il vain si la cadence, la rime, la formule, n'éveillaient, dans les coeurs qui les reçoivent, la résonance d'une vibration bien plus secrète, qui n'avait pas su conquérir l'expression. Ainsi s'explique cette magie mystérieuse, Y aura qui entoure toute grande poësie et la fait rebelle à l'analyse. D'un vrai poëme la critique ne saisit jamais que les thèmes rationnels, la méthode, la technique, - la coquille." (Daniel-Rops, Présence et Poësie)

"What is a poet? - A person who writes in verse? Of course not. A poet is a bearer of rhythm." (Alexander Blok)

FOREWORD

This work springs from the most modest beginnings imaginable. Engaged in translating a number of Blok's poems into English verse - and endeavouring to keep to the same metrical details as the Russian originals - I noted down for my own convenience the abstract schemes of the poems in question, on a simple 'short-long' basis. By the time these translations had reached the hundred mark, I could not fail to be struck by the frequent recurrence of certain patterns - though not always with the same rhyme or ending schemes. As a result, I decided it would be worth while investigating the whole of Blok's three Books on the same basis. This alone proved a long and laborious undertaking - the more so, as I now realise, because of my lamentable ignorance at that time of the niceties of Russian versification. In addition to a study of the more orthodox metres, it involved a detailed analysis of those eighty or so poems in accentual verse known to Russians as doVniki. It was during this work that I had the good fortune to light on a copy of Prof. Zirmunskij's Vvedenie v metriku - to my mind, in every sense the ideal introduction (as its name implies) to a study of Russian versification. Like all good introductory works, it opened the way to, and stimulated an appetite for, wider reading - Belyj's Simvolizm, Sengeli's Traktat, and a host of other invaluable works, short and long, on various aspects of Russian metrics. Side by side with this, the very real problems set by my efforts at verse translation induced me to consult a number of works on English prosody (as it is usually called). The legendary studies of Saintsbury formed an obvious starting-point, but many others, at least as valuable from my point of view, soon came my way - more especially, the works of Egerton Smith and of T. S. Omond. From these parallel studies, the logical next step was to read the impressions and experiences of others who had ventured into that fascinating field which is Russian-English verse translation - in particular,

8

FOREWORD

those of the late Sir Oliver Elton and of Sir Maurice Bowra. Comparative metrics is a rare enough science at any time, and this particular field is one, I believe, which is still virtually unexplored in detail even to-day. So, in retrospect, the gradual build-up of the present study appears. The purely objective metrical patterns formed the basis for Part IV - this was the first part to be written and constitutes, as it were, the dry material on which the rhythmical considerations discussed in Part III are based. The parallel studies of Russian and English versification, together with experience gained in translating Blok's poems, went to form Part II, of which, in a sense, Chapter II roughly 'corresponds' to Part IV, while Chapter III forms the general introduction to the (partly subjective) problems of rhythm and cadence which find their specific examination (i.e., in relation to Blok) in Part III. This work was thus composed in more or less the reverse order of its Parts, concluding (chronologically speaking) with the first chapter, which forms a study on its own. Although applied to the specific case of Blok, it inevitably raises the wider and more fundamental issue of the place even the justification and whole raison d'etre - of metrical studies such as these. The popular illusion of the 'inspired artist' dies hard and, while agreeing with every word of Sir Maurice Bowra's assessment of the 'literally inspired' nature of Blok's poetry,1 1 have endeavoured, in this first chapter, to put the matter in its proper perspective in relation to Blok's understanding of poetic technique and his painstaking, minute attention to detail. The ghost of 'pure' inspiration, as applied to the poet, was admirably laid by Edgar Allan Poe in his Philosophy of Composition. This is appropriately cited by Percy Scholes in his Listener's Guide to Music and, while I cannot quite accept his contention that "the arts are on an equal footing here", Scholes is certainly right in his view that "... we can learn something of the methods of work of the composer by considering ... those of the poet".2 The converse is equally true: What could be more appropriate in relation to the problem at hand than these words of Brahms': "There is no real creating without hard work. That which you would call invention, that is to say, a thought, an idea, is simply an inspiration from above, for which I am not responsible, which is no merit of mine. Yet it is a present, a gift, which I ought even to despise until I have made it my own by right of hard work. "3 1

Cf. Ch. I, p. 36, infra. ' The Listener's Guide to Music, p. 15. » Ibid., p. 18.

FOREWORD

9

If, as is my profound hope, this study leads in some small way to a better appreciation of Blok's verse; if it leads even to some acquaintance with that verse on the part of English-speaking readers which would otherwise have remained barred; and if, finally, it leads to a better understanding among lovers of Russian and English poetry in both countries (or wherever the two languages are read and understood) of the remarkable rhythmical affinity between the two (an affinity which will probably surprise many) - then, but only then, will it have served some useful, creative purpose. If, in parts - in many parts - it remains a dry and analytical study, this is to some extent the result of the 'scientific' demands set by a doctoral thesis, but largely because - in the absence of any large-scale work dealing either with Blok's versification or with comparative Russian-English metrics - this one was deliberately confined as far as possible within 'objective' limits, being conceived as the merest starting-point from which, as I hope, more truly creative studies may spring one day. At the same time, I cherish no illusions: "Aussi la technique de la poësie demeurera-t-elle toujours irréductible à la simple raison: on dénombrera en vain ce qu'un poëme contient d'allitérations subtiles, on mesurera en vain le rapport des longues aux brèves, des sons mats aux sonorités éclatantes; on n'aura pas expliqué pourquoi la grande poësie, avec des syllabes qui sont celles de tous les jours, - et la plus grande est souvent la plus simple, - arrive à nous faire pénétrer dans le domaine d'une réalité autre que la nôtre, et dont nous dirions peut-être, si nous en connaissions le secret, que la mort ne l'a pas atteinte." 4 All this is true - and may readers of this study never forget it! It may be, as one authority on comparative metrics has suggested, that the verse translator has a special part to play in this connection: " . . . it is the recompense of a verse-translator for his thankless work to arrive at a perhaps sounder understanding as well as to a keener sense of the distinct values of two versifications than he could do by the analytical methods of the metrician. His very shortcomings, his frequent fits of despair, are so many testimonies to the absolute and partly untransmissible virtues of poetry, to the something inherent in its essence, diffuse through all its aspects, felt not in the spirit only but also in the form, not only in the language or the figures of speech but also in the structure of the verse." 5 At the same time, it is no less true that a knowledge and understanding 4 6

Daniel-Rops, Présence et Poësie, p. 143. Emile Legouis, A Short Parallel between French and English Versification, pp. 17/18.

10

FOREWORD

of the underlying 'technique' of an art immeasurably enhances our appreciation of it, and this is no exception in the case of that art which one critic has described as supreme,"... because it gives us not only sound, like music, and form, like sculpture, and colour, like painting, but unites them all, and affects the senses like reality itself". 6 For, " . . . though works of art are not made by rule, yet rules may be made from them; certain definite touchstones and principles can be found in fine work, and we know that Tennyson, for instance, when his poem was finished, examined it by the light of them". 7 No one, so far as 1 know, has yet accused Tennyson of formalism! As for the reader, or listener (if ever verse were made for listening to, it is Blok's!), the problem is excellently summed up once more by Scholes: "Listening is as much an analytical act as the appreciation of architecture; it must, therefore, be practised consciously until long use and experience enable us to exercise our painfully acquired powers subconsciously." Scholes, of course, is concerned with the music-listener. Peu importe. His ensuing definition of his own aims admirably sums up the hope and purpose that lie behind the present work: "The succeeding chapters teach conscious analysis in listening - in the hope that with many readers this process of analysis will eventually become largely subconscious." 8 Acknowledgements - like so many social conventions - all too easily take on the ring of a sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. Yet nothing could be more real and more precious than the help and understanding I have received from so many quarters during the long and painstaking preparation of this work and - almost as long again - its virtually complete revision after an unavoidable break of two years just when it seemed on the point of completion. To the authorities at the British Museum Library - that Mecca of innumerable thesis-writers - go my thanks for their courtesy and helpfulness, including permission to order photostat copies of certain works which time did not allow me to study fully during my visits to London. To all those, more especially, at the Basle University Library, for their infinite patience, understanding, and generosity in the loan of some •

E. A. Greening Lamborn, The Rudiments of Criticism, p. 70. Ibid., p. 36. ' The Listener's Guide..., p. 22 (my italics). Scholes's phrasing, as he explains, is adapted from an analogous passage by Prof. Frederick Corder in his Modem Musical Composition. 7

FOREWORD

11

works for very long periods. To Mr. Alexis Struve, in Paris, for tracking down a large number of extremely rare Russian works - Blokiana and metrical studies - and for lending me others from his private collection. I am also indebted to Professor Roman Jakobson, of Harvard University, for supplying me with a microfilm reproduction of certain pages from his work on Czech verse referring to Blok's dol'niki. To Professor Kiril Taranovski, also of Harvard, for providing copies of certain works hard to obtain, and for drawing my attention to several others. To Professor Dimitri von Mohrenschildt, of Dartmouth College, Hanover, N.J., for permission to reproduce here some of my own Blok translations which originally appeared in The Russian Review. To Professor Gleb Struve, of the University of California, for help in solving some knotty points of accentuation. To Dr. George Ivask, for stimulating criticism on certain aspects of Russian metre and rhythm. To Dr. Avril SokolovaPyman, the author of two original studies on English translations of Blok's verse, for her lively comments and helpful suggestions in this domain. To Miss Helene Berg, for help in checking parts of the Russian text. And particularly to Miss Sonia Ryser, without whose invaluable aid I could never have hoped to complete the extensive revision of the manuscript necessitated by the two-year interruption already referred to. Finally, and above all, to my friend and teacher, Dr. Elsa Mahler. Professor of Russian Language and Literature at the University of Basle, She it was who first introduced me to Blok. She who saw the possibilities inherent in those original 'abstract metrical schemes' of some of his poems. She who - at all times and under all circumstances - remained ready to give generously of her time and energy, her encouragement, her sound advice, born of immense experience, and - not least valuable - her never-failing sense of humour during the long and often difficult period when this work was taking shape. Her unrivalled knowledge of and love for the idiosyncrasies of the Russian language, particularly in its rhythmical and poetical aspects (the fruit of her long and exhaustive study of Russian folk-songs and popular verse) was to prove particularly valuable to me in tackling the formidable problem set by the study of the rhythm and metre of a language that is not one's own. For her selfless and unstinting help at all times I can never be sufficiently grateful, and it is my earnest hope that in the final completion of this work, in the face of so many undreamed-of obstacles, she may see at least a part of her due reward. In conclusion: I am painfully aware that a study such as this can never hope to be entirely free from errors. There will, too, almost certainly be

12

FOREWORD

expressions of view with which not all prosodists will concur. For all criticism, for all errors called to my attention, and for all inquiries - the author's most satisfying reward - I shall always be sincerely grateful. "La Pensée" Blonay sur Vevey September, 1964

ROBIN KEMBALL

P.S. - During revision of the final proofs, every effort has been made to incorporate references to the more important sources of literature up to and including 1963. These include numerous additional footnotes and - where space allowed - the insertion of brief Addenda at the end of certain chapters. I should like my last word to be one of praise and sincere appreciation of the almost superhuman efforts made by the printers and publishers in producing a work which can have been little short of a typographer's nightmare. December, 1964

R.K.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

FOREWORD

7

PART I

INTRODUCTORY I.

BLOK'S PLACE IN RUSSIAN PROSODY

21

PART II

ENGLISH AND RUSSIAN A GENERAL II.

VERSIFICATION

COMPARISON

METRICAL FACTORS

55

1. Endings 2. Amphibrach and anapaest 3. Line-lengths and stanza forms a) In iambic verse b) In trochaic verse c) In triple-time verse 4. Metres most commonly employed 5. Summary and conclusions III.

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS -

SUBSTITUTION,

55 64 76 76 85 94 102 Ill EQUIVALENCE,

AND THE LIKE

114

1. Isosyllabic substitution a) Pyrrhic substitution b) Spondaic substitution c) Trochaic substitution or "inversion of stress" . 2. Conclusions 3. Annotation of stress

115 116 126 129 144 150

.

14

TABLE OF CONTENTS PART III

RHYTHM A N D METRE I N BLOK'S VERSE IV.

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

159

1. Light feet ("pyrrhics") a) The 4-foot iamb b) The 5-foot iamb c) Make-up of light syllables in arsis 2. Heavy feet ("spondees") a) The 4-foot iamb b) The 5-foot iamb c) Incidence of "spondees" in first foot . . . . 3. Combined substitution a) Incidence b) Make-up c) Combined substitution and "light" feet . . . d) Combined substitution outside the first foot . . V.

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TROCHAIC METRES

.

.

.

.

188

1. Light feet ("pyrrhics") a) The 4-foot trochee b) The 5-foot trochee c) Make-up of light syllables in arsis 2. Other "substitution" in trochaic verse a) "Spondaic substitution" b) "Iambic substitution" c) Combined (monosyllabic + trisyllabic) substitution 3. Comparison of trochaic and iambic line . . . VI.

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TRIPLE-TIME METRES

1. General features a) "Dual" words b) "Light" feet c) "Heavy" feet d) Enclitics 2. Specific features a) Dactylic metres b) Anapaestic metres c) Amphibrachic metres

.

.

159 159 164 167 173 173 174 175 175 175 177 182 183

.

188 188 191 193 198 198 198 199 203 206

206 206 208 213 218 220 220 221 226

TABLE OF CONTENTS VII.

VIII.

ANISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

229

1. Basically duple-time verse a) lambic verse b) Trochaic verse 2. Basically triple-time verse a) Anapaestic verse b) Amphibrachic verse c) Dactylic verse d) Mixed triple-time metres

230 230 233 234 234 236 236 237

THE RHYTHM OF THE TONIC POEMS

241

1. 2. 3. 4.

241 249 251 252 252 258 261 262 267 271 271 274 276 277 277 279 281 281 285 291

5.

6.

7.

8. IX.

15

Historical introduction Method Material Values of X a) 3-stress poems b) 4-stress poems Dominant line-types a) 3-stress poems b) 4-stress poems Other values of X a) X = 3 (and 4) b) X = 0 c) X = 5 d) X = 6 e) X = 1 or 3, rarely 2 f) Poems with marked iambic leanings Typical syllabo-tonic features a) Heavy syllables in "thesis" b) Light syllables in "arsis" Summary and conclusions

. . . .

ENDINGS AND ENDING-PATTERNS

293

1. The main quatrain ending-patterns 2. Ending-patterns in non-quatrain poems a) 2-line stanzas b) 3-line stanzas c) 5-line stanzas d) 6-line stanzas e) 8-line stanzas

293 301 301 301 302 303 304

. . . .

16

TABLE OF

CONTENTS

f) Miscellaneous poems 3. Summary of main ending-patterns a) All-masculine endings b) All-feminine endings c) Dactylic endings 4. Grammatical make-up of dactylic endings . . . . a) Nouns b) Verbs c) Adjectives d) Adverbs e) Present participles active f) Past participles passive 5. Unusual endings and ending-patterns a) Hyperdactylic endings b) Non-equivalent endings c) "Mixed" ending-patterns 6. Enjambement 7. Examples of enjambement in Blok's verse . . . . a) Iambic verse b) Trochaic verse c) Anapaestic verse d) Amphibrachic verse e) Dactylic verse f) Tonic verse g) Conclusion

304 305 306 307 307 309 310 311 311 312 312 313 313 313 314 315 315 320 320 324 326 329 331 335 337

PART IV

THE POEMS A R R A N G E D IN GROUPS A C C O R D I N G TO METRES X.

XI.

T H E IAMBIC METRES

341

1. 2. 3. 4.

341 354 368 382

The shorter metres (below 4 X 4) The 4-foot metres (4x4) The longer metres (above 4x4) Miscellaneous

T H E TROCHAIC METRES

383

1. The shorter metres (below 4x4) 2. The 4-foot metres (4x4) 3. The longer metres (above 4x4)

383 391 405

TABLE OF CONTENTS

17

4. Miscellaneous

407

THE ANAPAESTIC METRES

409

XIII.

THE AMPHIBRACHIC METRES

421

XIV.

THE DACTYLIC METRES

429

XII.

XV.

XVI. XVII.

MIXED TRIPLE-TIME METRES

435

1. Isometric (and regular anisometric)

435

2. Anisometric (irregular)

437

POEMS COMBINING MORE THAN ONE METRE

.

.

.

.

THE TONIC SCHEMES

APPENDIX:

List of Ending-Patterns and Stanza Forms

443 449

.

483

Bibliography

487

List of Main Tables, Diagrams, etc

497

Alphabetical Index of First Lines (and Titles) of Blok's Poems .

500

Numerical List of Blok's Poems

520

Index of Names

536

PART I

INTRODUCTORY

CHAPTER I

BLOK'S PLACE I N R U S S I A N PROSODY

"Russian literature," complained Sergej Bobrov, the Moscow poet, in 1916, "is indescribably poor in works dealing with Russian versification. It is easy enough for the French, English, or Italian poet to surround himself with the most adept studies on the history and theory of his native verse; the Russian poet, under similar conditions, finds himself in the most helpless situation." 1 One year earlier, he had written in much the same vein: "... The number of works on Russian versification is extraordinarily small and, as for studies devoted to the examination and description of the technique of any individual poet - such works, alas, can be counted singly. We shall probably not be far wrong if we say that, in the literature so far, there exist five such articles in all - and even these are not all of equal merit." 2 That, indeed, was nearly fifty years ago. Since then, much has been done to fill the gap which undoubtedly existed. Poets themselves - Belyj first, but Brjusov and Bobrov himself soon after, to be followed later by G. Sengeli - all made their contributions to the study of Russian metrics. About the same time, scholars began to devote their attention to the same problems. First there appeared the researches of the early Formalists, including notably Jurij Tynjanov and Boris Ejxenbaum, Osip Brik and Roman Jakobson; these were soon followed, and in part accompanied, by studies along more orthodox lines, including a series of valuable works by such trained and erudite investigators as Viktor Vinogradov, the late Boris Tomasevskij, and Viktor Zirmunskij, each of whom, while originally evincing some sympathy with the Formalist school, yet retained an independent and altogether more level-headed approach, avoiding many of 1

Sergej Bobrov, Zapiski stixotvorca (Musaget, M., 1916), p. 69. Sergej Bobrov, Novoe o stixosloienii A. S. PuSkirta (Musaget, M., 1915), p. 15. The works Bobrov had in mind were, primarily, N. Ostolopov's Slovar' drevnej i novoj poezii, published in 1821 (!), and especially, among more recent works, Andrej Belyj's Simvolizm (1910), with which modern Russian versification may fairly be stated to have begun (vide infra, Ch. HI, pp. 117ff., of the present work). 2

22

BLOK'S PLACE IN RUSSIAN PROSODY

the excesses into which the strict "Formalists" were, by the very nature of their dogma, bound t o fall sooner or later. 3 A m o n g these latter studies, particular importance attaches t o the work of 2irmunskij, whose Introduction to Metrics,* published in 1925, remains t o this day the leading work o n Russian versification generally, while his study of Rhyme (1923) remains unsurpassed in English - and probably in any other language. 5 Useful work has since been carried out by Soviet investigators (L. Timofeev and others), also in Yugoslavia and in the U . S . A . (K. Taranovski). 6 Finally, mention should be made in the present context of a small work by B. O. Unbegaun, which - though modest in scope and n o t setting o u t t o provide anything in the way o f original findings - is yet immensely valuable as providing the English reader for the first time with a competent survey of the basic principles of Russian versification. 7 In addition to works of a general nature, the lack of studies dealing with 3

On the subject of the Formalists, their sympathisers and opponents, cf. esp.: Victor Erlich, Russian Formalism. History - Doctrine (Mouton & Co., The Hague, 1955), passim. On the attitude of ¿irmunskij in particular, and his final break with the Formalist school, cf. esp. pp. 75-77 of the same work. Zirmunskij, described here as "the most distinguished among the quasi-Formalist moderates", was in fact always careful to draw a distinction between what he dubbed the "formalistic" {formalisticeskij) approach of the extremists, i.e. the original adherents of Sklovskij and the Opojaz, and the "formal method" (formal'nyj metod) of metrical study generally, which, he maintained, had far deeper, broader, and, incidentally, older foundations, dating back to the original researches of Belyj, to whom, if to anybody, the honour belonged of being the "founder" of such a system of study. His views are set out in unmistakable form in the Introduction to his collected articles : Voprosy teorii literatury (Academia, L., 1928, pp. 7-16), where he concludes : "In any case, for myself personally, the formalistic doctrine of Opojaz and the spirit of a 'system' and a 'school' which links scientific study with dogmatic decisions laid down in advance remain, as always, unacceptable. In problems concerning the theory of literature, I reserve the right to go my own way, as hitherto." (p. 15). Cf. also his article: K voprosu o "formal'nom metode", reprinted in the same work, pp. 154-174. 4 V. Zirmunskij, Vvedenie v metriku. Teorija stixa (Academia, L., 1925). This invaluable study is frequently quoted throughout the present work under the abbreviated title: VVM. 5 V. ¿irmunskij, Rifma. Ee istorija i teorija (Academia, P., 1923). (Henceforth: Rifma). Cf. René Wellek & Austin Warren, Theory of Literature, p. 162. 6 For details, see Bibliography (III), pp. 489 ff., infra. 7 B. O. Unbegaun, Russian Versification (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1956). The present work was already two-thirds completed before the publication of Unbegaun's study. This fact - together with the (designedly) elementary and noncontroversial nature of his book - explains the incorporation in the present study of a certain amount of historical and other explanatory detail concerning Russian versification generally (cf. esp. Ch. II and III of the present work, infra). A French edition - in all essentials a reproduction of the English version, but adapted to the needs of the French reader, and including two extra works in the bibliography - appeared in 1958 under the title: La Versification russe (Librairie des Cinq Continents, Paris).

BLOK'S PLACE IN RUSSIAN PROSODY

23

the verse of individual poets, so deplored by Bobrov, has also partially been made good - more particularly, as might be expected, in the case of Puskin and of Lermontov; among modern poets, attention has also been directed to the verse structure of Majakovskij and, to a lesser extent, to the work of Anna Axmatova.8 All in all, the position had so far improved since Bobrov's time that Unbegaun, writing in 1956, could state without fear of contradiction: "Studies in Russian versification are numerous...". 9 And yet - amongst this, to-day, formidable array of metrical researches, the absence of any large-scale study of Blok's versification cannot fail to call attention to itself as constituting at once a lamentable and surprising omission in the field of Russian prosodical investigation.10 Lamentable, because Blok is, by any standards, one of the relatively few first-rank Russian poets ever; surprising, because, over and above this, he is - of all Russian poets, and perhaps of all poets of all times - the outstanding example of one who derives so tremendous a part of his total effect from his uncanny sense of rhythm. This pre-eminently rhythmical quality in Blok's verse is universally acknowledged. "Blok's poems, more than any other Russian poems, must be read, not so much analysing the text as listening to the rhythm - and in any case multiplying the sense by the sound," wrote Georgij Adamoviô, doyen of Russian émigré critics, in 1931. "Blok's text is confused, its literal meaning, in the majority of cases, obscure. Yet, [when] supported by the rhythm - in which case the intonation of the sentence sometimes lends it 8

Cf. Bibliography. On Puskin, cf. esp. the works by Tomasevskij. Other studies are given by ¿irmunskij on p. 264 of VVM. ; later studies are mentioned by Unbegaun on p. 159 of his Russian Versification, notably that by N. V. Lapsina et al. On Lermontov, cf. esp. the works by D. G. Gincburg (VVM, p. 264) and I. N. Rozanov. Also that by S. V. Suvalov (Ch. VI - Poetikd), and the section O stixe Lermontova which appears in the Academy edition of Lermontov's works edited by D. I. Abramovic (Vol. 5,1913, pp. 206-209). On Majakovskij, cf. articles by A. Abramov and others in : Tvorâestvo Majakovskogo (cf. Russian Versification, p. 159). On Axmatova, cf. Boris Ejxenbaum, Anna Axmatova. Opyt analiza. 9 Russian Versification, p. 156, where a list of the more important bibliographies of works on Russian versification is given. 10 The only work dealing specifically with Blok's verse from a structural, or at least an analytical, point of view would still seem to be 2irmunskij's Poezija Aleksandra Bloka (cf. Bibliography). But this is not, and was never intended to be, a study in Blok's versification per se, though it does contain a brief 'formal' examination of his accentual verse (Ch. VI) and of his rhyme (Ch. VII). A certain amount of technical and statistical data may be found in part V of Sophie Bonneau's V Univers poétique d'Alexandre Blok, pp. 297ff. But these, too, are not of a strictly prosodical nature and are, in any case, by no means always reliable (cf. esp. Ch. II, p. 109, note 172, and p. 110, note 176, of the present work).

24

BLOK'S PLACE IN RUSSIAN PROSODY

ten times as much force - the [same] text becomes dazzling in its brilliance."11 A quarter of a century later, Blok's rhythm still had not lost any of its power over him. "Blok's [poetical] mastery (masterstvo) is first and foremost a rhythmical one, and it would be hard to name a poet in whose work intonation and melody are of greater importance. ... Thanks to his astounding rhythmical gift, to his 'absolute ear', Blok acquired a magic all his own..." 12 An English admirer of Blok, Sir Maurice Bowra, puts it in much the same way. Recalling Valery's dictum that "a poet's task is simply to transfer to another his own state", he comments: "That is what Blok does. Through his rhythms and the power of his words he conveys his own unique, extremely private state."13 K. Cukovskij, contemporary and close friend of Blok, has recorded the literally magic spell under which the poet held his admirers. "He did with us what he pleased, because the power of his lyric verse had its roots not so much in its words as in its rhythms."14 Rhythm, in fact, was in all Blok's being. The poet, Georgij Culkov, another close friend of Blok's, once referred, in a striking passage, to the 'living rhythm of his face', with 'its something melodious, harmonious, and well-proportioned', and even - 'particularly captivating' - to the rhythmical nature of Blok's very gestures.16 Hand in hand with the rhythm of Blok's verse goes its essentially musical quality - the 'melody' and 'harmony' that are, almost inevitably, mentioned by most commentators in the same breath. If rhythm was in his being, music was for him very life itself - such stuff, it might fairly be said, as his dreams were made of. "If we... ask ourselves the question: who among Russian poets... most sensed the musicality (muzykaVnost') of the world and tried to communicate that musicality in his poetry? - we inevitably light on Blok. By his own assertion, Blok lived the whole time in [tune with] the ring (zvucanii) and the rhythm of 11 Georgij Adamovic, Aleksandr Blok (in: Sovremennyja Zapiski, XLVII, Paris, 1931, pp. 283-305), p. 300. 12 G. Adamovic, Nasledstvo Bloka (in: Novyj ¿urnal/The New Review, XLIV, New York, 1956, pp. 73-87), p. 79. 18 C. M. Bowra, The Heritage of Symbolism (Macmillan, London, 1954), p. 147. 14 K. Cukovskij, Kniga ob Aleksandre Bloke (izd. 2oe, Epoxa, Berlin, 1922), p. 65. Cf. Prince D. S. Mirsky (on Blok's Dvenadcat'): "His supreme mastery of rhythm far surpasses the ordinary limits assigned to poetic expression, and transcends the rational element of speech." (Modern Russian Literature, O.U.P., London, 1925, p. 108). 15 Georgij Culkov, Aleksandr Blok i ego vremja (in: Pis'ma Aleksandra Bloka. Kolos, L„ 1925, pp. 91-120), pp. 95/96.

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25

his age ... so much so ... that, as soon as he ceased to hear that rhythm, he ceased writing poetry also." Thus writes K. Pomerancev in an article on The Essence of Poetry.16 Referring to the forebodings of doom and imminent catastrophe in Blok's verse, the same author declares:" ... the main feature in these forebodings lies not in the words and not in the sense of Blok's poetry but in its tonalities (tonaVnosti), in its melodies (napevax) ... Blok was a poet who, in an entirely special way, heard the rhythm of [his] time, the music of [his] age." 17 "Blok," wrote A.V. LunaSarskij on one occasion, "was a musician with all his being, and he apprehended the world as music likewise ... Blok's strength resided precisely in the fact that the symbols he created were primarily musical ones ... This musical conception of the world, this firm conviction that the inner essence of existence (bytija) was musical, ... accompanied Blok throughout the course of his life." 18 Cukovskij bears this out to the full, recording that even " . . . space resounded for him in some way or other. Of objects, he was in the habit of saying: 'that is a musical object' or 'that is a non-musical object'. He even wrote to me once, in reference to some anniversary, that the day had been 'not empty, but musical'. At all times, and not only with his ears, but with his very skin, with his entire being, he perceived the music of the world about him ... he was overflowing with music. He was one of those darlings of [the gods of] music for whom creating meant lending an attentive ear, who experienced neither tension nor effort in creating." 19 'Blok and music'is a theme vast enough to fill a book in itself. This cosmic conception of the role of music - encountered in his writing again and again - is perhaps best summed up in the following extract from his diary for 1919, where he writes, in his characteristic, inimitable way: "In the beginning was music. Music is the essence of the world. The world grows in tensile rhythms. The growth holds itself back, afterwards to 'burst forth'. Such is the law of all organic life on earth - the life of the individual and of humanity [as a whole]. Volitional surges (volevye napory). The growth of the world is culture {kul'tura). Culture is musical rhythm. "The whole brief history of humanity retained in our feeble memory is evidently [one of] the changing of periods; in one, music dies away, 18

K. Pomerancev, SuScnost' poezii (in: Literaturnyj Sovremennik. Almanax. Proza, stixi, kritika. Mjunxen [Munich], 1954, pp. 214-224), p. 215. 17 Ibid., p. 216. 18 A. Lunacarskij, Aleksandr Blok (in: Sobranie socinenij. Izd. Pisatelej v Leningrade, 1932, Vol. I, pp. 14-55), pp. 24/25. 19 K. Cukovskij, Aleksandr Blok kak celovek i poet (Izd. A. F. Marks, Petrograd, 1924), p. 25.

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sounds smothered, only to burst forth with a new volitional surge in the one succeeding it." "Such was the great musical period of humanism - the period of the Renaissance, which followed on the musical lull of the Middle Ages." 20 At this point it is essential, if misunderstanding is to be avoided, to define a little more closely what Blok's musical nature was - or, at least, what it was not. It is clear, for instance, that he had no 'ear for music' in the normally accepted sense of the term. In this, as Marija Beketova pointed out in her original biographical sketch of the poet, Blok was like his uncle, Petr L'voviC Blok: neither of them had 'a musical ear', though both were outstanding for their 'striking sense of rhythm'. 21 Taking this as his cue, LunaSarskij enlarges on the definition: " . . . Blok was not a musical person in the ordinary sense of the word, i.e. he was exceptionally fond of music, felt its power over him very strongly, but himself played no instrument and did not possess a good ear, i.e., in particular, was unable to repeat music he heard." 22 There is, in this connection, a famous letter of Blok's to Belyj, in which he once confessed: "My understanding of music is non-existent to the point of despair - bereft as I am by nature of the remotest ear for music, with the result that I cannot talk of music as an art from any point of view. This being so, I am condemned to [a state in which] that which is for ever singing inside me never emerges into the open ..,." 23 To this, LunaSarskij again brings his own interpretation, which - for all its cumbrous wording and laboured style - probably comes somewhere near the truth. " With this," he writes, "Blok declares that within him there lived some kind of continuous song, some kind of musical principle, probably not organised in melodic form [but] evidently consisting rather of a rhythmical exchange of emotions, crescendoes and diminuendoes - in a word, of some more or less dynamically organised life of sensations, moods, affects (affektov), very closely related to what Blok evidently experienced when listening to music ... Music called forth in him profound, varying, powerful excitations. But these excitations he experienced even without music; moreover, they strove outwards but, finding no escape in purely tonal creation, found it in verbal creation 20 Dnevnik Al. Bloka 1917-1921 (II), p. 155. On the same theme, cf. ibid. p. 158 and p. 161, and esp. V. Gol'cev, O muzikal'nom vosprijatii mira u Bloka (in: O Bloke, pp. 259-282). 21 M. A. Beketova, Aleksandr Blok (Alkonost, Pbg., 1922), pp. 13/14. 22 Aleksandr Blok, pp. 21/22. 23 Andrej Belyj, Vospominanija ob Aleksandre Aleksandrovice Bloke (in: Zapiski Mectatelej, No. 6, Pbg., 1922, pp. 5-122), p. 17.

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24

[instead]." At this point, LunaCarskij recalls Goethe's suggestion that people with powerful artistic leanings, but untalented in the 'plastic' or musical sphere, tend to become poets and, as it were, tell (in words) of the visual images or sound worlds which they would like to create more directly, not through the intellect, but for the eyes and ears as such.25 However this may be, there is nothing very new or surprising in the fact that Blok - the most 'musical' of poets - should yet have been so 'unmusical' in the accepted sense of the word.26 An obvious analogy from the 24

Aleksandr Blok, p. 22. Ibid., p. 22. 26 On the totally different - and even, on occasion, mutually antagonistic - nature of the musician's and the poet's "musicality", cf. an interesting article by L. Sabaneev: O muzike reci, which appeared in Russkaja MysV (Paris) on 21.X.1958. Of the leading poets of his time (and he claims to have known nearly all), Sabaneev maintains that only two or three were "musical" in the accepted sense of the term - "Vjaceslav Ivanov and Bal'mont, and, of the younger generation, Georgij Adamovie." "Blok, it is said, was the most musical of poets. Yet as regards music (in the narrow sense of the word), he was in fact extraordinarily unmusical. He had difficulty in memorising the simplest tunes, was little interested in music as such, " In a later article (OproSlom. Serebrjannyj vek russkoj literatury. II. BaltruSajtis. In : Russkaja MysV [Paris] 8.XII. 1959), Sabaneev returns to the same theme: " all the other members of the Symbolist group [ = except BaltruSajtis] were - unexpectedly and to me incomprehensibly completely anti-musical: Sologub, Merezkovskij, Brjusov, Belyj, and Blok - some of them simply loathed music (Brjusov), others had [at best] primordial and primitive tastes. This confirms once more [my] belief ... that the 'musicality' of verse and the musicality of musical substance (tkan') are two completely different and at times even opposing factors and stand in absolutely no reciprocal relationship whatsoever." By the opposite token, Sabaneev argues (O muzike reci), musicians are very often 'deaf' to poetry, more particularly to that feeling for the 'music of verse' with which we are concerned here. In this connection, one inevitably thinks of Boris Pasternak - undoubtedly the most musicianly musical of modern Russian poets: his mother was an eminent concert pianist, he himself studied music under Scriabin, and for a time seriously considered taking it up as a career. Though he eventually turned to poetry instead, he remained throughout his life not only a great music lover but a brilliant improvising pianist. Yet who would pretend that his verse - for all its undoubted merits, including 'rhythmicity' - has anywhere near the 'musicality' we associate with that of Blok? The distinction was once drawn by Gogol' : "Whatever one may say, the sounds of the soul and the heart, expressed in words, are several times wider in range (raznoobraznee) than musical sounds." (Vybrannyja mesta izperepiski s druz'jami, Ch. XIV: O teatre, etc.) On 'music' and 'musicality' in Symbolist poetry - French and Russian - cf. also Georgette Donchin, The Influence of French Symbolism on Russian Poetry (Mouton & Co., The Hague, 1958), pp. 105-114. (Blok's attitude is briefly summarised on pp. 110/111.) Further Sir Maurice Bowra, who, discussing Mallarmé, bears out in a sense the view expressed by Sabaneev: " . . . Mallarmé was certainly deluded by the analogy of music. ... Words are limited by their meanings. The most melodious and associative poetry cannot hope to snatch his honours from the musician. Attempts have been made to justify Mallarmé's belief, but the facts are against him." (The Heritage of Symbolism, p. 14.) 25

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realm of English verse would be with Shelley, whose lyrical poems, in the words of Egerton Smith, " . . . even though not composed for musical setting, and though he had evidently no ear for musical tones, were dominated by this ideal of song. He made melodies of words, and therefore chose words which had fine and subtle melodic qualities, both combinative and individual".27 In lyric poetry, the same author tells us, "... a new set of conditions arises ... that leaves the realm of true song ... a poet has to create, by his melodious rhythm and impassioned treatment of a suitable lyric theme, that ^medicated atmosphere' which produces in the reader an exalted mood in which the verse is accepted as something to be sung rather than spoken ,.." 2 8 As for rhythm, he reminds us that it may be "both a cause and an effect, and also an intensifier of passionate feeling."29 Blok was like Shelley in at least one other respect: neither poet occupied himself much with problems of versification - at least, not in the sense of consciously or deliberately applied prosodical study. For Saintsbury, Shelley was "the great modern example of prodosic inspiration". 30 In much the same way, as AdamoviS has rightly pointed out, "even in the realm of rhythm, Blok's approach was intuitive rather than the result of consciously applied calculation and skill." "This intuition," continues Adamovic, "never betrayed him." 31 And it is this intuitive gift which almost certainly helps to explain Blok's own negative attitude towards all forms of prosodic study. Zorgenfrej tells us that Blok "... avoided anything in the nature of long discussions on literary themes - the views he expressed were of a fragmentary nature and, with rare exceptions, unimpassioned. ... all literary virtuosity (masterstvo), all purely formal(-istic) poetics called forth in him a negative reaction. ... Attainments in the sphere of poetic technique, unless supplemented by other attainments of a different nature, left him profoundly indifferent." 32 The late Georgij Ivanov, who knew Blok in his later years, records in his memoirs how, as a young poet, he once asked Blok whether a sonnet required a coda, only to find, to his astonishment, 27 Egerton Smith, The Principles of English Metre (O.U.P., 1923), p. 128 (my italics). This invaluable study - of great relevance to Russian verse problems also is henceforth referred to by the abbreviated title of P.E.M. " P.E.M., p. 128. " P.E.M., p. 128, note 1. 30 George Saintsbury, Historical Manual of English Prosody (Macmillan, London, 1914), p. 312. This valuable, refreshing, albeit controversial, study is henceforth referred to by the abbreviated title of H.M.E.P. 81 Nasledstvo Bloka, p. 79. 32 V. A. Zorgenfrej, Aleksandr Aleksandrovic Blok (in: Zapiski Mectatelej, No. 6, pp. 123-154), p. 147.

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that "Blok, the famous maitre, did not know what a coda was .. ." "Nothing," writes Sophie Bonneau in her study of the poet, "equals Blok's sovereign indifference to everything concerning the technical [side of verse]."34 Other accounts suggest that his attitude was even one of profound and adamant hostility. "Not from books," wrote Cukovskij soon after Blok's death, "but from the experience of his entire creative work, he knew that poetry was something more than mere letters, and the fact that the young generation of his day conceived of it as such struck him as being an ominous sign of our times. The present-day approach to poetry, via purely formal(-istic) analysis of poetic technique, seemed to him to spell the death of poetry. He detested each one of the schools springing up then, designed for the formal study of poetry, because he sensed in them likewise that same whisper of death that he felt around [him]..." 35 No one, certainly, foresaw better than Blok the fearful dangers of overspecialisation. Four months before his death, in April, 1921, he wrote: "Just as in Russia painting, music, prose, poetry are inseparable, so, too, philosophy, religion, social problems (obscestvennosV), even politics, are indivisible - from the former and from one another. Together they represent one single mighty flood, bearing with it the precious burden of national culture ... This is a sign of strength and youth; the reverse, a sign of weariness and decrepitude ... More and more dividing up into schools and movements, more and more specialisation - [these are] signs of just such a lamentable state of affairs." 36 From this, Blok passed on to a searing attack on Gumilev and his school of self-styled 'Acmeists', whom he accused of " ... floundering in the cold bog of soulless theories and every kind of formalism; ... in their poetry (and, consequently, in their own selves also), they silence the most important, the only [thing] worth while: the soul. ... to talk seriously with any of them or about any of them will only be possible when they quit their 'guilds', renounce their formalism, ... and become themselves [once more]."37 But to return to the specific realm of metrics and prosody: Blok's inveterate opposition to all attempts at 'prosodic study' was undoubtedly 38

Georgij Ivanov, Peterburgskie zimy (Izd. Im. Cexova, New York, 1952), p. 204. VUnivers poétique d'Alexandre Blok, p. 297. 36 Aleksandr Blok kak celovek i poet, p. 29. 36 In the article: Bez bozestva, bez vdoxnoven'ja (cited here from: Aleksandr Blok. Socinenija v dvux tomax [Gos. Izd. Xudoz. Lit., M., 1955, Vol. II, pp. 361-370], pp. 362/3). 37 Ibid., p. 370. 84

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highly coloured by his acquaintance with Belyj, whose absurd exaggerations unfortunately led him (Belyj) more and more away from his originally fruitful ideas towards a conception of metrics akin to an exact science and virtually indistinguishable from a set of abstruse mathematical formulae. This is borne out by the account subsequently given by Belyj himself in his reminiscences of Blok: "He himself ( = Blok) never embarked on the analysis of verse structure, considering it dangerous for a poet to make a detailed study of the anatomy and physiology of [his?] creative work; such study he looked upon as a particular form of suicide; I remember how, when 1 earlier explained [to him] my approaches to the study of verse rhythm, A.A. listened in silence, not evincing overmuch interest; ... later they told me that A.A. advised young persons against analysing rhythm, pointing to me (at that time I was not writing any poems) in illustration: 'Take Andrej Belyj - there was a poet for you. He embarked on a detailed study of rhythm and - himself stopped writing; it was bound to be.' ..." "on this point," continues Belyj, "I never agreed with Blok." And, citing the young poet Kazin as a brilliant example of the conscious study of rhythmics, he concludes, significantly: "Here, I am with Gumilev, rather; and - with the formalists."38 Far from abandoning his search for a mathematical ultima ratio, Belyj later returned to his cherished dream, producing, towards the end of his life, what may fairly be termed the reductio ad absurdum of everything that Blok had castigated - something, indeed, which must have exceeded Blok's worst fears and to this extent abundantly justified them. Of Belyj's Rhythm as Dialectics,39 even Zirmunskij - who himself devoted years of his life to serious, scientific, prosodical research - was moved to observe that its author "seemed all too often to proceed on the assumption that there exist in poetry immanent laws of 'mathematical dialectics'. Algebraic symbols... acquire... an autonomy of their own, when the critic embarks upon elaborate mathematical operations, the results of which hardly warrant the effort they entailed."40 As the first man in the field of modern Russian metrical study, Belyj deserves his full share of credit. By the same token, however, he must accept some share of the blame for the direction in which Russian pros38 Andrej Belyj, Vospominatiija o Bloke (in: Epopeja, No. 4, Berlin, 1923, pp. 61-305), pp. 196/7. 3 " Andrej Belyj, Ritm kak dialektika (Federacija, M., 1929). 40 Cf. V. 2irmunskij, Po povodu knigi'Ritm kak dialektika' (in: Zvezda, No. 8,1929). The above account is cited from the paraphrase (?) given by Erlich on p. 22 of Russian Formalism. On this point, cf. also Ch. Ill, p. 117, note 12, of the present work.

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ody subsequently tended to develop. By nature strongly disposed towards exaggeration, by heredity imbued with a passion for the mathematical approach, 41 Belyj, in his Simvolizm, set a tone which, to a greater or lesser extent, was to colour the majority of subsequent Russian studies in metre and rhythm to the present day. Indeed, in the event he was, as it were, 'out-Belyj-ed' by the 'Belyj-ists' that followed him, and certainly out-formalised by the Formalists themselves, for whom, apparently, his method was not sufficiently 'specialised' - not sufficiently divorced from the soul of poetry and poetics as a whole. Ironically enough, two years before the publication of Belyj's Rhythm as Dialectics (which far exceeded in mathematical extremism anything that had appeared in Simvolizm), 2irmunskij, taking his stand in opposition to the Formalists, paid tribute, with characteristic fairness, to the 'vital impulse' which Belyj had given to 'methodological research into ... problems of literary form'42 - although himself well aware of the shortcomings and dangers of Belyj's original 'method' of prosodic study, to which he had already called attention in his Introduction to Metrics.43 Whether partly because of the tone set by Belyj (though it would be unfair to lay the sins of succeeding investigators entirely at Belyj's door); or because of the nature of the Russian language and its verse structure as such (which admittedly favours a statistical approach to a far greater extent than English); or because of a national bent towards theoretical discussion rather than practical realities - the fact remains that Russian metrical study (in its briefer but correspondingly more concentrated history, since 1910) has tended to follow a much more 'mathematical' and 'statistical' path than, say, English prosody, which - entirely in keeping with its own national genius - has, by comparison, favoured a more empirical and practical approach. This brings us to the more general problem of the aims and ideals that prosody should set itself - of its nature and true purpose. It is significant that, in the very same year as Belyj's Simvolizm made its appearance, Saintsbury, in his new Historical Manual of English Prosody, should have written in a Preface: "The work ... cannot hope to content those who think that prosody should be, like mathematics or music, a science, immutable, peremptory, abstract in the other sense. It will not content those who think - in pursuance or independently of such an opinion - that it should discard appreciation of the actual poetry, on which, 41

Belyj's father, Prof. Nikolaj Bugajev, was an eminent mathematician, and Dean of the Science (Physico-Mathematical) Faculty at the University of Moscow. " In the Introduction to: Voprosy teorii literatury, pp. 8/9. a Cf. VVM., esp. pp. 40-45. Also Ch. i n , pp. 117 ff., of the present work.

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from my point of view, it is solely based." 44 This insistence on the artistic, rather than the scientific, basis of prosody recurs again and again in Saintsbury's work. Since, he claimed, at the time at which he wrote, "no authoritative body of doctrine on the subject of English prosody" could be said to exist, he was setting out to provide one - but again, "with the constant proviso and warning that it will be doctrine subject, not to the practically invariable uniformity of Science, but to the wide variations of Art, - not to the absolute compulsion of the universal, but to the comparative freedom of the individual and particular." 45 In the light of his exhaustive research and immense knowledge, Saintsbury ultimately framed a number of 'rules' on which he considered such a 'body of doctrine' might well be based. But here, again, he was quick to point out that by 'rules' he understood, "not imperative or compulsory precepts, but observed inductions from the practice of English poets"; to which he added the typically refreshing and mischievous afterthought: "He that can break them with success, let him." 46 Particularly valuable, too, was his insistence on the dangers of losing sight of the historical background - "which ought to be, but has very seldom been, the basis of every discussion on prosody". 47 This point was subsequently taken up, and acted upon with admirable results, by Egerton Smith: "Metrical theory cannot without danger divorce itself from the history of poetic form, and 1 have tried to show how the fundamental principles of verse have been modified by different factors ... This has hardly received sufficient recognition, but for the full exposition of so complex a subject an historical as well as an analytical study is required." 48 For such investigators, clearly, prosody is anything but an exact science capable of definition in terms of mathematical formulae or of explanation outside its historical environment.49 44

H.M.E.P., p. vi. H.M.E.P., p. 4. H.M.E.P., p. 30 (my italics). 47 H.M.E.P., p. 4. 48 P.E.M., p. vii. 49 Two examples of Saintsbury's delightful irony, and of his eminently common-sense approach, are worth recording here: 1. Of anisosyllabic substitution in English (and the theory that English verse is basically syllabic): "One difficulty in it, however, could never escape its most peremptory devotees;... It was all very well to lay down that English verse must consist of a certain number of syllables; but it could escape no one who had ever read a volume or even a few pages of English poetry, that it did consist of a very uncertain number of them. The problem was, therefore, how to get rid of the surplus where itexisted." (p. 16). 2. Of the shortcomings of Guest's method of prosodic study: "It may seem incredible that a writer of learning and acuteness should not have seen the absurdity of his 46

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33

This is not to say that the results of their investigations are always beyond dispute, or their deductions uncontroversial. Far from it.60 That would be asking too much. The fact nevertheless remains that, with all the controversy to which prosodical theories - in English as in other languages - give rise, the majority of modern English prosodists reveal an equally refreshing and sane approach. In particular, they have, by and large, avoided the besetting temptation, the ever-present danger, of all purely theoretical, 'abstract' approaches - that of arriving at a point (as ultimately happened to Belyj) where the verse tends to be there for the benefit of the method of scansion (or 'rules') devised, rather than the reverse. This approach was strenuously opposed by David Masson in his study of Milton's versification. "The proper way," he wrote, "is not to impose the music upon the lines, but to let the music of each line arise out of it as it is read naturally. Only in this way can we know what metrical effect Shakespeare or Milton anywhere intended." 51 In this connection, incidentally, he did not feel that time had basically altered very much in terms of strictly metrical, as opposed to pronunciational, values. "No doubt the reading of English poetry in Milton's time or Shakespeare's differed in some respects from ours. The differences, however, must have been in details of pronunciation rather than in metrical instinct ... For this reason, and also because Milton's poetry is a property which, by his own express intention, we may use and enjoy after our own habits and methods, the right way of scanning his verse is to read it freely and naturally as we should read verse of our own day, subject only to a few transmitted directions, and to register the actual results as well as we can in metrical formulae," 52 Once again, the insistence is, rightly enough, on the subordination of metrical method to its material, and not vice versa. This common-sense approach - so obvious that it might seem hardly worth mentioning, were it not for the exaggerations of certain metrical theorists - was dealt with particularly forcefully by Edgar Allan Poe: "The object of what we call scansion is the distinct marking of the rhythmical flow... There can be no other object, and there is none. Of course, then, the scansion and the reading flow should go hand-in-hand ... The former represents and exposition when he tells beautiful poetry - sometimes admitted by himself as such - that it has no business to be beautiful because it does not suit his rules." (p. 255). 10 This applies to Saintsbury in particular. With the views of Egerton Smith, I find myself in general agreement. 51 Cf. The Poetical Works of John Milton, Vol. Ill, p. 214. » Ibid., p. 215.

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presses the latter; and is good or bad as it truly or falsely represents and expresses it. If by the written scansion of a line we are not enabled to perceive any rhythm or music in the line, then either the line is unrhythmical or the scansion false."53 This view is all the more convincing for its coming from a poet- rather than a scholar-prosodist. It was another poet-prosodist, Robert Bridges, who gave what may well be the answer we are seeking in relation to Blok. "The fact," wrote Bridges, "that rhythm is so much more evident than prosody, and is felt to he so much nearer to the poetic effects, inclines people to think that prosody is pedantic rubbish, which can only hamper the natural expression of free thought and so on. But in all arts the part that can be taught is the dry detail of the material which has to be conquered; and it is no honour to an art to despise its grammar."^ Now it is true, of course, that Bridges, though he wrote some fine verse, does not rank among the really great English poets - any more than does Poe. It would, however, be quite wrong to infer from this that, because some of the greatest and most 'inspired' poets have had little or no need to study the 'grammar' of verse, evidence of such study therefore relegates a poet automatically to the second class, or presupposes that he is not, by nature, in the top rank. As the counterpart, in this sense, to Shelley's 'prosodic inspiration', Saintsbury cites Keats, Tennyson, and Swinburne as outstanding examples of 'prosodic study'.55 Now the grace and ease of Keats, like the melody and rhythm of Tennyson, are universally acknowledged. As for Swinburne, he offers the most interesting example of all in relation to the point at issue, combining inspiration and applied technique to an unusual degree, and with no less unusual and strikingly successful results. Saintsbury named him "of all English poets the one who has applied the widest scholarship and study, assisted by great original prosodic gift, to the varying and accomplishing of English metre. Impeccable in all kinds; in lyric nearly supreme." 56 55 The Rationale of Verse (in: Edgar Allan Poe. The Poems and Three Essays on Poetry etc. [O.U.P., 1948], p. 239). Not so John Thompson, who considers that a line from Paradise Lost "... would be scanned (but surely not read) in this way! ..." (Linguistic Structure and the Poetic Line, p. 171). 64 Cf. Milton's Prosody, with a chapter on Accentual Verse and Notes (by Robert Bridges), Revised Final Edition (O.U.P., 1921), p. I l l (my italics). 56 H.M.E.P., p. 312. Among French poets, Baudelaire (incidentally, a great admirer of Swinburne) provides an outstanding example of inspiration and poetic genius allied to consciously applied technique. Cf., inter alia, Donchin, The Influence of French Symbolism ..., p. 114. 66 H.M.E.P., p. 313. Cf. also Richard Church, in his Introduction to: Swinburne. Poems and Prose (Everyman's Library, Dent, London, 1950, pp. ix-xvii): "With all

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35

The extent to which poets - including the greatest poets - apply themselves consciously to prosodic study thus varies immensely. In Russian, it is true, not one of the four great poets could really be said to have busied himself with problems of versification as such, though Lermontov, in particular, clearly had a keen eye and ear for certain poetic devices coming within the metrical sphere.67 Puskin was severely opposed to any purely technical approach which concentrated on outward forms at the expense of the inward 'thought'. 58 But even those whose technique is predominantly the product of unconscious inspiration still have their lesson to tell. It is in this sense, surely, that we have to understand Saintsbury's penetrating - albeit at first sight paradoxical - observation that "the greatest poets are naturally, and almost inevitably, the greatest prosodists", in which connection he again quotes, as perfect examples of the two 'extreme' approaches, the cases of Keats and of Shelley.59 Of the latter, he points out that he "never seems to have studied metre much ... But he touches none that he does not adorn; none that he does not make matter of delight; and none, likewise, in which he does not supply a text for infinite technical instruction as well."40 Very much the same might be said of Blok, whose affinity with Shelley in this respect has already been touched on earlier. Every art has its own technique - its 'grammar', as Bridges termed it - the mechanism, to coin a colloquial but effective phrase, that 'makes it tick'. What lies beyond this technique is inspiration, genius, divine gift, call it what you will - something intangible, which defies analysis and dissection, but without which no artist, no work of art, will ever be truly great. At the same time, it is no less true that the most inspired and gifted artist - though he may achieve 'greatness' - will never achieve perfection unless or until he has, by some means or other, mastered his technique. Again, the proportions vary immensely. Of all the arts, the one that makes the most exacting demands on technique - even more than music - is almost certainly the dance; which goes a long way towards explaining his prolixity, his metrical technique is impeccable. There is not a poet in our language with a more subtle ear for metre." (p. xiv). 67 Cf., inter alia, Ch. II of the present work, for Lermontov's adoption of certain typically English metrical devices during the early 1830's. 58 Cf., inter alia, D . Blagoj, Masterstvo PuSkina (Sov. Pis., M., 1955), p. 17. Citing the example of Ronsard and Malherbe, both of whom had rendered "indisputable service to their native tongue", but who - having expended their energies "wrestling with the mechanics of versification..." - already lay forgotten, Puskin once remarked: "Such is the fate awaiting writers who occupy themselves with the outward forms of the word rather than with its thought, its true life, regardless of its usage!" 49 H.M.E.P., p. 203. H.M.E.P., p. 205.

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the extreme rarity, in ballet, of a Pavlova or an Ulanova, a Nijinsky or a Nureyev - great artists who ultimately succeed in expressing their genius beyond, rather than within, the confines of the merely technical. At the other end of the scale, almost certainly, comes poetry, of which Enid Hamer has aptly said : "There is no other art in which genius may be so far unaware of the laws and materials by which and in which it works. A painter must know something of a colourman's chemistry; a sculptor cannot neglect the properties of stone and metal; a musician must school himself in the complex mathematics of harmony. But the poet's materials are more intimately a part of common life, the sounds of spoken words, and the laws for their manipulation are instinctive. A fine ear is his guide."81 At the same time, despite these differences of degree, one axiom remains true of all art and of all true artists - the technique, once mastered, is relegated to a subordinate position, is outshone by the brilliance and genius of the creative, the artistic, the divine, the inspired; and henceforth passes, to this extent, unnoticed.62 Now Blok, of course, is the example among poets of just such inspiration. "More than any Russian poet, more than any European poet of his time," Sir Maurice Bowra has justly said of him, "Blok gives the impression of being literally inspired. The extraordinary originality of his poetry, its endless surprises and startling strength, its inexhaustible music, seem to have been given him by some power outside himself and to owe little to painstaking workmanship." 83 Cukovskij once made much the same point, simultaneously enlarging on the theme and hinting at the deceptive nature of this unobtrusive mastery. "The things he [ = Blok] wrote of seemed so penetrated with suffering that, reading them, we failed to notice the subtleties of his poetic mastery. His astounding technique is astounding precisely by reason of its being " Enid Hamer, The Metres of English Poetry (Methuen, London, 1930), p. vii. (This work is henceforth referred to by the abbreviated title M.o.E.P.). " "... de même qu'il n'y a pas de recette permettant de faire de la vraie poésie, il ne saurait en exister non plus pour créer une danse colorée, inspirée par la pensée et le sentiment, c'est-à-dire d'expression claire encore que muette et artistiquement belle. Il va de soi qu'outre l'alphabet, le poète doit aussi connaître la grammaire et le syntaxe de sa langue maternelle. Il doit les manier avec aisance, dans toutes leurs finesses et leurs nuances. De même, l'artiste de ballet. Mais de même qu'une connaissance impeccable de la langue n'est qu'une condition préliminaire à l'œuvre du poète, de même une impeccable maîtrise de sa technique, de son alphabet, n'est qu'une condition indispensable, sans doute, mais seulement préliminaire du travail normal d'un artiste de ballet." Galina Oulanova, L'Ecole d'une danseuse (L'Art soviétique, Editions en langues étrangères, Moscou, n.d.), pp. 17/18. " The Heritage of Symbolism, p. 178.

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37

almost imperceptible. Only among lesser poets does technique occupy the forefront of the picture in such a way that we involuntarily become aware of it. ... But with a great poet, with a Lermontov or a Blok, the entire technique is so organically welded with what was once called the soul that, though enchanted by it, we are yet unconscious of its existence." 64 This 'organic welding' is the hall-mark of true greatness. And Blok is great, as AdamoviS has truly said, "because, in his best poems, the content - not infrequently mysterious, but not as the result of any deliberate process of obscuration - is fused with all that expresses that content ..." 8 5 Of Pu§kin, Blagoj has said much the same: "For his ideas, Puskin always created the most perfect artistic forms; content and form in his work ... are always inseparable, organically fused with each other; the form unerringly corresponds... to the creative thought of the artist.. ." 66 It is just this imperceptible nature of the great artist's technique - the 'divine ease' with which he welds every individual component into one perfect whole - which feeds the illusion of genius pouring forth like a flood from some hidden, mystic source, to achieve, unattended and unworked upon, immediate - or at any rate immortal - fame. Yet, if the truth be told, as Tolstoj once told it: "The more glowing the inspiration, the greater the need of minute, painstaking work (kropotlivoj raboty) for its realisation. We read Puskin - such smooth, such simple lines, and it seems to us as if they poured out of him into just that form. And we do not see how much labour he expended on them for them to emerge [in a form] so smooth and so simple."67 Much has been written about PuSkin's method of working - of his insistence on the need for "unremitting labour, without which nothing truly great exists".68 Of Blok, by contrast, surprisingly little has been said in this connection. Yet, in his own way, he was no whit less attentive or less painstaking in the labour and loving care he expended upon his verse. Blok was undoubtedly capable of 'inspired' performances, so intense and so concentrated as to be quantitatively, as well as purely qualitatively, astounding. A few examples are sufficient to illustrate this: a) In the years covered by the First Book of Poems (Jan. 1898 •* Kniga ob Aleksandre Bloke, pp. 129/130. •5 Nasledstvo Bloka, p. 80. Masterstvo PuSkina, p. 18. 67 N . N . Gusev, Dva goda s Tolstym (Posrednik, M., 1912), p. 140 (cited by Blagoj in: Masterstvo PuSkina, p. 19). 68 On this theme, cf. esp. Blagoj's Masterstvo PuSkina, notably Ch. 2 (Genij-truzenik).

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- June 1904), Blok composed no less than 687 poems — an average of over 100 a year for more than six years running. 89 b) In the first 13 days of January, 1907, Blok completed no less than 30 separate poems; of these again, no less than 23 were completed on four individual days, namely six each on Jan. 3rd, 9th, and 13th, and five on Jan. 4th. 70 c) Blok's last great poem, The Scythians, was begun on Jan. 29th, 1918. By the evening of the 30th, the poem was virtually complete, differing only in non-essentials from the final version, which appeared in print one week later.71 d) As for The Twelve, completed just beforehand, Cukovskij has recorded his astonishment when, six months before Blok's death, he was able to look at the original manuscript, on which, "in so short a time, so easily and so freely, he had traced out that great poem in pencil, almost without erosions."72 Such facts certainly suggest periods of intense and impassioned ('inspired') activity, during which Blok evidently had little time - and apparently little need - for the 'unremitting labour' of amending and correcting. At the same time, Blok's creative life had its other, very different, side. From the time when, in 1905, the first Songs of the Lady Beautiful appeared in a collected edition,73 Blok laboured more or less incessantly (subject only to the interruptions and exigencies of the War and the Revolution) on this and the ensuing books of verse, shortening, adapting^ rearranging, lengthening once more, and again recasting into some other, as he considered, more suitable form. 68 Of which only 314 were ultimately incorporated in the First Book. Full details will be found in the 12-vol. edition of Blok's works, Vol. I, p. 281, Appendix V (Aleksandr Blok, Sobranie socinenij, Izd. Pisatelej v Leningrade/Izd. Sovetskij Pisatel', L.-M., 1932-1936). (Henceforth referred to simply as: "12-vol. edition".) 70 Cf. 12-vol. edition, Vol. V, pp. 273/4 (Nos. 861-890 in the Chronological List of Blok's poems). 71 Cf., inter alia, an introductory note to the present writer's translation of The Scythians, which appeared in The Russian Review, Vol. 14, No. 2 (April, 1955), pp. 117 if. The details given there are based on those published in the 12-vol. edition, Vol. V, pp. 135ff. 7a Aleksandr Blok kak celovek ipoet, pp. 25/26 (my italics). Here, Cukovskij maintains that The Twelve was also written in the space of two days, but this probably arises from a confusion with the case of The Scythians. While he brings some detail in support of his statement, there seems little reason to doubt the accuracy of the account given in the 12-vol. edition (Vol. V, p. I l l et seq.), according to which this poem altogether occupied Blok for a period of three weeks (Jan. 8th-28th, 1918). It is, of course, still possible that the essentials of Dvenadcaf were in fact put together in two days, as Cukovskij alleges. " Aleksandr Blok, Stixi o Prekrasnoj Dame (Izd. Grif, M., 1905).

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39

This applied particularly, though by no means exclusively, to the First Book of poems, which for ever retained a special place in Blok's affections.74 In a foreword designed for a new edition of this Book (never actually published), Blok himself referred to the unremitting labour which this work of revision had cost him. "Each new edition of the book," he wrote, "gave me the opportunity of working over it once more; on the first occasions, I was concerned with clarification of the content on as broad a scale as possible; on subsequent occasions, I occupied myself a great deal with [problems of]poetic technique; ..." In the event, neither of these approaches ultimately satisfied him. "In the former case, I lost myself in a mass of material; in the second, I replaced isolated expressions by others, more adroit from the literary point of view [but] to the detriment of the underlying sense." 75 Whereupon he hit on the idea of compiling a commentated edition of the Songs, somewhat on the lines of Dante's Vita Nuova; in fact, he even made a beginning on this monumental labour, which, to the misfortune of posterity, he was destined never to complete.76 Nor - as has already been mentioned - was this work of amendment and improvement confined to the First Book alone. A glance at the Variants and Other Versions collected in the complete edition of Blok's poems shows that these cover no less than 95 pages of small print; of these, 39 concern the Third Book of poems and a further 32 the Second Book. 77 As a result of the meticulous care expended throughout this long period of his creative life, Blok ultimately supervised the lay-out and preparation of no less than 5 editions of the First Book, 4 of the Second, and 3 of the Third. The last of each of these editions represent, as it were, the 74

Cf. inter alia, the account given by VI. Pjast, according to which Blok once remarked to his mother, during the last years of his life: "You know what? I wrote one volume - the first. All the rest were mere trifles." (VI. Pjast, O pervom tome Bloka, in: Ob Aleksandre Bloke, Pbg., 1921, p. 213). Blok's reference to his later poems is, of course, a patent exaggeration, but the remark is of interest as showing how much the First Book meant to him. 75 From a draft foreword to a projected new edition of the First Book, dated August 15th, 1918; cited, inter alia, on pp. 269/270 of Vol. I of the 12-vol. edition (Appendix III: Predislovie [Nabrosok] k predpolagavSemusja rtovomu izdaniju pervoj knigi). (My italics). 78 Cf. Blok's diary for August and September, 1918, in: Dnevnik Al. Bloka, Vol. n , pp. 122-136 (also reproduced in Vol. I of the 12-vol. edition as Appendix IV, pp. 270280). A brief account is given in: K. Mocul'skij, Aleksaitdr Blok, YMCA Press, Paris, 1948, pp. 66/68. 77 Cf. Aleksandr Blok. Polnoe sobrante stixotvorenij v dvux tomax (Izd. Sovetskij Pisatel', L., 1946), Vol. II, pp. 391-485. For further details of this edition, henceforth referred to as: Pol. Sob. Stix.j1946, cf. esp. note 79 on p. 40, infra.

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sum results of the countless alterations and amendments carried out by him in the course of his lifetime. As such, they may be considered 'canonical' as regards both text and arrangement, neither of which should, as VI. Orlov once rightly remarked, be tampered with.78 It is on these three Books in their canonical form - comprising, for purposes of metrical analysis, a total of 766 poems - that the present study of Blok's versification is based.''9 "One must admit", wrote VI. Orlov in his detailed study of Blok's Literary Heritage, "that Blok himself did much to lighten the task of those called upon to edit his works. Blok's manuscripts were preserved, not, it is true, in their entirety, but none the less in large measure - and were preserved in perfect order ..." "To the task of editing his works," the same author assures us, "Blok always devoted the most extraordinary care and attention" - at times, he considers, even to the point of "pedantic exactitude".80 ' 8 Cf. VI. Orlov, Literaturnoe nasledstvo A leksandra Bloka (in: Literaturnoe Nasledstvo, No. 27/28, M., 1937, pp. 505-574), p. 506. For Orlov's subsequent interference with Blok's own lay-out, cf. note 79 below. 79 It was obviously essential, for a detailed study such as the present work entails, to have some brief and simple means of identifying each individual poem concerned. For this reason, I have adopted the system of serial numeration given in the complete edition of Blok's poems referred to in note 77 above (Pol. Sob. Stix./1946). This edition is in two volumes, the first of which covers the whole of Blok's 3 Books of lyrical poems mentioned above, together with the 3 longer poems (poemy), Vozmezdie, Dvenadcat', and Skify. The latter are occasionally referred to in the present work, but are not included in the statistics of the 766 poems mentioned. The poems contained in Blok's 3 Books are numbered as follows: Book I. Nos. 1-314 Book II. Nos. 315-518 Book III. Nos. 519-760 The total figure of 766 is explained by the fact that poem No. 344 (Eja Pribytie) consists of 7 parts which, metrically, constitute separate entities. In order not to interfere with the 'standard' numeration, these parts are referred to here as Nos. 344" to 344e inclusive. The same system of numeration (at least as far as No. 760) is used in two other (1-volume) editions of Blok's (selected) works, also edited by VI. Orlov: Aleksandr Blok: Stixotvorenija/PoemylTeatr ... (Gosizd., L., 1936, and Gosizd., L.-M., 1946). The same order (but without numeration) is retained in most other editions of Blok's poems, including the first 3 volumes of the 12-vol. edition, but excluding two 1955 editions edited by Orlov, in both of which - pace the editor's protestations to the contrary - the structure and lay-out on which Blok expended such loving care are arbitrarily destroyed. These editions are: a) Aleksandr Blok. Socinenija v dvux tomax (Gosizd., M., 1955); and b) Aleksandr Blok. Stixotvorenija (Biblioteka poeta, bol'Jaja serija, izd. 2oe, Sovetskij Pisatel', L., 1955). A new 8-vol. edition of Blok's works has recently appeared (cf. Bibliography); from this it appears that Blok's own arrangement has been restored to its rightful place once more. (Cf. also Numerical List of Blok's Poems, pp. 520ff., infra.) 80

Literaturnoe nasledstvo Aleksandra Bloka, p. 505.

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Others, too, have testified to the almost unbelievable order that reigned in Blok's literary kingdom - the meticulous accuracy which Blok - the 'wild', the'chaotic', the 'gipsy-lover' - yet maintained and retained in this other life of his. For Blok, as Georgij Culkov once wrote, did, in fact, have two lives - the one, down-to-earth, homely, tranquil; the other, out-of-this-world, the life of the streets and taverns, of gipsy-girls and heady wine. In Blok's home, all was order, tidiness, and outward felicity. "True," Culkov continues, "there was no genuine felicity even here, but he valued this semblance of it. Beneath the mask of correctness and pedantry there lurked the fearful stranger - chaos." 81 This last remark is misleading. According to Georgij Ivanov, the same Culkov - "quite unable to accustom himself to Blok's methodical manner" - once suggested that it might be due to the German blood in him. To which Blok, after mature reflection, allegedly made the striking reply: "German blood? I don't think so. More likely - self-defence against chaos." 82 In contrast to Culkov, Ivanov insists rather on the fact and the genuine nature of Blok's orderliness and precision. "Blok," he writes, "the most seraphic, the most 'unworldly' of poets, was precise and methodical to a strange degree." In illustration, he tells of the care with which he would wipe each glass before pouring out his red wine, holding it up to the light to make sure no speck of dust remained; of the book he kept in which were entered full details of every letter he received, whether from friends, acquaintances, or perfect strangers, together with date of receipt and of answering; of Blok's own handwriting - "even, beautiful, legible"; of the 'exquisite' nature of all his writing utensils; and of the scrupulous tidiness of his desk.83 German blood, self-defence against chaos - whatever its origins, this precision was no less a part of the real Blok. It was simply, as Culkov has rightly said, that Blok's own brand of exactitude was of a different order from that of "outwardly more temperate souls".84 In fact, in this as in many other ways, Blok was following, not the dictates of his German ancestors, but nothing less than a great Russian tradition, dating from at least the time of PuSkin. "When we come to Russian poetry," writes Sir Maurice Bowra in a brief but penetrating study, "from English or French or Italian, we feel at first that its tones are quieter, its colours more subdued ... even in the nineteenth century the world revealed in 81 8i 83 84

Aleksandr Blok i ego vremja, pp. 119/120. Peterburgskie zimy, p. 203. Peterburgskie zimy, p. 202. Aleksandr Blok i ego vremja, p. 119.

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Russian poetry is much quieter, much closer to common life, than we should expect in the age of Shelley and Hugo ... Though its two greatest exponents, Pushkin and Lermontov, lived lives at least as romantic as Byron's ..., their poetry is more straightforward and more truthful than his. ... However the poets behaved in their lives, in their work all is order and sincerity ... The most frankly emotional of European peoples has given to the arts the discipline which it sometimes shuns in its life." 85 Certainly, Blok's spirit of order and discipline was something more than outward show, extending as it did in his own work to the tiniest details of spelling and punctuation. Where Puskin had spoken of the need for inspiration 'in poetry as in geometry', Blok insisted on the need to recognise that words, too, had their own science of mathematics. "Correctors and publishers," he once wrote reproachfully, "who have any respect for the word must know that there exists a [science of] wordmathematics (matematika slova) (just as all other arts have their mathematics) - especially in verse. This being so, to change them according to their personal whim, whatever their nature from their own point of view, [betrays], to say the least, a lack of culture." 86 To one such publisher (the late S. K. Makovskij, editor of the review Apollon), Blok once wrote: "All my grammatical negligence (oplosnosty) ...is not just chance', behind it lies that something which, inwardly, I am unable to sacrifice; in other words, it 'sings inside me' in this way (mne tak «poetsja»)."87 This 'inward melody' led Blok to adopt - and to insist on his publishers' adopting - a number of unusual features as regards orthography and punctuation. Certain words, for instance, he would spell in two different ways, depending on the context in which they occurred. Thus, on the manuscript of poem No. 158 ("/a ukryt do vremeni v pridele"), Blok made a note insisting on the absolute need to retain here his spelling of M^TejiH, "in contrast to the Snow Mask (1910)", where he required the alternative spelling, MeTe.nn.88 Similar dual spellings used by Blok from time to time include: HCOJITHH and ACEJITBM; pimoTKa and ptmerica; cropaa and crapaa; and even flbiinert (!) as well asflbimMTb.89To these 85

C. M. Bowra, A Book of Russian Verse, pp. xiii/xiv (my italics). From the original version of Blok's Autobiography, the main part of which he wrote in Oct. 1909, subsequently discarded by him in the course of revision in 1915. Cf., inter alia, Pol. Sob. Sti:C./1946, Vol. I, pp. 612/613. 87 Letter to S. K. Makovskij, Peterburg, Dec. 29th, 1909. Reproduced, inter alia, in: Socinenija v dvux tomax (M., 1955), II, p. 639. For Makovskij's reaction, cf. Aleksandr Blok (in: O Parnase etc.), pp. 151 ff. 88 Cf. Pol. Sob. Stix.l1946, Vol. I, p. 623. 89 Cf. Pol. Sob. Stix./1946, Vol. I, p. 607, and Socinenija v dvux tomax (M., 1955), I, p. 704. 86

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43

peculiarities must be added the spellings of tm, OHa, etc. sometimes with small, sometimes with capital, letters (notably in the First Book of poems). As for punctuation, Blok's extreme attention to detail may be judged from the emphasis he placed, in a note on the manuscript of his Boyhood Poems, on the need to adopt there, as a punctuational device, "four dots, and not the usual three". 90 The significance of these and others of Blok's idiosyncrasies has been recognised, in particular, by VI. Orlov, who has been responsible for the editing and preparation of the vast majority of Soviet editions of Blok's works, as well as being the author of the article on Blok's Literary Heritage already referred to. Conscious of the moral obligation incumbent on those editing Blok's works to act in accordance with the poet's clearly expressed wishes, he has, on the whole, been careful to preserve all such details and peculiarities in the various editions he has supervised - the more so since, as he himself has rightly said, "punctuation in verse composition always has an intonational significance, in addition to a strictly grammatical one". 91 In view of this extreme attention to detail - this wholly admirable respect for Blok's own wishes in matters as minute as those concerning a single letter or a single point - it is at once surprising and regrettable to find that none of these editions has preserved what would seem to be the sine qua non of all such exactitude and fidelity - namely, the retention of the old orthography, in which, when all is said and done, Blok originally wrote every one of his poems (including those composed after the 'reformed' orthography had been officially introduced). If one is going to respect Blok's 'word-mathematics' at all, it seems fair to ask: Why leave the process half finished?92 90

Cf. Pol. Sob. S/IX./1946, Vol. I, p. 607. Cf., inter alia, Aleksandr Blok. Stixotvorenija (Sov. Pis., L., 1955), p. 666. Compare the following English 'parallel' (in relation to Pamela Frankau) from an article by J. W. Lambert in The Sunday Times of May 14th, 1961: "'Grey' to her . . . carries a suggestion of blue, whereas 'gray' has a tinge of brown. And it is good to read her blasts of indignation against those faceless men in publishers' offices who blithely make her spell both words in the same way, who delete commas or scatter exclamation-marks about a writer's text..." 92 In an editorial note to Vol. I of the new 8-vol. edition of Blok's works (vide supra, p. 40, note 79), VI. Orlov writes (p. 567): "The text of the works of A. Blok is reproduced in accordance with the currently accepted rules of orthography, but with due allowance for certain individual peculiarities of orthography and punctuation on the part of the author, on the strict observance of which he resolutely insisted." Having dealt with some of these peculiarities in detail, he admits that, though one may not always share Blok's "mystical interpretations", "... those anxious to ensure the 91

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The imperative need to retain, within reason, the poet's original orthography was convincingly demonstrated by Bijusov in relation to the works of PuSkin. Brjusov summed up his investigation by saying: "PuSkin's orthography stands in indissoluble union with Puskin's language, and with his verse. In changing PuSkin's orthography, we deprive ourselves of the chance of learning many sides of the poet's personality... to change the aspect of Puskin's language is in itself a crime, and we involuntarly do change his language if we change the orthography." His inescapable conclusion was that," ... in publishing Puskin's works, there is only one orthography to be adhered to - Puskin's own ..." It would, Brjusov added, be just as wrong to change Puskin's spelling as it would be reckless to change the orthography of the Slovo o Polku Igor eve.

Admittedly, the reasons in the case of PuSkin are somewhat peculiar, and are not directly applicable, say, to Blok; Brjusov himself suggested that, in respect of another poet, the matter would 'perhaps not be overimportant'. Yet, if the same general considerations apply, mutatis mutandis, to any one Russian poet, that poet is surely Blok - if only for the reasons just stated. There are, however, other reasons besides - reasons of a general nature, which make it eminently desirable that all prosodical or metrical studies of a poet's work - involving, as they do, detailed analysis of such factors as pause and compensation, rhythmic acceleration and retardation, exact and inexact rhymes, etc., etc. - should, ideally, make use of the same orthography and punctuation as that used by the poet in question. 94 To all these factors of a logical, objective, nature must be added the more subjective - but no less cogent or impelling - reason that the use of the old orthography would undoubtedly correspond with Blok's own wishes in this respect. Blok, in fact, was forced to weigh very deeply the problems set by the juxtaposition of the 'old 'and 'new' orthographies at the time when, in January, 1918, he sat on the committee appointed to deal, inter alia, with just this question. The entries in Blok's diary at this authenticity of the text of his works have no grounds for ignoring the clearly expressed wish of the author" (p. 568). These laudable sentiments, however, are promptly belied: "Of the peculiarities in A. Blok's orthography, we have retained in the text, in principle, [only] those which in some way or other reflect peculiarities of pronunciation." (p. 568). The same unhealthy compromise, the same fatal half measures, are also applied in respect of Blok's punctuation (pp. 568/9). " Cf. Valerij Brjusov, Zapiska o pravopisanii v izdanii socinenij A. S. PuSkina (in: Mo] PuSkin, Gosizd. M.-L., 1929, pp. 207-212), p. 212. 94 Of English prosody, Enid Hamer warns : "In many cases modernisation of the text makes a considerable difference to the metre . . . " (M.o.E.P., p. viii).

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time make it abundantly clear where he, personally, took his stand - a stand, in keeping with his whole nature, typified by sound common sense, healthy instinct, and fearless artistic independence. "I raised the question of orthography," he wrote in his diary for Jan. 18th, 1918. "My main objection is that this is something which concerns the technique of creative endeavour, in which the government should not meddle." "The older writers, who used jaV [ = t , R.K.] as one means of their creative endeavour, should be published in the old orthography. New writers, who will write in the new style, will transfer their creative energy (élan) into other devices " 95 Nor was Blok's view based, as Benois' was based, on any personal dislike of the new orthography as such (though it is significant that Blok continued to use the old spelling until his dying day). Where Benois experienced a personal loathing (Blok underlined the word) of " H 3 B e c THH", and even loved "the Molière-type orthography of XVIIth-century editions", Blok wrote of himself : "I am not personally attached to the old [style], and it may be that I shall even learn [the new one] myself; but I fear for the objective loss of something for the artist, and, consequently, for the people also."98 If any lingering doubts remained regarding Blok's wishes in respect of his own works, they should be dispelled once and for all by a glance at the notes and instructions he made, as late as April 16th, 1920, for the 5th edition of his First Book of poems. There, together with other detailed comments regarding the spelling of MHTEJIB with A and of XOJITUH with o, of the positioning of epigrams, the dates of poems, and the print to be used for them (petit, italic, etc.), we find at the end the two unmistakable words: Orfografija s taraja.97 For each and every of the reasons listed, it was considered essential to base the present study on an examination of Blok's poems in the exact form in which he himself created them and, having created them, re-read them, amended them, and approved them for the last time for publication. Such approval carried with it, beyond all shadow of possible doubt, Dnevnik Ai. Bloka 1917-1921 (II), p. 99. »« Dnevnik Al. Bloka 1917-1921 (II), p. 99. *' Cf., inter alia, Vol. I of the 12-vol. edition, Appendix V, p. 281. In this connection, it is worth noting that the last edition of Blok's Book the Third approved by him during his lifetime, though published as late as 1921, was also printed in the old orthography (Aleksandr Blok, Stixotvorenija, Kniga tret'ja [1907-1916], Izdanie tret'e, dopolnennoe. Alkonost, Peterburg, MCMXXI).

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the assumption that the old orthography in which he had written his poems would be retained. This orthography has accordingly been used throughout the present work in all quotations from Blok's verse. No other solution seemed compatible with the demands of serious, detailed, prosodical research - or commensurate with the dictates of elementary ethics in respect of a great artist. 98 The details assembled above regarding Blok's creative life-his manner of working, his extreme industry and minute attention to detail, his methodical workmanship, his orderly mind - are of interest and importance not only for themselves, for the glimpses they afford us of this less known (or at least less publicised) side of Blok's nature, but also for the wider and more general context of our present study. One fact of overriding importance they establish clearly and beyond doubt: that, at heart, no one knew better than Blok the technical demands made of the artist striving to achieve perfection; no one, at heart, recognised more clearly, and accepted more readily, that need for 'incessant labour' originally postulated by Puskin (with whom, in this respect, Blok displays many characteristics in common). Maxim Gorkij, recommending Blok as a model to a youthful poet, once emphasised his utter trustworthiness and his "fearless sincerity". 99 It was this inborn, inalienable sincerity, this detestation of all humbug and artificiality, which aroused Blok's wrath and his scepticism of the sort of 'poetic technique' exemplified by, say, Belyj's mathematical obiter dicta on the one hand and Brjusov's purely technical tours de force on the other. Indeed, it may well be that, for this and related reasons, the very mention of the word 'technique' - conjuring up visions such as these - aroused negative, even hostile, feelings in Blok's soul. It would, however, be as wrong to infer from this that Blok never bothered himself with matters of'poetic technique' in the broader and more human sense as it would be to suppose (a view I took care to dispose of earlier) that he merely wrote from 'inspiration' and left it at that. 88 For purposes of convenience, it is the text, lay-out, and numeration of the Pol. Sob. Sti.r./1946 version, 'reconverted' to the old orthography, that has, generally speaking, been utilised for the present study. In doubtful cases, reference has been made to other editions, notably the 12-vol. edition of Blok's works, and - for the old orthography - certain earlier editions mentioned in the Bibliography to the present study. For Blok's own ethics when editing other poets, cf. esp. Ivan Rozanov, Blok redaktor poetov, and E. F. Knipovic, Blok i Gejne [ = Heine] (both in: O Bloke, pp. 21-59 and pp. 165-181 respectively). m Cf. Dm. Semenovskij, A. M. Gorkij. Pis'ma i vstreci, M., 1938 (cited by VI. Orlov in: Aleksandr Blok, Stixotvorenija i poemy [Bibl. poeta, malaja serija, izd. 2oe, Sov. Pis., L„ 1951], p. 6).

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Such a view is belied, not only by everything we know of Blok's untiring work of revision and correction, but by his own words - the admission (already referred to) that, in the later revisions of his First Book (and presumably, of his other Books also), he "occupied (himself) a great deal with problems of poetic technique"; or, say, his explanation of how he deliberately and consciously chose the iamb as the metre for his autobiographical poem, Vozmezdie. 100 Nothing, incidentally, could illustrate more strikingly the difference in the concept of 'rhythm' as cherished by Belyj on the one hand and by Blok on the other. Where, for Belyj, a poet's rhythm - or 'rhythmicity' (ritmicnosf) - was a simple matter of mathematical calculation (based on the number of deviations from the metrical norm), 101 for Blok, it was, as we have seen earlier, a human, even a cosmic, conception, intimately bound up with, and deriving from, the events of the world around him and the 'spirit of the time' in which he lived, betrayal of which, as he once remarked, was the only sin which his century would never forgive a man. 102 This cosmic conception of rhythm Blok then transferred into the 'technical' sphere of his own creation. As Orlov himself recently put it: "Even the rhythmical structure of his poems he set in intimate union with the 'rhythm of the age'." 103 Enumerating, in the Foreword to Vozmezdie, the many and varied events of 1910 and 1911 which formed the background to the first part of the poem, Blok continued: "All these facts, however different they may seem, for me have one musical significance ... I think the simplest expression of the rhythm of that time - when the world, preparing itself for unheard-of happenings, was so strenuously and systematically developing its physical, political, and military muscles - was the iamb." "It is my habit to set alongside one another facts from all the [different] spheres of life accessible to my ken at a given time, and I am certain that together they produce one single musical impulse." 104 Such was Blok's own 'rhythm' - and such, it seems, was his understanding of rhythm in others, or, as he once termed it, the inward 'beat' 100

Aleksandr Blok, Vozmezdie (Alkonost, Peterburg, 1922), p. 12. On Belyj's 'method', vide infra, Ch. Ill, pp. 117ff., of the present work. 102 In the article, Rycar'-Monax (1910). Cf., inter alia, Socinenija v dvux tomax (M., 1955), Vol. H, p. 167. 108 In an article, Aleksandr Blok, in: Socinenija v dvux tomax (M., 1955). Cf. Vol. I, p. XXXI. 104 Foreword to Vozmezdie, p. 12. 101

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(vnutrennij 'takt') of a writer, the loss of which he considered "the most dangerous of all things". 106 Blok's conception of rhythm was - as stated - a fundamentally different one from that of Belyj. Blok spoke of rhythm in the capacity of the poet, artist, creator; Belyj, in terms of the prosodist, 'scientist', analyser. But the two approaches, as I have tried to show earlier (citing Swinburne and Tennyson as brilliant examples, and Robert Bridges as a convincing spokesman), are in no way mutually exclusive, and not necessarily even antipathetic. Blok listened to the 'music of his time' and, by a combination of 'inspiration' and serious application, transformed it - welding its different melodies in the process - into the medium of verse; Belyj tried to take this transformation one stage further in the direction of more objectively, 'scientifically', definable terms. Where Belyj failed, he failed largely through the exaggeration and extremism inherent in his own nature - but this is not to say that these failings are an inseparable part of prosodical research as such. What Blok objected to - and rightly objected to - was, in essence, the same one-sidedness and overspecialisation against which Puskin had protested in his time - the busying of oneself with purely technical problems for their own sake, or for originality's sake, but out of context with the soul, the 'true life', of poetry as a whole. We should do well to recall Zorgenfrej's words: "Attainments in the sphere of poetic technique, unless supplemented by other attainments of a different nature, left him profoundly indifferent." 106 After emphasising, in a passage referred to earlier, the oneness - the perfect welding - of form and content in PuSkin's work, Blagoj continues: "If we remember this, there need be no danger, in analysing the forms of Puskin's creative work, incomparable in their artistic beauty, of 'sinking into formalism'. Moreover, studying Puskin's creative endeavour, following his creative path, the rich and captivating 'technology' of his poetic mastery, we plunge ... into what in fact constitutes the specific of artistic literature; one penetrates, as it were, into the most secret recesses of artistry." 107 And again: "... the truly inspired 'geometry' of PuSkin's compositions remains completely unnoticed and hidden from the eyes of the reader, and can be revealed only as the result of special analysis. But it is precisely the los In the article, Duia pisatelja (1909). Cf., inter alia, Soíinenija v dvux tomax (M., 1955), Vol. II, p. 105. 10 * Vide supra, p. 28, note 32, of this chapter. (My italics.) 107 Masterstvo PwSkina, p. 18.

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existence of that 'geometry' which also communicates that infinitely satisfying aesthetic sensation of unusual wholeness and proportion, completeness and fullness, outward and inward harmony, that one experiences when reading Puskin's artistic work". 108 From this point of view, poetry merely reveals, once again, its fundamental kinship - despite differences of emphasis and degree - with the arts as whole. "No work of art," writes Enid Hamer, "can be truly enjoyed till we experience in regard to it that sense of possession which comes of knowing why we enjoy, and how the artist has achieved certain effects upon the mind and senses. The so-called appreciation which shrinks from technique, and repudiates the function of the brain in artistic experience, is a vain and idle illusion." 109 In poetry, as in every art - be it music or painting, sculpture or the dance - a knowledge and understanding of (and, a fortiori, a direct and personal acquaintance with) the underlying technique immeasurably enhances our appreciation of that art, and of the innumerable components of which it is composed. At the same time, it is not easy to define exactly what the aims of 'technical' investigation should be. Enid Hamer insists on "the function of the brain", and the advantage of "knowing why we enjoy". But it is something more complex, more subtle than mere rational explanation as Gilbert Highet once put it: "A good poem, a fine play, the movements of a dancer, cannot be explained."110 Robert Bridges referred to "the dry detail of the material which has to be conquered" as "the part that can be taught". But it is doubtful even how much falls within the province of instruction. Eric Blom put this aspect of the matter very clearly in relation to music: "In teaching, it is true, the attempt is constantly made to impose rules as though they were a priori laws - made by God or by God knows whom - which those who want to become composers have only to follow in order to produce great works of art. In their heart of hearts, of course, even the teachers know that this is nonsense: that great composers, though aware of certain laws of nature and of valid precedents, constantly modify and expand their art as they find it." "There was fugue before Bach, but nothing precisely like a Bach fugue; for that is a vital thing following rules in spirit but not to the letter and not establishing anything like its own fixed rule. It is possible to write a fugue, with different material, tracing every turn taken by a given Bach 108 109 110

Masterstvo Puskina, p. 265. M.O.E.P., pp. vii/viii. The Mind of Man, p. 94.

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fugue; but what results will not sound in the least like Bach, much less convey a Bachian message. His rules, or anyone else's, are teachable; there is something else behind his music, or that of any other great master, which can be neither taught not learnt." As for the man setting out to provide a guide to musical composition, "... even he cannot tell us whether the devices he discusses as the basis of this or that work add up to great music, or, if they do, why. These are aesthetic matters, which can be written about more or less well, though always a little vaguely or disputably, but remain ultimately unteachable." m In relation to poetry, Sir Oliver Elton likewise pointed out that it was more than just a matter of devices reducible (as Belyj virtually implied) to mathematical formulae. "The student..," he wrote," ... will learn the rhythmical habits of many writers; one thing he will never learn, a recipe for the production of beautiful effects". "But," he added, "his ear may be made more sensitive by the discipline."112 It may indeed. Here, we are getting closer to the core of the matter; and - which is no mere coincidence - to Blok's own concept of the role that research and training should play. "To train the inward ear tirelessly, to accustom it as it were to the distant music, is the essential condition of a writer's existence," he wrote in his study of the writer's soul. Nor was it enough just to listen for the 'rhythm of the age'. One must learn to recognise it: in one's own self, because "to know one's own rhythm is for the artist the surest shield against all praise and obloquy"; in others, because it is the basis of all real understanding of them and their work: " . . . the prerequisite condition of all artistic and critical research consists essentially in defining the 'rhythmical funds' of an a r t i s t . . . " ( . . . opredelenie «ritmiceskix fondov» xudoznika .. .)113 It is just these'rhythmical funds' of Blok's that it is the aim of the present study to define - in so far, that is, as they be capable of definition in universally acceptable metrical terms. In attempting to arrive at such a 'definition', no one school or method has been slavishly followed; various approaches have been adopted, various means brought to bear, in accordance with what seemed to offer the most fruitful line of investigation in any given instance. Where these means include (as they frequently do) studies of a purely statistical nature, these 111

In an article, The Vnteachable, which appeared in The Observer, London, Jan. 16th, 1955. 112 Oliver Elton, English Prose Numbers (in: A Sheaf of Papers, Hodder & Stoughton, London, 1922, pp. 130-163), p. 143 (my italics). 115 In the article, DuSa pisatelja (1909). Cf., inter alia, Socinenija v dvux tomax (M., 1955), Vol. II, pp. 105/106.

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51

have been undertaken with one clear object in view: that of passing fair judgment on certain theories already enounced by previous investigators in the field, both as regards Russian prosody generally and Blok's verse in particular. Obviously, such views can be proved or disproved only by 'objective' methods of analysis analogous to those employed by their authors in the first instance.114 At the same time, let it be stated quite plainly that I cherish no illusions whatever regarding either the nature or thefertility of such purely'objective', formal' approaches, and have endeavoured, wherever it seemed possible and permissible, to introduce other currents more closely bound up with the soul of Blok's work as a whole. In so doing, I have tried to be ever mindful of the protests and warnings of Blok himself, and of Puskin before him, and have steadfastly opposed the view that prosody should discard appreciation of the actual poetry, on which, as Saintsbury rightly emphasised, it should in fact be based.115 In this respect, there is not only much new soil to be tilled, but many weeds and much deadwood first to be cleared away. If the present study appears rather one-sided, the reason must be sought in the fact that so much still remains to be done. A vast region still remains to be explored, and in this respect the present investigation does not set out to be more than the merest beginning; in particular, the entire purely musical side of Blok's work - rhyme, assonance, alliteration, repetition, and a dozen other melodic devices - still awaits investigation. It very soon became clear that this comprised sufficient material for a complete study in itself, for which reason it was decided to confine the present work to purely metrico-rhythmical considerations as such.116 In investigating these, an attempt has been made to introduce something of those currents from English prosodic study which, it seemed, might help to enrich and enliven previous purely Russian studies in the field. In so doing, three main objects were kept in view. In the first place, to infuse into Russian versification (still mindful of Blok's reproaches!) something of that generally more empirical, more refreshing, at once more 'artistic' and 'realistic', English approach to prosodic study. Of this, some114 An obvious instance is the alleged triple-time basis of Blok's so-called doVniki, the whole problem of which is dealt with at length in Ch. VIII of the present work. Incidentally, as Victor Erlich has pointed out (Russian Formalism, p. 21, note 24), there is an 'honourable precedent' for the use of statistical techniques in the metrical analysis of ancient verse. 116 Cf. H.M.E.P., p. vi (also pp. 31/32 and note 44, supra). 116 In this connection, it is interesting to note that Zirmunskij's Introduction to Metrics fills a book of 284 pages; his study of rhyme (Rifma), a further separate book of no less than 337 pages!

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thing has been said already. Secondly, to enrich the theory of Russian versification with the results of certain English prosodic explorations which, mutatis mutandis, were felt to apply in equal, or nearly equal, measure to the conditions of Russian verse. (Such include, inter alia, Egerton Smith's brilliant analysis of so-called 'trochaic substitution' in iambic verse.)117 Thirdly and lastly, to render the present study - dealing as it does with a Russian poet and Russian verse - more easily accessible and acceptable to the English reader, in the hope of thereby arousing a greater interest than has hitherto been shown, not only in the prosody of Blok himself, but in problems of Russian versification as a whole. It is to a brief comparative study of the two 'schools' of prosody - Russian and English - that we must next turn. Before doing so, as a link and a point of departure, we should do well to recall the words used by Saintsbury in relation to Shelley and which, as mentioned earlier, so admirably apply to the case of Blok: " . . . it is in his lyrics that Shelley's prosodic, like his poetic, power shows highest... Shelley never seems to have studied metre much, and ... his first pattern is the merest startingpoint for him. But he touches none that he does not adorn; none that he does not make matter of delight; and none, likewise, in which he does not supply a text for infinite technical instruction as well".118

117 118

Vide infra, Ch. Ill, pp. 130ff., of the present work. H.M.E.P., pp. 204/205.

PART I I

E N G L I S H AND RUSSIAN VERSIFICATION A GENERAL COMPARISON

CHAPTER II

METRICAL FACTORS

A detailed examination of English prosody obviously lies outside the scope of this work - indeed, even Russian versification will be discussed only to the extent that such a background proves indispensable to a proper understanding of Blok's poetic technique. At the same time, it will clearly be helpful in the first instance to review briefly the main points on which the two systems of verse composition differ or coincide - the more so since no such study, beyond a passing reference here and there, appears to have been undertaken hitherto.1 1. E N D I N G S

Modern English verse consists of lines with an overwhelming majority of masculine endings.2 This is in some contrast to Middle English, and is 1 ¿irmunskij draws a number of comparisons between Russian verse on the one hand and English and others (German, French, Spanish, Italian, etc.) on the other; but this, of course, is from the Russian point of view (cf. VVM., esp. Ch. II, § 15, and Ch. V, § 30, also p. 123). Unbegaun's recent Russian Versification, written for the English reader, contains a brief comparison of Russian with English, German, and even French binary rhythm (pp. 41-45) but little else in this connection, being intentionally only an elementary study. Other references usually occur more or less en passant, in the course of English studies and translations of Russian poets - such, for example, as Sir Oliver Elton's article on The Lyrics of Fet (in: A Sheaf of Papers, Hodder & Stoughton, London, 1922, pp. 111-129) or the late Dr. N. Bachtin's study of Majakovskij (Mayakovski, in: Oxford Slavonic Papers, Vol. II, 1951, pp. 72ff., esp. § xiv, pp. 79-81). A few general comparisons will also be found in the Introduction to Sir Maurice Bowra's Book of Russian Verse and Second Book of Russian Verse. s The definitions used throughout this work - for endings as for all other metrical phenomena - are, as far as possible, those most nearly corresponding to the terms current in Russian versification; as such, they may not always be those most usual to the English prosodist. As regards endings, the terms adopted are: i) Masculine - monosyllabic; ending on a stressed syllable. (M) ii) Feminine - disyllabic; stressed syllable followed by 1 light (unstressed) syllable. (F) iii) Dactylic - trisyllabic; 'triple' or 'tumbling' (rhyme); stressed syllable followed by 2 light syllables. (D)

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largely explained by the reduction that has taken place in the language since that time - in contrast, once again, to modern German, where feminine endings are still fairly common (e.g. to go: gehe/i; love: Liebe, etc.). True, feminine (rhymed) endings are by no means so rare in English as is sometimes assumed. They were frequently employed, for instance, by Keats in his earlier poems, and - usually in regular alternation with masculine endings - by Scott, Byron, Shelley, Praed, Swinburne, and others.® Nevertheless, generally speaking, the prejudice against the use of feminine endings in English verse seems - consciously or unconsciously - to be deeply rooted. Certainly, in modern English, the feminine rhyme in no way compares with its masculine counterpart as regards frequency. A recent popular work on English prosody states that, while feminine rhyme "has been widely used from the beginnings of English poetry, ... the proportion of feminine to monosyllabic rhymes seldom exceeds on the average one in twenty."4 Saintsbury considered even the 'double rhyme' (as he termed it) sometimes in danger of producing a burlesque effect, analogous to that almost always associated with 'triple' (dactylic) rhyme in English.8 iv) Hyperdactylic - in theory, any ending longer than dactylic; in practice (even in Russian) limited to tetrasyllabic or at most pentasyllabic ones; unless specifically mentioned, it is applied here to the former, viz. stressed syllable followed by 3 light syllables. (H) Since nearly all the verse with which we are concerned here is rhyming verse, the term 'ending' is normally understood to mean 'rhymed ending'. All the above terms are also current in English prosody, though iv) rarely occurs in practice. Saintsbury objects to the term 'feminine' rhyme being applied to 'double rhyme' in general, and would restrict the former (presumably by French analogy) to "words at the end of a line with the final (now mute) e" (H.M.E.P., p. 280). But cf. Egerton Smith, P.E.M., p. 311, and esp. p. 186, where he further subdivides the traditional rhyme groups, with the result that "feminine" is much more specifically suited to rendering the Russian term (which applies to the "trochaic" ending only) than "disyllabic", which could also cover the "iambic" ending described by Egerton Smith as "extended masculine". 8 Cf., inter alia, Egerton Smith, P.E.M., pp. 181 ff., who mentions that other examples may be found in the Shorter Poems of Robert Bridges. Contemporary English verse, in so far as it condescends to make use of rhyme at all, seems to cling to the masculine ending more and more - a fact most indicative of the relative insignificance into which rhythmic considerations have now fallen. At the other end of the scale, so to speak, comes Shakespeare's XXth sonnet ("A woman's face with Nature's own hand painted..."), which consists of feminine endings throughout. For illustrations of English verse with feminine endings, vide infra. * Robert Swann and Frank Sidgwick, The Making of Verse (Sidgwick & Jackson, London, 1950), p. 36, § 64. 6 H.M.E.P., p. 35 (Rule 36). The same view is expressed (but with no supporting evidence)by Wellek and Warren: "In English, where masculine rhyme prevails, feminine rhymes have usually burlesque or comic effects,..." {Theory of Literature, p. 162).

ENDINGS

57

Dactylic rhyme, in serious English verse, is practically non-existent; the one brilliant exception - Thomas Hood's Bridge of Sighs, quoted in almost every manual of prosody - merely goes to 'prove' the general truth of this rule: One more Unfortunate, Weary of breath, Rashly importunate, Gone to her death! Take her up tenderly, Lift her with care; Fashion'd so slenderly, Young, and so fair! ... Touch her not scornfully; Think of her mournfully, Gently and humanly; Not of the stains of her, All that remains of her Now is pure womanly, etc. (O.B.E.V., pp. 776/7, No. 662) It is, of course, no mere chance that these dactylic endings - rare enough in themselves - should occur in a dactylic metre; the lines are thus acatalectic and, indeed, such endings in any other context would be almost unthinkable in serious verse in English. How different is the picture in Russian verse! Here, the feminine ending - originally, under Polish influence, the only one countenanced at all6 occurs, at least from the time of PuSkin onwards, in roughly equal proportions with the masculine ending, with which, as a general rule, it alter6

Since in Polish the stress falls on the penultimate syllable, Polish verse employs exclusively feminine endings (in much the same way, say, as Italian). This 'rule' was applied to early Russian syllabic verse and all-feminine endings were used, inter alia, by Kantemir in his Satires and by Trediakovskij in his early works, until Lomonosov finally pointed out the falsity of the 'analogy' and its complete unsuitability to the conditions of the Russian language, in his Pis'mo o pravilax rossijskago stixotvorstva (1739). Lomonosov himself first used alternating FMFM endings in his translation of Finelon's Ode (1738) and in his own Oda na vzjatie Xotina the following year. In this, as in other matters of Russian versification, Lomonosov was at first fiercely opposed by Trediakovskij, who, however, in the second edition of his Sposob (1752), ultimately conceded Lomonosov the victory on this point. Cf. esp. Zirmunskij, Rifma, pp. 30/31. Also: D. D. Blagoj, Istorija russkoj literatury XVIII veka (izd. 3'e, Gos. U£-Ped. Izd., M., 1955), pp. 122-127 and 141-143.

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nates, by far the commonest stanza in classical Russian poetry being the quatrain with alternating feminine and masculine endings (FMFM) and rhymes (abab).1 Of course, numerous other arrangements exist - e.g. poems with all-feminine and, notably, with all-masculine endings (q.v. infra) - but this does not alter the fact that, in contrast to English usage, the feminine ending in Russian exists in every sense on equal terms with the masculine one. The dactylic ending - while far less common than the other two - is yet incomparably more widespread in Russian than in English verse. In folk poetry, of course, it always abounded - indeed, it is the typical ending, inter alia, of the Russian bylina;8 its use in Russian literary verse dates from the early part of the XlXth century, when it was used, inter alia, by Zukovskij, Baratynskij, and Jazykov. A little later, Lermontov also employed dactylic endings. Particularly wide use was made of them by Nekrasov (who was in general greatly influenced by Russian popular verse) and, among more modern poets, by Bal'mont.9 In most cases, the dactylic ending takes the place otherwise occupied by the feminine one, i.e. it alternates with the masculine ending (DMDM). There are, however, a number of Russian poems with DFDF ending patterns, and others with all-dactylic endings (DDDD).10 To the English reader, however, by far the most striking - because unfamiliar - factor about the Russian dactylic ending is its widespread use in other than dactylic metres - not only in other ternary measures (e.g. anapaests) but in trochaic and even in iambic verse, where, of course, it produces lines hypercatalectic by 2 syllables.11 One of the best known examples of the latter type is Blok's * This applies with particular force to Blok (vide infra, Ch. IX), but may be taken as broadly representative of Russian poetry from the time of PuSkin onwards. 8 Cf. Ch. VIII, pp. 277if., of the present work. • Cf., inter alia, Rifma, pp. 37-39. 10 Two famous examples of the D D D D variety are Lermontov's Molitva ("Ja, Mater' Boiija, nyne c molitvoju...") and Tuci ("Tucki nebesnyja, vecnye stranniki\"). For these and other ending-patterns in Blok's verse, vide infra, Ch. IX of the present work. 11 Dactylic endings in English iambic verse - quite apart from the scarcity of rhymes are almost unthinkable to most people, representing at best, say, a tour de force in a (metrically) strict rendering of a Russian original. But the usual result in English is to produce an acatalectic iambic line longer by one foot than the Russian prototype, the last three syllables in English tending to produce a cretic ( - ^ - ) rather than a dactylic ( - ^ effect. The pitfalls awaiting the unwary are clearly demonstrated in the English rendering of Blok's Neznakomka given by O. A. Maslenikov (The Frenzied Poets: Andrey Biely and the Russian Symbolists, Univ. of California Press, 1952, pp. 162-164). In the entire poem of 13 stanzas, only one pair of truly dactylic endings occurs, and even these do not rhyme (gracefully : tracelessly - verse 12). Three other (more or less) dactylic endings are 'paired' with definitely cretic ones (restaurants: drunken taunts - v. 1; city gates: sophisticates - v. 3; propinquity: enchanted sea - v. 10).

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immortal Neznakomka, which consists of 4-foot iambs with alternating DMDM endings throughout: IIo BenepaMi. Hafli pccropaHaMU r o p H i i n B03flyxi> flHKt h r j i y x t , H npaBHTb OKpHKaMH HbAhblMU BeceHHifl H TJitTBopHbifi flyxt.

etc.

(438)

In Russian verse, then, we encounter, as a matter of general rule, two phenomena as regards endings which in English verse occur, if at all, only on very rare occasions, viz: a) the predominance of alternating (or at any rate mixed) endings in the vast majority of poems, the commonest form being FMFM, but DMDM and other combinations being by no means unusual; and b) more specifically, the use of dactylic, i.e. trisyllabic, endings not only in other (non-dactylic) forms of ternary verse (i.e. anapaestic and amphibrachic), but even in duple-time measures. In German, Johannes von Guenther (Alexander Block, Gesammelte Dichtungen, Willi Weisman Verlag, Munich, 1947, pp. 142/3) achieves closer rhyme, but true dactylic pairs of endings are rare, and usually far heavier than their Russian counterparts (Nebentoni), e.g. sonderbar : wunderbar; Findungen : Windungen, etc. In most cases, German produces an even more pronounced 'cretic' effect than English ( o f f e n steh'n : Besoffenen (!); gaukelnd dringt: schaukelnd winkt; Stunde schlägt: unentwegt, etc.). For 'light' dactylic (and even hyperdactylic, e.g. 'solitary'!) rhymed endings in English iambic verse (alternating, incidentally, with feminine endings - a scheme deliberately adopted in the interests of a Pasternakian 'atmosphere'), cf. the following poem To Boris Pasternak: Unmoved by slander, gain, idolatry, Uncompromising and untiring, In loneliness among the solitary, Possessed of beauty, truth-aspiring Contemptuous of appointed ritual, His blood - reflection and discussion, His brother - man, the individual, Humane and humble, deeply Russian ... So, contradicted, contradictory, Through labyrinth conflicting mazes, He battles onward. - Whose the victory: The savage onslaughts? Or the praises? Dactylic endings would, perhaps, be just conceivable in trochaic verse, though the effect in English would almost inevitably be once more that of a 'cretic' termination, i.e. a line longer by one (catalectic) foot, with masculine ending. The same tendency makes itself felt in Russian sung verse (e.g. the bylina), and occasionally in 'literary' imitations of popular verse, e.g. Blok's No. 505 ("Garmonika, garmonikaV'), q.v., Ch. X, pp. 345/6, infra. On the bylina, cf. Ch. VIII, pp. 277 ff., infra.

60

METRICAL FACTORS

In Russian, then, the ending is to a very large extent independent of the particular metre involved - and is, indeed, regarded as something quite separate from the metrical line as such.12 The result of this - its corollary, in fact - is that the concept of acatalexis plays next to no part in Russian prosody - at any rate, no part in the sense of a principle regarded as an 'ideal' or a 'norm'. Instead, we may - and often do - find all three main types of ending (and even hyperdactylic endings on occasion) used with every one of the standard syllabotonic metres and, a fortiori, with poems composed on a pure-tonic (accentual) basis. This situation is very different from that of English verse, where acatalexis tends to dominate the picture. True, in English also, catalectic (and hypercatalectic) endings are known and countenanced, but such instances are, more often than not, the result of force majeure, imposed by the relative absence of feminine or dactylic endings. This in turn requires the 'admission' of masculine endings in, say, trochaic and dactylic verse. Since, however, the iamb and, in triple time, the anapaest are by far the commonest English metres (q.v. infra), English verse is acatalectic to an extent unthinkable in Russian, where - quite apart from the wide use of all three main endings as such - the very fact that two different types of ending usually alternate in one and the same poem ipso facto precludes acatalexis in more than 50 % of lines at most.13

la

Typical of Russian metrical usage in this respect is TomaSevskij's division of every line of verse (stix) into three parts: a) Anacrusis (anakruza); b) 'Metrical line' (metriieskij rjad), which covers everything from the first stress to the last stress of the line inclusive; and c) Ending (okonianie), i.e. everything from the last stress of the line onwards, again inclusive. From this, it is obvious that the ending (often referred to as the clausula [klauzula]) must partly overlap with the 'metrical line' - entirely so in the case of the masculine ending. Nevertheless, the ending in Russian remains, as already emphasised, an entirely independent concept. Cf. B. TomaSevskij, Russkoe stixosloienie - metrika (Academia, Peterburg, 1923), pp. 43-66, esp. p. 46 and p. 51. Also VVM., Ch. IV, esp. § 22, pp. 131-138, and Rifma, Ch. II, esp. 1.1, pp. 23ff. 11 This difference in approach is well illustrated by the terminology adopted in such cases. It is extremely doubtful, for instance, whether any Russian would dream of saying that an iambic line with feminine ending concluded with 'an amphibrachic foot* (of substitution); still less, in the case of a dactylic ending, that it ended with a '2nd paeon'. Yet both these terms are used by Enid Hamer (M.O.E.P., pp. 17/18). Cf. also Saintsbury's reference to 'stumbling amphibrachic ends' {H.M.E.P., p. 69). Likewise Lascelles Abercrombie, who states that Milton's verse "... admits the 'britannic' foot ( - - - ) at the end of the lines ..." (Principles of English Prosody,

ENDINGS

61

As regards the effect of various endings in Russian and English: The general impression of continuous endings of one type on the Russian ear is one of rhythmical monotony. This applies with particular force to the use of all-masculine endings - i.e. precisely the situation which obtains in probably 90% or more of English verse! When 2ukovskij translated (1821) Byron's Prisoner of Chillon into 4-foot iambic verse with all-masculine (couplet) endings and rhymes, Russian critics were quick to seize on this as a brilliant illustration of a deliberate stylistic device, designed to correspond with the solemn, gloomy tone set by Byron's poetic artistry - although, as Zirmunskij rightly points out, there was nothing in the original in any way peculiar as regards metrical technique from the point of view of an English poet.14 Zukovskij subsequently used all-masculine endings in triple-time verse, e.g. his anapaestic translation of Scott's Eve of St. John,15 and ultimately in his own poems. Others took up the fashion - including Puskin,18 and especially the then very popular Ivan Kozlov. But it was Lermontov who - first and last among Russian poets - for a time made almost a rule of all-masculine endings in his poems, producing, during the year 1830/31, no less than 70 lyric and 4 longer poems of this kind. TjutCev at one time also showed an interest in the masculine ending, but his total of 20 poems of this type in no way compares with the 90 or so that Lermontov produced in the course of his career.17 Conversely, ¿irmunskij claims that alternating FMFM rhymes produce on the English ear much the same impression of "wearisome monotony, due particularly to the need in such cases to use rhymes composed ex-

Part I, The Elements, Martin and Seeker, London, 1923, p. 148). For the use of the term "britannic", vice "amphibrach", vide infra, p. 67. 14 Cf. Rifma, pp. 31/2, and esp. note 11 on p. 312, where extracts from contemporary Russian criticism are given - not the first (nor the last!) occasion on which critics have discovered 'devices' of which the authors themselves were almost certainly unaware! This, of course, in no way detracts from ¿ukovskij's feat. Cf. note 17 below. 16 The Prisoner of Chillon = SiVonskij Uznik; The Eve ofSt. John = Zamok SmaVgoVm. " Apart from humorous verses, poems in this pattern by PuSkin include: Cernaja SalUznik; Obval; Exo; and "Ne daj mne Bog sojti s uma ...". " Cf. esp. Ivan Rozanov, Lermontov v istorii russkogo stixa, pp. 428-435. Cf. also Rifma, pp. 30-34, and note 12, p. 313. 2irmunskij's statistics differ only in unimportant details from those of Rozanov, on which latter the above data are based. - Despite occasional earlier experiments in this direction (including one ode of Lomonosov's written in 1743!), the honour of introducing all-masculine endings into Russian literary verse undoubtedly belongs, as Rozanov rightly says, to Zukovskij. By the same token, it might be said that the honour of "canonising" them belongs to Lermontov. 79 of Blok's poems have all-masculine endings (cf. Ch. IX, Table III, p. 306, infra).

62

METRICAL FACTORS 18

clusively of suffixes." But this view - based, it seems, on some remarks of Sir Oliver Elton's in connection with the translation of Fet's lyrics into English - almost certainly arises from a misunderstanding of what the latter actually implied. Elton's actual words were: "Some of Fet's best lyrics might not daunt a translator who was a professed poet; but I have evaded them owing to the problem of the double rhymes. These abound in Russian ... but in English as we know they are fewer and more monotonous. We have our participles in -ing and -ed; but the Russian verb, like the noun and adjective, is rich in trochaic and dactylic inflexions."19 From this it is clear that the 'monotony' referred to is at most a relative one ('more monotonous') and that it arises more from the comparative scarcity in English of feminine rhymes as such - which is not at all the same thing as saying (or at least implying) that FMFM endings in themselves produce an impression of 'wearisome monotony' on the English ear. Besides, the terminations in -ing and -ed mentioned by Elton barely touch the fringe of possible feminine rhymes in English. What, for instance, of the endless combinations in -tion, -sion, -ssion, etc., preceded by any one of five vowels? Are these any more monotonous than, say, the Russian abstract endings in arCe or en'e, frequently encountered in Puskin and others?20 In any case, many of the commonest Russian feminine endings are likewise suffixal. None of this, of course, in any way invalidates the fundamental truth of Elton's words - there cannot be the slightest doubt that the Russian language is incomparably richer in feminine (and dactylic) rhyming endings than English.21 At the same time, the possible variety and extent of the latter should not be underestimated, and it would, in my view, be quite wrong to suppose, with Zirmunskij, that such endings of themselves produce any impression of monotony in English. There are plenty of examples in English verse which effectively belie such a view, and even Saintsbury - whose fears regarding the possible burlesque effect of such endings were mentioned earlier - was the first to admit the ex18

Rifma, note 11 on pp. 312/3 already referred to. A Sheaf of Papers, p. 111. E.g. in the poem K A.P. Kern, where 8 of the 12 feminine rhymes are in erie. With the later introduction of freer (less exact) rhymes generally, especially by Blok and his successors, this factor became less marked. (Cf., inter alia, Victor Erlich, Russian Formalism, pp. 194-196). n Cf. also Sir Maurice Bowra: "For poetry Russian is superbly fitted. Its rich and expressive syntax enables it to dispense with many artifices required by English. . . . It is rich in rhymes not merely single but double and even triple . . . " etc. (A Book of Russian Verse, Macmillan, London, 1947, Introduction, p. xiv). 18

20

ENDINGS

63

treme effectiveness of what he called 'the redundant syllable' in the odd lines of both iambic and anapaestic English verse.22 In this, he was later supported by Egerton Smith, who, quoting examples from Byron and Shelley, concluded: "This alternation of masculine and feminine rimes is a device which has added a new charm to the resources of English lyric poetry." 23 On one point concerning the effect produced by endings, there is probably a large measure of agreement between English and Russian prosodists - namely, that the masculine ending creates the most 'final' impression. To the English ear, a feminine ending in the last line of a poem tends to create an impression of being 'left in the air' (except, possibly, in a poem composed of feminine endings throughout - which occurs extremely rarely). In Russian, this would seem, basically, also to apply - albeit to a less marked degree - and 2irmunskij is almost certainly right in suggesting that, in poems with alternating endings, "the masculine rhyme usually follows the feminine one, giving an impression of completion, (of) a more distinct conclusion".24 The quatrain forms FMFM and DMDM are, in fact, by far the commonest of their kind in Russian; moreover, there are - in Blok's verse, for instance - several poems in which the basic ending and rhyme-pattern change in the last stanza (or stanzas) in such a way that the poem closes with a masculine ending, M

Cf. H.M.E.P., esp. p. 92 (examples (a), from Gay's Molly Mog, and (c), from D. Lewis?, where Saintsbury speaks of "the refreshing and alterative effect of redundance"). Likewise on p. 114, in Byron's lines to Haidee (before Don Juan), where he finds that: "The gain ... is immense." Again in Praed's Letter of Advice ("... improved ... still further"), culminating in Swinburne's "... final inspiration of shortening the last line to two feet ..., with an astonishing result of added and finished music: ..." (pp. 114/5). The examples from Gay, Byron, and Praed are cited on pp. 64/5 below. 15 P.E.M., p. 182, e.g. Shelley's: I fear thy kisses, gentle maiden; Thou needest not fear mine; My spirit is too deeply laden Ever to burthen thine. I fear thy mien, thy tones, thy motion; Thou needest not fear mine; Innocent is the heart's devotion With which I worship thine. On p. 183, Egerton Smith draws an interesting distinction between the usual feminine ( = trochaic) rhymes and those he calls "full double rimes ... where the second syllable seems capable of carrying a secondary stress", citing Gay's Molly Mog (cf. p. 64) as an effective example. " Rifma, p. 24.

64

METRICAL FACTORS

rather than the feminine one which the basic pattern would otherwise dictate.26 Finally, inasmuch as it stands in some contrast to English usage, attention should be called to a phenomenon already implicit in what has been stated earlier - namely, the richness and frequency of rhyme in Russian poetry generally. Even where patterns other than the usual abab quatrain are used, it is extremely rare in Russian verse to find blank (i.e. nonrhyming) lines - e.g. the odd lines of a quatrain (say, xaxa xbxb). Even among the more modern poets - even, for instance, in Blok's freer verse, with its arbitrary line lengths and rhyme scheme - it is usual for every line to rhyme with at least one other line in the poem and, not infrequently, with two or even three.26 2. A M P H I B R A C H A N D A N A P A E S T

It seems probable that the difference between the English and Russian approach to the matter of endings also plays some part in explaining a further contrast between the two schools of prosody - namely, the recognition, in Russian, of the amphibrach as a metre in its own right, independent of both the anapaest and the dactyl. Some of the triple-time verse quoted by Saintsbury and Egerton Smith in illustration of FMFM endings in English would be classed by Russian prosodists as 'amphibrachic' without further ado, inasmuch as the anacrusis is monosyllabic virtually throughout. Such would include, for instance, the stanza taken from Gay's Molly Mog: The schoolboy's desire is a play-day, The schoolmaster's joy is to flog, The milkmaid's delight is on May-day, But mine is on sweet Molly Mog. 26

A good example is provided by Blok's 4-foot iambs with basically M F M F endings and rhymes. Of 49 such poems, 10 have deviations of one kind or another involving a masculine conclusion, viz: Closing with MFFAf - 7 poems (Nos 358, 426, 510, 593, 690, 701, 720). Closing with F M F M - 1 poem (No. 636). Closing with F F M M - 2 poems (Nos 595, 698). On this point, vide infra, Ch. X, pp. 360/1. For the predominance of the F M F M (and D M D M ) patterns in Blok's verse generally, cf. Ch. IX, infra. " There are, of course, exceptions even here (e.g. No. 344 b , No. 621, or No. 759), as well as poems with no rhyme at all, or at least no discernible pattern of what are apparently chance rhymes (e.g. N o . 55, No. 679, and - with no rhyme at all - N o s 423, 515-518, 553, 324, and all but the last part of the longer poem, No. 329 - to mention only a few).

AMPHIBRACH AND ANAPAEST

65

Byron's lines to Haidee: I enter thy garden of roses, Beloved and fair Haidee, Each morning where Flora reposes, For surely I see her in thee. or Praed's Letter of Advice (disyllabic anacrusis in 6th line): Remember the thrilling romances We read on the bank in the glen; Remember the suitors our fancies Would picture for both of us then. They wore the red cross on their shoulder, They had vanquished and pardoned their foe Sweet friend, are you wiser or colder? My own Araminta, say "No!" Nor would this depend, in the Russian view, on the existence of feminine endings in 50 % of all the above lines. The first verse of Scott's Lochinvar: O, young Lochinvar is come out of the west, Through all the wide Border his steed was the best; And save his good broadsword he weapons had none, He rode all unarm'd, and he rode all alone. So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war, There never was knight like the young Lochinvar. (iOxford Standard Ed., p. 142) or of Browning's How They Brought the Good News ...: I sprang to the stirrup, and Joris, and he; I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three; 'Good speed!' cried the watch, as the gate-bolts undrew; 'Speed!' echoed the wall to us galloping through; Behind shut the postern, the lights sank to rest, And into the midnight we galloped abreast. (Oxford Standard Ed., p. 208) would both, in isolation, be classified - despite their masculine endings - as 'amphibrachic'; catalectic, of course, but under no circumstances (as in English) as acatalectic anapaests with 'dropped syllable' in the anacrusis of each line. Since, as we have already seen, the ending used in Russian is independent of the metre involved, there remains - in triple-time verse, at any rate - only the opening of the line (anacrusis) to determine the metre. Where this anacrusis is monosyllabic throughout, the poem is considered amphibrachic; where disyllabic, anapaestic; and there, for the Russian, is an end of the matter.

66

METRICAL FACTORS

In English, by contrast, such guarded talk of 'amphibrachic' verse as occurs at all would seem to be limited to those stanzas in which at least some feminine endings exist, i.e. in which there are at least some 'perfect' (acatalectic) amphibrachs to show.27 At this point, a brief history of the place of the amphibrach in modern English prosody may be found helpful: It was towards the end of the last century that Skeat, in his study of versification, pointed out: "The amphibrach plays a highly important part in English verse, though it is usual not to mention it at all."28 He accordingly included it among his four word-groups (or 'monopressures' as he called them29) - the only trisyllabic 'foot', incidentally, of the four. David Masson, in his study of Milton's versification (1910), likewise found the amphibrach, "strange to say, the neatest agent" to "account for" what he termed "trisyllabic variations" in certain of Milton's (basically iambic) lines.30 So far, however, the question at issue was confined to one of foot division within basically iambic lines, i.e. the problem was whether or not the amphibrach 'existed' as a foot of trisyllabic substitution in disyllabic (duple-time) verse. Saintsbury later referred to the matter in a wider context: "According to some, this foot [=amphibrach] is not uncommon in English poetry, as, for instance, in Byron's The black bands | dime ov6r The Alps and | their snow. as well as individually for a foot of substitution." His conclusion, however, was: "Others, including the present writer, think that these cases can always, or almost always, be better arranged as anapaests The black | bands came o|v6r The Alps | Snd their snow, On this point, vide infra, pp. 69 ff. " Cf. The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, ed. by the Rev. Walter Skeat, reprinted lithographically ... from sheets of the first edition (1894)... at the University Press, Oxford, in 1950. Vol. 6, General Introduction, §§ 98-117 (Versification). The passage quoted above appears on p. lxxxiii. 28 The idea of the 'monopressure' was taken over by Skeat from the author of an anonymous work entitled: Accent and Rhythm, explained by the law of Monopressures, Part I (Edinburgh, 1888), to which he referred on p. lxxxiv of his own study. The earlier work is attributed by Saintsbury to J. W. Blake (H.M.E.P., p. 337, also referred to on p. 260). 50 Cf. The Poetical Works of John Milton, Vol. Ill, pp. 206ff. (Milton's Versification ...), esp. p. 215 and p. 222.

AMPHIBRACH AND ANAPAEST

67

and that the amphibrach is unnecessary, or, at any rate, very very rare in English."31 In his study of English prose rhythm (1922), Elton found that what he termed 'waved rhythm' (which included the amphibrach, along with 2nd and 3rd paeons) was "the most distinctive type of rhythm in [English] prose," but contrasted this with the position in verse, "where its occurrence is doubtful". 32 Later in the same study, however, he confessed that the amphibrach was a foot he was "inclined to admit into verse, unlike Professor Saintsbury."33 Long before this, Robert Bridges had entered his 'defence' of the amphibrach, for which he suggested - as better reproducing the combination involved - the term 'britannic'. "Certainly," he wrote, "classical prosody does not make the slightest a priori probability in favour of an anapaestic or dactylic system in English ..." i.e. rather than an amphibrachic one.34 Bridges' use of the word 'system', however, is somewhat misleading. In fact, he was concerned here with accentual (pure-tonic) verse, and his conclusion (p. 97) that the 'britannic' was "the commonest trisyllabic unit of stressed verse" in reality did little more than support Skeat's finding that it constituted one of the commonest word-groups in English speech. And when Abercrombie used the term 'britannic' in relation to Milton's verse, he was again only concerned with its occurrence as a foot of substitution in the iambic line.38 While, therefore, there would seem to be ample evidence of the existence of the amphibrachic 'foot' in English36 (verse as well as prose), none of it goes to the heart of the matter which concerns us here - namely, whether the amphibrach can (or could) exist in English as a metrical scheme in its own right. 31

H.M.E.P., p. 268. Cf. English Prose Numbers, p. 134. 33 English Prose Numbers, p. 155. 34 Milton's Prosody, p. 95. The original edition appeared in 1889, but by 1901 the work already included what Saintsbury calls "important additions on stress-prosody" (H.M.E.P., p. 337). 36 Principles of English Prosody, Part I, p. 148. 36 One striking exception is Egerton Smith, who, while referring at one point to the "so-called amphibrachs of Byron's", yet roundly declares (in his glossary) that the amphibrach is merely a "combination", which "cannot strictly be a metrical foot". He gives no evidence in support of this surprising statement - unless it is to be deduced from his categorical assurance earlier that "... in a given piece of homogeneous verse the ictus must fall always at the end or always at the beginning of a foot". If this statement be invoked to 'disprove' the amphibrach, it amounts to begging the question; at best, it raises suspicions of post hoc, ergo propter hoc. (Cf. P.E.M., pp. 182, 303, and 13 respectively). 32

68

METRICAL FACTORS

The most searching investigation into this aspect of the problem is that made by T.S. Omond in his Study of Metre; his remarks in this connection are worth quoting at some length: "Why have only two subdivisions been given in triple metre, rising and falling? Why not a third, in which the signalising stress shall rest on the mid-syllable of three? This collocation, whose analogy would be with the Classic amphibrach, is one of Prof. Skeat's four units. It is undoubtedly common in our speech, therefore presumably in our verse, but for some reason our metrists object to recognising it as an English 'foot*... Personally, I have no doubt that the collocation of syllables loosely described by this name does occur in a period. Many lines, moreover, seem at first sight written to this cadence, such as ... Browning's: I galloped, | Dirck galloped, | we galloped | all three; o r . . . Mr. Swinburne's: The laurel, | the palms, and | the paean, | the breast of | the nymphs in | the brake. But an examination of the poems from which these lines are taken will show that the effect is accidental. A dropped syllable at the beginning is responsible for i t . . . our freedom of dropping a syllable makes the three varieties seldom long distinguishable. Even the two main effects, of falling or rising stress, blend and alternate; to constitute a third type seems wholly unnecessary".37 So far, the conclusion is reminiscent of Saintsbury's (pp. 66/7, supra). But Omond goes one step further: "Logically, it [ = the amphibrach] would complete the division, and should a poem ever appeai; containing lines of this pattern only it might be desirable to do it, ..." In the next breath, however, he undoes his logic by adding that "even then the metre might as easily be called triple rising with the first syllables always omitted". However this may be, he again emphasises: "Practically, such lines occur only casually and infrequently; and to give them a separate name would appear to create unnecessary complication."38 Reserving judgment for a moment on the accuracy of this last statement, we are at least getting nearer the crux of the problem. It is typical of English prosody that it should concern itself with practical realities rather than abstruse theory or finer points of logic, and it is a fact that virtually no poem in triple-time metre in English maintains the monosyllabic ('amphibrachic') anacrusis throughout. But this is not to say, as Omond claims, 37 38

T. S. Omond, A Study of Metre (Alexander Moring Ltd., London, 1920), pp. 93-95. Ibid., p. 95.

AMPHIBRACH AND ANAPAEST

69

that the 'amphibrachic' line occurs "only casually and infrequently". On the contrary, most of the early so-called anapaests in English very much tended to open with what Saintsbury termed "dissyllabic feet", i.e. monosyllabic anacrusis.39 Enid Hamer likewise notes that, up to the time of Prior, almost the only 'substitution' in anapaestic verse was "that of the iambus at the beginning of a line ..." 40 - which is another way of saying the same thing. Even at a later date, the monosyllabic anacrusis was at least as often the rule as the exception. "The first foot in the line ... is hardly ever a full anapaest, but an iamb in Scott, and an iamb or a spondee in Browning."41 Why, then, it may be questioned, is there no talk of an amphibrachic base with regard to some of these poems - but only of an anapaestic one, with 'iambic substitution' (or 'dropped syllable') in a majority of the lines? The most likely explanation, as we have seen, seems to be the absence of feminine endings from these poems. Since, ipso facto, not a single line from them could be scanned as a 'perfect' amphibrach, the claim is that it is just as 'logical' - and very much more convenient - to scan them as anapaests with deviations in the first foot. As mentioned earlier, it is usually only when feminine endings are involved that English prosodists begin to talk of 'amphibrachic' lines at all.42 Where feminine endings do occur, the pattern is usually the 'Russian' one of alternating FMFM lines, as in the examples from Gay, Byron, and Praed cited earlier (pp. 64/5, supra). Occasionally, however, we encounter all-feminine endings - as, for instance, in Byron's Stanzas Written ... between Florence and Pisa : Oh, talk not to me of a name great in story; The days of our youth are the days of our glory; And the myrtle and ivy of sweet two-and-twenty Are worth all your laurels, though ever so plenty. etc. (Oxford Standard Ed., p. I l l ) 58

H.M.E.P., pp. 74/5 (examples from Tusser, Gifford, and lines from Mary Ambree late XVI century) and p. 82 (Dryden, 1691?). 40 M.O.E.P., p. 261. 41 M.o.E.P., p. 263. An analysis of Browning's How They Brought the Good News shows that, through the first 7 stanzas, there are 29 monosyllabic to only 13 disyllabic openings, only the 5th verse having predominantly disyllabic anacrusis. The last 3 stanzas (8-10) are mainly disyllabic but, even so, the totals for the poem as a whole are 34 monosyllabic against 26 disyllabic openings. Similarly, Scott's Lochinvar has, in the first 5 verses, 22 monosyllabic to only 8 disyllabic openings; by the end of the 7th verse, the figures are 27:15. The final (8th) stanza is mainly disyllabic, the total for the poem being 28:20. 44 Certainly, all the poems referred to by Saintsbury, Egerton Smith, and Enid Hamer as 'possible' amphibrachs involve feminine endings of one kind or another. Otherwise, there is talk of anapaests only. Not so, however, Omond, q.v. supra.

70

METRICAL FACTORS

For the whole poem, we here have a predominantly monosyllabic anacrusis, occurring in 10 lines altogether against 6 with disyllabic opening. The third stanza of Scott's Coronach begins with four amphibrachic lines so perfect in every respect that it would seem almost cussed to call them anything else: Fleet foot on the correi, Sage counsel in cumber, Red hand in the foray, How sound is thy slumber! - were it not for the fact that the next four lines have an equally constant disyllabic anacrusis: Like the dew on the mountain, Like the foam on the river, Like the bubble on the fountain, Thou art gone, and for ever! ( TYMAM» H M p a i c t ,

"Bxajn> THXO HAFLT piKoio y^ajioH Ka3aKT>. etc. (I/p. 70) Blok has 13 poems in 4 x 3 trochaics, the most striking of which is probably the delightful Sny: H n o p a y c H y T b , a a acajiKO,

H e xony ycHyTb!

KoHb K a n a e T c a

Kanajnca,

H a KOHH 6i> CKAKHYTI»!

JIyii>

JIAMNAFLKH, KAXT BI> TYMAHI,

Parb-flBa, pa3t-flBa, pa3i>! . . . HFLETI KOHHHua . . . a HSHH TAHETI. CBOH PA3CKA3I>...

etc.

(745)

though several others from this group are scarcely less captivating in their way, notably No. 680 and No. 474.123 c) In triple-time verse. Some of the main differences between English and Russian usage in ternary verse have already been discussed, and others briefly referred to, in Section 2 of this chapter. It remains to say a word or two here in connection with the line-lengths most frequently employed in the respective languages. As with the iamb (but not, remarkably enough, with the trochee), we find that the tendency in triple time is again for Russian poets to adopt a line one foot shorter than that most usual in English; this does not mean, of course, that converse examples do not exist. In English 'anapaestic' verse (which includes the 'amphibrachic' types 1M

Cf. Russian Versification, p. 31, where a footnote refers in this connection to K. Taranovski, Ruski dvodelni ritmovi, I-H (Beograd, 1953), pp. 47/8. 123 For details, vide infra, Ch. XI, pp. 388/9.

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95

discussed earlier), there seems to be general agreement that the 4-foot line is, as Enid Hamer puts it, "the commonest and most characteristic".124 Egerton Smith likewise considers that "the four-foot line is probably the most characteristic measure normally anapaestic"; at the same time, he is quick to point out "the divine energy of Swinburne's chorus, 'Before the beginning of years', and the seductive melody of Dolores", both of which are in 3-foot measure, and, more generally, the fact that anapaestic verse "is ... more independent and self-sufficient than the iambic in shorter measures". Quoting the opening of Cowper's famous: I am monarch of all I survey, My right there is none to dispute: From the centre all round to the sea I am lord of the fowl and the brute; he points out that it is "a line quite capable of standing by itself, having sufficient volume to satisfy the ear as a unit".125 That the 3-foot line has also enjoyed considerable popularity in the hands of certain English poets should be obvious from the examples of 'amphibrachic' verse cited earlier in this chapter (Gay, Byron, Praed). In this connection, it is interesting to read Saintsbury on the historical evolution of the metre of Swinburne's Dolores. "There can be little doubt," he writes, "that its original, or the earliest form to which it can be traced, is the split Alexandrine or three-foot iambic, which appears in the French of Philippe de Thaun, and in several English poems ... But this gives far too little room in English.... This shortness kept it back, more especially when the fear of mainly trisyllabic measures came in after the fifteenthcentury anarchy. But as soon as that fear disappeared, and the anapaest forced itself into general use, logic, assisted by tune, suggested a cutting down of the popular dimeter or four-foot anapaestic line to three. This, for a long time, maintained itself in strict literature without much variety of structure ..." In illustration, Saintsbury cites Shenstone's: Since Phyllis vouchsafed me a look, I never once dreamt of my vine; May I lose both my pipe and my crook, If I know of a kid that is mine; Cowper's Alexander Selkirk lines (already quoted above), and also his Catherina: 124

1,5

M.O.E.P., p. 262.

P.E.M., pp. 139-141.

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METRICAL FACTORS

She came - she is gone - we have met, And meet perhaps never again; The sun of that moment is set, And seems to have risen in vain. Such lines, although "pretty", Saintsbury rightly finds "exposed to the charge of being pretty sing-song, and monotonous jingle". And it was, interestingly enough, the introduction of what he calls "the redundant syllable and double rhyme in the odd lines" (i.e. the 'Russian'-type FMFM abab quatrain) which, in his view, brought such 'immense gain' to this metre and led, through Byron's Translation of the Romaic Song ("I enter thy garden of roses") and Praed's Letter of Advice (q.v. supra), to Swinburne's "final inspiration of shortening the last line to two feet (or an anapaestic monometer), with an astonishing result of added and finished music: Though the many lights dwindle to one light, There is help if the heaven has one, Though the skies be discrowned of the sunlight, And the earth dispossessed of the sun, They have moonlight and sleep for repayment When, refreshed as a bride and set free, With stars and sea-winds in her raiment, Night sinks on the sea."126 Though Swinburne's may have been the final, supreme achievement, the part played by Praed in the development of this metre should not be underrated. Of him, Saintsbury writes: "His greatest triumph, the adaptation of the three-foot anapaest, alternately hypercatalectic and acatalectic ..., which had been a ballad-burlesque metre as early as Gay, had been partly ensouled by Byron in one piece, but was made his own by Praed, and handed down by him to Mr. Swinburne to be yet further sublimated."127 And elsewhere, as if to drive home his point still further, Saintsbury refers to Swinburne's "shortening of the last line of the Praedstanza .. ."128 The existence of the 3-foot anapaest in English verse has been emphasised at some length, largely in order to bring out the interesting analogy with Russian usage, in much the same way as was done earlier for the 4-foot iamb. This notwithstanding, the commoner English anapaestic metre remains the 4-foot line - usually alone, as, for instance, in Scott's 126 147 138

Cf. H.M.E.P., pp. 112-115. H.M.E.P., p. 311. H.M.E.P., p. 314.

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97

Lochinvar, Byron's Destruction of Sennacherib, Browning's How They Brought the Good News..., and Swinburne's chorus from Atalanta in Calydon beginning: "When the hounds of spring are on winter's traces"; or, more rarely, in alternation with the 3-foot line, as, say, in Wolfe's Burial of Sir John Moore ( 4 x 3 MFMF abab): Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note, As his corse to the rampart we hurried; Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot O'er the grave where our hero we buried. etc. (O.B.E.V., No. 610, p. 712) Little interest attaches to the longer lines, in view of their rarity in Russian verse generally and in Blok's verse in particular. Swinburne, who, in Hamer's words, "had more proficiency in dealing with trisyllabic measures than anyone before or since",129 produced what Egerton Smith considers the finest example of 5-foot anapaestic verse in his Atalanta, in the short chorus beginning: We have seen thee, O Love; thou art fair; thou art goodly, O Love; A far less successful attempt is Browning's Saul, which, as the same critic points out, in many places illustrates "the peculiarly disastrous effect in this metre of heavy syllables in the thesis of an anapaest" - for instance, a line like: I report as a man may of God's work - all's love yet all's law or, worse still: But I sink the pretension as fearing a man may o'ertake God's own speed in the one way of love: I abstain for love's sake ... All's one gift: thou can'st grant it, moreover, as prompt to my prayer.130 In Maud, Tennyson used both 5-foot and 6-foot anapaests. Swinburne also used 6-foot lines (Hymn to Proserpine, Garden of Cymodoce), 7-foot (Armada, Pt. IV; Hesperia), and even 8-foot {March, and parts of the Ode to England). The tendency for anything longer than 5-foot anapaests, however, is for the lines to split up into at least two parts. The parallel between English and Russian anapaestic verse - even in the 3-foot FMFM quatrain - is, of course, at most a relative one, due to the frequent occurrence in the English form of anacrusis variations and, "» 130

M.O.E.P., p. 263. Cf. P.E.M., p. 140, also note 1 on p. 149.

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METRICAL FACTORS

in particular, of disyllabic or other substitution within the metrical line.131 In the case of dactylic verse, this contrast is even more marked - indeed, English so-called dactylic verse is so beset by catalexis and anacrusis (disyllabic as well as monosyllabic) that prosodists frequently differ as to what in fact constitutes dactylic metre, and there are even those who maintain that dactylic verse hardly exists in its own right in English. "It was ... early discovered," writes Saintsbury, "even by favourers of classical 'versing', that there is something awkward about the English dactyl. And in fact, though we have a very large number of words which are fair dactyls regarded separately, they are no sooner set in a verse than they seem to slip or waggle into other measures, and especially the anapaest."132 Egerton Smith takes much the same view: "In dactylic verse," he comments, "it is perhaps more difficult [than in trochaic, R.K.] to avoid anacrusis and open with a true unmistakable dactyl, and final catalexis is particularly hard to avoid - rather more so when rime is necessary."133 And again: "Any considerable use of masculine endings affects not merely the final cadence, but the run of the whole line, and, especially when combined with anacrusis, practically changes it to anapaestic verse..."134 Admittedly, one suspects that both these opinions - and those of other English authorities besides - fail to make a sufficiently clear distinction between purely rhythmic considerations of cadence on the one hand and metrical factors on the other.135 At the same time, it has to be admitted that the constant mixture of anacrusis, in particular, renders it extremely difficult always to distinguish clearly between the two. In so far as it is fair to talk of English dactyls at all, Egerton Smith considers that "three-foot and four-foot lines, as with anapaestics, are generally most successful".136 Browning - "perhaps ... the most successful writer in dactylics" - uses both types of line in his Misconceptions'. This is a spray the Bird clung to, Making it blossom with pleasure, Ere the high tree-top she sprung to, 181 Cf. esp. Wolfe's Burial of Sir John Moore, the first verse of which is quoted above. By contrast, the examples cited from Praed and Swinburne show little or no substitution within the line. 138 H.M.E.P., p. 276. 1,8 P.E.M., p. 144. 131 P.E.M., p. 145. 185 Saintsbury seems to be especially guilty in this respect. Cf., for instance, his remarks on Swinburne's Hesperia and particularly on Kingsley's Andromeda, which he maintains is "clearly, though not consciously, anapaestic ..." (H.M.E.P., p. 119 and p. 123 respectively). P.E.M., p. 145.

LINE-LENGTHS AND STANZA-FORMS

99

Fit for her nest and her treasure. Oh, what a hope beyond measure Was the poor spray's, which the flying feet hung to, So to be singled out, built in, and sung to! etc. (iOxford Standard Ed., p. 238) However, some of the most successful of English dactyls have been written in 2-foot measure, notably Hood's Bridge of Sighs, mentioned earlier in this chapter, Scott's Pibroch of Donuil Dhu (DFDF endings): Pibroch of Donuil Dhu, Pibroch of Donuil, Wake thy wild voice anew, Summon Clan-Conuil. Come away, come away, Hark to the summons! Come in your war array, Gentles and commons. etc. 0Oxford Standard Ed., p. 731) and Tennyson's Merlin and the Gleam (Pt. IV - mainly feminine, with occasional dactylic, endings): Then to the melody, Over a wilderness Gliding, and glancing at Elf of the woodland, Gnome of the cavern, Griffin and Giant, And dancing of Fairies In desolate hollows, etc. {Works, Globe Ed., p. 605) These examples, incidentally, show up the difficulty of finding genuine dactylic rhymes in English. Only Hood makes use of them to any great extent. Scott's 'dactylic' endings only rhyme in the final syllable, while Tennyson's eschew rhyme altogether. Not infrequently, a feminine ending followed by monosyllabic anacrusis in the next line completes the full (syllabic) triple-time measure; in the absence of rhyme, a slight rearrangement then produces 'pure' (acatalectic) dactylic lines, e.g. (Merlin and the Gleam, Pt. VI): Then, with a melody Stronger and statelier, Led me at length To the city and palace Of Arthur the king; (X X) etc.

100

METRICAL FACTORS

The longer dactylic lines occur frequently in Swinburne's verse - from 4-foot (Erectheus) and 5-foot (A Child's Future) to as many as 8 feet (albeit with frequent disyllabic substitution) in The Armada (Pt.VlI). As poems, however, it is at least doubtful whether they can reasonably be classified as dactylic any more than anapaestic. As Egerton Smith points out in another context, Swinburne himself, "the fineness of whose ear few will impugn", declared all dactylic forms of verse to be 'unnatural and abhorrent' in English, but found anapaestics 'natural and pliable' - the inescapable inference being that he himself regarded his own triple-time verse as belonging to the latter category.137 In any case, the same tendency towards splitting up occurs here as in anapaestic lines proper. All in all, it is safe to say that English dactylic verse, so-called, shows little if any metrical analogy with its Russian counterpart. Indeed, from all that has been said on this somewhat vexed question, it should be clear that the same consideration applies, mutatis mutandis, to the whole of English triple-time verse. In Russian triple-time verse, it is the 3-foot line that dominates the picture. Unbegaun's statement on this point, quoted earlier in this chapter {vide supra, p. 83, note 86), is borne out by Sengeli, whofindsthe 3-foot line by far the commonest in all three types of ternary verse, viz. anapaestic, amphibrachic, and dactylic.138 At the same time, such statements need some qualification. In the earlier days of Russian triple-time verse, the tendency - in which English and German models doubtless played a part - was rather towards the 4-foot line, or else the 4-foot and 3-foot combined, usually in alternation. The latter form (4 x 3) was particularly popular as a Russian ballad measure - predominantly the amphibrachic type made fashionable by Zukovskij. Puskin likewise tended towards one or other of these forms in the few ternary measures he tried, using 4-foot lines for his Cernaja saV and for Kavkaz (both amphibrachic) and 4-foot combined with 3-foot lines in his Pesn' o vescem Olege (amphibrachic) and in Budrys i ego synov'ja (anapaestic). We find much the same tendency with Lermontov, who - for all his other innovations and generally exploratory turn of mind - adhered largely to the same two forms. Of his 26 amphibrachic poems, seven make use of 4-foot lines and eight are in 4 x 3 measure; one other is in 5-foot measure and one more still in 5,3,5,4 quatrains. Against these longer lines (17 in all), we find only five in pure 3-foot measure and four others in 2-foot, or 2- and 3-foot com-

"»

Cf. P.E.M., p. 15. Cf. Prakt. Stix., pp. 24/25, 16/17, and 31/32 respectively.

LINE-LENGTHS AND STANZA-FORMS

101

bined. Of his 5 regular dactylic poems, four are in pure 4-foot measure and one is in 4 x 3 form. Only the anapaests show some leaning towards the 3-foot line, three out of five following this measure, with one in 4 x 3 and one in 2-foot lines. Even the 'mixed' anapaest-amphibrachs {vide supra, p. 74, note 52) are in 4 x 3 measure in six cases, while the seventh (II/6) is in 4-foot lines throughout. Thus, among 43 poems in triple time, no less than thirty are in 4 x 3 or longer measures, while only eight are in 3-foot lines throughout, and five are in shorter measures. With the passage of time, however, the 3-foot line pure and simple seems to have come into its own - particularly for anapaestic and amphibrachic measures - being taken up by the two great mid-century exponents of triple-time verse, Nekrasov and Fet, the latter in numerous lyrics, the former, inter alia, in the longer narrative poem, Moroz Krasnyj-Nos. In his review of the various ending and rhyme patterns used by the more important poets since Lermontov, Rozanov - after noting the preference of Nekrasov for dactylic and of Fet for feminine rhymes - continues: "Both elements, the Fet-like and the Nekrasov-like, joined hands in [the verse of] Blok, who so brilliantly crowned the period of Russian literature which began with Lomonosov."139 This statement could fairly be applied in a wider context, and is particularly apt in the present connection. With Blok, indeed, the 3-foot line reaches a degree of eminence never known before, representing by far the largest single line-length in all three ternary measures. Of Blok's 41 dactylic poems, nineteen ( = 46 %) are in pure 3-foot measure, compared with seven in 4 x 3 and thirteen in 4-foot form. Of the 35 amphibrachic poems, twenty ( = 57%) have pure 3-foot lines, compared with four poems in 4 x 3 and five in 4-foot form. With the anapaests, the proportion of 3-foot poems is higher still. Of 104 such poems, only seven are in 4 x 3 measure, four have 4-foot lines, while no less than seventy-six ( = 73 %) are in pure 3-foot form. These latter poems constitute the third largest group in all Blok's verse, being outnumbered only by the 4-foot iambs and 4-foot trochees. From this it is clear that only in dactylic verse is there anything even remotely approaching numerical equality between the 3-foot and 4-foot poems. Conversely, in anapaestic verse, the 3-foot line brooks no opposition. Between the two stands the amphibrach, which, however, leans more towards the anapaest than to the dactyl in this, as in other, respects. This tendency - already discernible in Lermontov's verse (dactyls nearly 139

Lermontov

v istorii russkogo stixa, p. 468.

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METRICAL FACTORS

all 4-foot, amphibrachs mainly 4-foot or 4 x 3, and anapaests predominantly 3-foot) - is easily explained when we think of the stress and syllable distribution in the various types of line. Remembering the frequent use of masculine endings in the even lines of Russian verse, even in dactylic metre, a moment's reflection shows that the the 3-foot dactylic line of this type is extremely short, having only 7 syllables: - ^ ^ | - ^ ^ | Even the corresponding 4-foot line will have only 10, which is no more than, say, the 3-foot anapaestic line with feminine ending: ^ - | ^ ^ - | ^ ^ - | Moreover, whatever the ending employed, the third stress of the dactylic line will perforce always fall relatively early, i.e. on the seventh syllable of the line. Add to this the fact that the first syllable of the dactylic line frequently bears only the lightest of stresses, as we shall later see,140 and it becomes clear why, of the three triple-time metres, the dactyl veers most towards the longer, 4-foot, line. Conversely, the anapaest is best suited to the 3-foot line, consisting as it does of a minimum of nine syllables, with the third ictus as late as the ninth syllable of the line, and often including an additional, hypermetrical, full stress on the opening syllable of the line.141 4. METRES MOST COMMONLY EMPLOYED

In conclusion, it remains to say a few words on the respective roles played in English and in Russian verse by the principal metres as such, i.e. the proportion of poems composed - irrespective of the linelengths employed - in iambic, trochaic, anapaestic, amphibrachic, dactylic, and purely accentual ('pure-tonic') measures. One feature, at least, is common to both languages - the overwhelming predominance of iambic metre over all others, virtually at all times and in all types of verse. Of the predominance of the iamb in English verse, the English reader will hardly need convincing. A glance at almost any study of prosody is sufficient to confirm this. "English verse," wrote Masson, in his study of Milton's versification, "is prevailingly Iambic, or of the xa metre ... Trochaic, Dactylic, and Anapaestic measures occur occasionally in our lyric poetry; but the Iambic is all but our metrical factotum."142 "A foot of two syllables - short, long," says Saintsbury of the iamb, and 140 Vide infra, Ch. VI, p. 209 and p. 220. This opening syllable is so light that many authorities refer (incorrectly, in my view) to "absence of stress" in such cases. 141 Vide infra, Ch. VI, p. 213 and esp. pp. 221 ff. 14S Milton's Poetical Works, Vol. Ill, p. 207.

METRES MOST COMMONLY EMPLOYED

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continues: the commonest in almost all prosodies, and (though this is sometimes denied) the staple foot of English."143 The qualification in brackets applies only to that misleading - and happily small school of prosody which would equate poetry with music pure and simple, and so maintains that all verse is practically either trochaic (if duple-time) or dactylic (triple-time), with or without 'anacrusis', as the case may be. This method - denounced by Saintsbury as 'ludicrous, hideous, and false'144 - is disposed of for our purposes, neatly and without fuss, by Egerton Smith, when he writes: "Whether or not we adopt for purposes of analysis a scheme of notation, analogous to that of musical convention, in which the beat or ictus is represented as always falling on the first syllable of the bar or foot, it is clear that the staple rhythm of nearly all English speech-verse has been iambic, i.e. in rising rhythm, falling normally into disyllabic feet..." "The majority of recognised English poetry falls into verses which open on a light syllable and end on a heavy, the iambic cadence being unmistakably in the writer's mind." ... "Most English speech-verse falls into what is known as rising rhythm. Scansion according to a trochaic scheme might represent the abstract time-relations of this, disregarding the concrete cadences; but an iambic scheme of notation has the advantage of representing both."145 Even Omond - arch-advocate of the musical connection and the time basis of English verse - admits that what we may call the 'pan-trochaic' form of scansion is "less natural and convenient in metre than in music". "English sentences," he continues, "most frequently begin with an unimportant word, such as 'And' or 'Of' or 'The'. English lines of verse naturally do the same. So far as the types can be separated, therefore, rising metre is immensely more common than falling."14e Such fundamental unanimity among experts who have yet approached the principles of English verse from such very different angles should be confirmation enough of the overwhelming predominance of iambic metre in English duple-time verse. At the same time, the distinction between the iambic and trochaic forms is, as we have seen, far less easy to determine in English than in Russian, owing to the frequent intermingling of the two types of line-opening in one and the same poem. As Omond puts it: 143 H.M.E.P., p. 284, where a footnote adds: "Professor Hardie reminds me of Quintilian's assertion (Inst. Orat. IX.iv.136) that even in Latin, iambs "omnibus pedibus insurgunt"." 144 Cited from Saintsbury's longer History of English Prosody (iii, 525) by Egerton Smith (P.E.M., p. 15). 146 P.E.M., pp. 131/132. 146 A Study of Metre, pp. 61/62.

104

METRICAL FACTORS

"Our poets ... pass backwards and forwards from one form to the other at their pleasure."147 However and wherever the distinction may be drawn, the predominance of duple-time verse as a whole (iambic, trochaic, and 'mixed') is also a recognised factor in English verse. To quote Omond once more: "Dupletime verse, being the more consonant to our speech-habit, was for long considered practically our one form of metre. The other was detached from it by degrees and with difficulty. Nine-tenths of our whole verse, at a rough guess, moves to duple time .. ," 148 As regards English triple-time verse, the difficulties in the way of dividing it up into anapaests and dactyls (let alone amphibrachs) are, as we have already seen, almost insuperable. At the same time, it seems clear that the vast majority of such verse must be classified - if only faute de mieux - as basically anapaestic in character (with frequent and irregular monosyllabic anacrusis, which often outweighs the disyllabic opening, especially in the early days). Of the anapaest as a continuous metre, Saintsbury found that "the early examples of it are well marked, though not very numerous; but in the sixteenth century it seems ... to have caught the popular ear, and from the late seventeenth has been thoroughly established in [English] literature". 149 By contrast, 'pure' dactylic verse is, in English, rare in the extreme. Taking the triple-time metres as one group, Omond's estimate would imply, ipso facto, that it constituted at most a mere 10 % of English verse as a whole.150 The matter is further complicated by the great frequency with which English verse generally makes use of anisosyllabic substitution - more particularly, trisyllabic substitution in duple time and disyllabic in triple time - a fact which again makes it hard to draw a clear dividing line, both between these two main types of verse individually and also between the two collectively on the one hand and pure accentual verse on the other; in this connection, we have only to recall Saintsbury's extraordinary contention that Christabel is written in "octosyllabic couplet, ... more or less freely but regularly equivalenced".151 By and large, Omond's estimate is probably correct - allowing, of course, for considerable variations between one poet and another and, to some extent, between one age and another. It seems likely that the A Study of Metre, p. 61. Ibid., p. 50. 148 H.M.E.P., p. 270. 150 "At most", since we do not know what allowance, if any, is made for pure accentual verse in this estimate. (On this point, see the rest of the above paragraph). 151 H.M.E.P., p. 98.

148

METRES MOST COMMONLY EMPLOYED

105

verse, say, of Scott and Byron, of Praed, of Browning, and of Swinburne all contains rather more than an average of 10% triple-time poems though it is doubtful if it anywhere approaches double that figure. This is in sharp contrast to Russian usage, where triple-time metres, although developing, as in English, later than the duple-time measures and having likewise to combat the prejudice of being unsuitable for serious poetry, yet ultimately flourished so well as to occupy some 40 % of the total output of Nekrasov and as much as 50 % of Bijusov's verse.152 Russian ternary verse in its 'pure' form - as opposed to imitations of the classical hexameter - was, as we have seen, introduced for the first time on any considerable scale by 2ukovskij. PuSkin hardly touched it, 153 and even Lermontov used ternary metres in only about 11-12% of his poems. 154 The early examples were largely, if not exclusively, amphibrachic a metre which had remained generally unused until the time of 2ukovskij and Batjuskov, though it had, in fact, been employed far earlier than this by the 18th-century poet, Sumarokov (1718-1777), whose songs, as Prince Mirsky put it, "are remarkable for a truly prodigious metrical inventiveness (not so much as imitated by his successors) .. ." 155 The anapaest was later in finding a foothold, and would seem, as Unbegaun points out, "to have been the last to establish itself among the ternary metres". 156 Emphasising the innovatory role played by Lermontov in adopting anapaestic measures, Rozanov makes the point that, in the early thirties of last century, the only examples he would have had to go on were 2ukovskij's translation of Scott's Eve of St. John (1822 - vide supra, p. 61), a few poems published in various journals during the late twenties (notably two by Polezaev which appeared in 1829), and Puskin's P'ju za zdravie Meri (published 1831) - since "among other recognised poets there were no anapaests whatever to be found". 157 In this matter of anapaest and amphibrach, there was a strange but 152 These figures are quoted by Unbegaun (Russian Versification, p. 46) from Tomasevskij's Teorija literatury: Poetika (5-oe izd., M.-L., 1930), p. 119. 153 Unbegaun, again citing Tomasevskij, states that triple-time verse accounts for only 1.5% of Puskin's verse (Russian Versification, p. 46). 164 Among the 418 poems of Lermontov, 45 are in indisputable triple-time metre, while a further 10 are 'possibles'. These latter include 1 classical hexameter and 9 other poems which, in view of greater or lesser anisosyllabic substitution, might more accurately be classified as doVniki (accentual verse). 155 D. S. Mirsky, A History of Russian Literature (Routledge & Kegan Paul, London, 1949), p. 46. According to Unbegaun, the oldest known amphibrachic poem in Russian is an ode on the betrothal of the Tsarevich Alexis, composed by J. W. Paus in 1711 (Russian Versification, p. 49). 166 Russian Versification, p. 49. Lermontov v istorii russkogo stixa, p. 452.

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interesting contrast between prosodical theory and poetical practice. The amphibrach - which established itself the sooner - was long virtually ignored in treatises on Russian versification. Lomonosov, who recognised the anapaest, never even suggested that the amphibrach might exist, and even N. Ostolopov, in his famous Slovak drevnej i novojpoezii (published in 1821), though he mentioned the existence of the amphibrach among the Greeks, never once referred to its place in Russian verse, although both Zukovskij and BatjuSkov had produced successful examples some years previously, and Puskin's Cernaja saV (1820) had achieved immediate popularity - not to mention the 18th-century amphibrachs just referred to. With the amphibrach, then, it was, as Rozanov puts it, a case of 'practice outstripping theory';158 with the anapaest, by contrast, practice took some considerable time to catch up with what had long been recognised as theoretically feasible and permissible. It is primarily to Lermontov that the credit belongs for introducing the anapaest on any considerable (albeit still modest) scale in Russian verse - both the 'pure' form (with constant disyllabic anacrusis) and, as already noted, the mixed (or 'English') form, with regular or irregular anacrusis variations. The dactylic metre was the first of the triple-time measures to find its way into Russian verse - largely through attempted imitations of the classical hexameter and other dactyl-containing lines. According to Unbegaun, Deriavin's verse contains 25 dactylic poems, compared with nine amphibrachs and not a single anapaest.159 Whether, as Unbegaun also maintains, the dactylic line is "the commonest among the [Russian] ternary metres"160 depends to some extent on whether we consider the 'Russian hexameter' (usually, as in English, composed of dactyls and trochees, on an accentual basis) to be dactylic verse as such. Even if we do, it still seems doubtful - taking Russian verse say, from, Lomonosov to Blok - whether the dactyl would prove the most widespread ternary metre. Sengeli, in fact, places the dactyl last in this respect, maintaining that the amphibrach is the most widely used of the Russian triple-time metres, followed by the anapaest, with the dactyl 'the least used'.161 Unbegaun - who presumably includes the Russian hexameter and other classical imitations in his count - states that Nekrasov's triple-time verse contains on average 4 dactyls to 3 anapaests to 1 amphibrach, and that of Fet 4 dactyls to 3 anapaests to 3 amphibrachs.162 On the other hand, 158

Lermontov v istorii russkogo stixa, p. 441. * Russian Versification, p. 46. 180 Russian Versification, p. 47 (my italics). 161 Prakt. Stix., pp. 15, 24, and 30 respectively. 162 Russian Versification, p. 47. 16

107

METRES MOST COMMONLY EMPLOYED

Lermontov, as we have seen, has 26 amphibrachs, 5 anapaests, and 7 mixed forms ('amphipaests'?!) compared with only 7 dactyls (8 if we include 1 hexameter); while Blok has 104 anapaests, 41 dactyls (including 1 hexameter, completely dactylic except for 2 trochee-spondees), and 35 amphibrachs. Converting all these figures to percentages, we find, for the four poets concerned :

Anapaest Amphibrach Mixed Dactyl

Lermontov

Fet

Nekrasov

BLOK

11.0 58.0 15.5 15.5

30.0 30.0

37.5 12.5

56.0 18.5 4.5 21.0

—

40.0

—

50.0

With such marked differences between individual poets, 163 overall statistics are of little significance; the absolute most that might be traced here would be the existence of certain trends, possibly associated to some extent with chronological factors. In this connection, the emergence of the anapaest as an independent metre stands out particularly clearly, with the amphibrach gradually losing its relative importance beside it. The dactyl emerges to dominate the poetry of Nekrasov (50 % of his ternary verse) and, to a lesser extent, of Fet (40% of ternary verse), but with Blok recedes once more, to take its place roughly on a level with the amphibrach.164 However this may be, it is clear that, in contrast to English usage, all three types of ternary metre have enjoyed - and, incidentally, continue to enjoy - considerable popularity in Russian verse. Indeed, the Russian language, with its higher proportion of grammatically unstressed (or at most very lightly stressed) syllables and its smaller number of heavy monosyllables, is metrically altogether better suited to triple time than the English. In fact, the accentual frequency of Russian triple-time verse - which normally works out at about 1 stressed syllable per 2.6-2.8 total syllables - corresponds almost exactly with the average conditions obtaining in normal Russian speech.165 As Unbegaun points out: "If, 168 It should be emphasised that the percentages given apply only to the total tripletime output of each individual poet ( = 100% in each case); they bear no relation whatever to the absolute amounts of triple-time verse put out by one poet as compared with another. 1,4 Even here, chronology plays a not insignificant part. Thus, while five-eighths of Blok's dactyls are concentrated in Book I, the amphibrachs are fairly evenly divided between the three volumes (8, 14, and 13 respectively). 185 Cf. inter alia VVM., p. 58, and note 31, p. 268 (citing Sengeli and V. Cudovskij); also Russian Versification, p. 54.

108

METRICAL FACTORS

nevertheless, ternary metres are rarer in Russian than binary, this is not because of their accentual frequency, which is normal, but because of the excessively monotonous regularity of the unstressed intervals, which are invariably disyllabic."186 We have seen that triple-time verse may constitute as much as 40 and even 50 % of a Russian poet's total output. This is admittedly exceptional - certainly so in the case of Bijusov, who was something of an innovator for innovation's sake; nevertheless, the general proportion still remains far higher than in English, even in the case of a Russian poet so utterly averse to affectation as Blok. Among the 766 poems of his with which we are concerned, we find no less than 190 in pure triple-time metre, representing almost exactly one-quarter of the whole. To these, some investigators would add at least 45 - and probably more - of Blok's doVniki (which they look upon, wrongly in my view, as basically tripletime poems with considerable disyllabic substitution);167 if these were to be included, it would represent an incidence of nearly one triple-time poem in every three. This notwithstanding, the fact remains that the duple-time metres are normally in the ascendancy, even in Russian. In the early days of Russian syllabo-tonic verse, it was the trochee that enjoyed pride of place - largely as a result of the impulse given by the old syllabic verse, which tended more and more, especially in the shorter line-lengths, to fall into more or less regular trochaic rhythm. This was notably the case with the early (pure-) syllabic verse of Trediakovskij, who, when later introducing the "tonic" ( = syllabo-tonic) principle into Russian verse for the first time in his celebrated Sposob (1735), rated the trochee as the best and 'most natural' metre for the Russian language, the pyrrhic and spondee as the next best, and the iamb as the least satisfactory.168 Even Lomonosov, in his first attempt at Russian syllabo-tonic verse - a translation of Fenelon's Ode - used 4-foot trochaics. But in his epoch-making Pis'mo o pravilax rossijskago stixotvorstva (1739), published a year later, he admitted the iamb as a metre on a par with the trochee (as well, incidentally - again in contrast to Trediakovskij - as the Russian Versification, p. 54. For a full examination of this vexed question, vide infra, Ch. VIII of the present work. 168 Cf., inter alia, D. D. Blagoj, Istorija russkoj literatury XVIII veka, pp. 122-126. According to Blagoj, citing figures given by S. M. Bondi, Trediakovskij's 6-syllable lines deviate from true duple-time metre in only 3 % of cases, the 7-syllable lines in about 10%, and the 8-syllable in about 25% (ibid., p. 123 and p. 138). 1,7

METRES MOST COMMONLY EMPLOYED

109

189

dactyl and the anapaest). The supremacy of the trochee was shortlived; from the middle of the 18th century onwards, the iamb took precedence and soon established for itself an ascendancy which it has never since surrendered. Thus, it has been calculated that only 10.6% of Puskin's verse is trochaic.1'0 With Baratynskij, the figure is only 7.2% (16 poems out of 222)171 and with Lermontov it is even less (26 poems out of 418 = 6.95 %). With Blok, it is considerably higher than any of these - 127 poems out of 766, equal to 16.6% - though this figure is to some extent magnified by the relatively high proportion of trochaic poems in Book II, the average for Books I and III together being only 13.3 % (74 poems out of 556). In any case, for all Blok's use of trochees, triple-time measures, and so-called doVniki (accentual verse), he yet remained firmly wedded to the tradition of iambic supremacy. No less than 364 of his poems are in iambic measure; this represents almost half the total, outnumbering the trochees by nearly 3 to 1. Even in the second Book of poems - sometimes loosely stated to be dominated by the trochee172 - the 'dominance' is, as stated, no more than a relative one. Of the 210 poems concerned, 72 are iambic (34.3%), 53 are trochaic (25.2%), while a further 55 (26.2%) are in triple time. At this point, it may be of interest to set out the statistical data concerning Blok's poems in tabular form. The table on p. 110 gives the distribution of these poems according to metres, the details being subdivided for each of the three Books of poems. The overall predominance of the iamb emerges particularly clearly from this table. Absolutely and relatively (to the number of poems per volume), it outstrips all other metres - even, as has just been pointed out, in Book II, where, however, its relative incidence is greatly reduced (34.3 % as compared with an average incidence for Books I and III together of 52.5%). In Books I and II, the iamb is followed by the trochee, though in the first volume the latter is practically equalled by the tonic poems ( d o V n i k i ) , with the anapaests not far behind, and a not inconsiderable proportion of dactyls. In Book II, the relative incidence of both tonic and anapaestic Cf., inter alia, D. D. Blagoj, Istorija russkoj literatury XVIII veka, pp. 141/2. Cf. Russian Versification, p. 27. Unbegaun quotes this figure from a work by N. V. Lapsina, I. K. Romanovskij, and B. I. Jarxo, Metriceskij spravocnik k stixotvorenijam PuSkina (M.-L., 1934), p. 23. 171 Russian Versification, p. 27. 172 Cf., for instance, Sophie Bonneau, V Univers poétique d'Alexandre Blok, pp. 312/3 : .. l'amphibraque, et surtout le chorée, les pieds dominants du Deuxieme Volume ; " For other inaccuracies in this connection, vide infra, p. 110, note 176. 1,0

110

METRICAL FACTORS

Classification of Blok's Poems According to Metres and Books Metre Iambic Trochaic Anapaestic Amphibrachic Dactylic Mixed TripleTime Metres . Mixed Metres Pure-Tonic (Accentual)

Book I 153 (42.1 %)173 (48.8 %)174 44 (34.7%) (14.0%) 39 (37.5%) (12.4%) 8 (22.8%) (2.5%) 25 (61.0%) (8.0%) 0(-) (-)

2(40.0%) (0.6%) 43 (53.8%) (13.7%) 314

Book II

Book III

72(19.8%) (34.3%) 53 (41.7%) (25.2%) 27 (26.0%) (12.9%) 14 (40.0%) (6.7%) 7(17.1%) (3.3%) 7 (70.0%) (3.3%) 2 (40.0%) (1.0%) 28 (35.0%) (13.3%)

139 (38.1%) (57.5%) 30 (23.6%) (12.4%) 38 (36.5%) (15.7%) 13 (37.2%) (5.4%) 9(21.9%) (3.7%) 3 (30.0%) (1.2%) 1 (20.0%) (0.4%) 9(11-2%) (3.7%)

364

242

766

210

Total

127 104 35 41 10 5 80

(47.5 %)17« (16.6%) (13.6%) (4.6%) (5.3%) (1.3%) (0.65%) (10.45%)

poems remains much as in Book I but the incidence of trochees is nearly doubled. In fifth place, the amphibrach to some extent takes over the position occupied by the dactyl in Book I. In Book III, the anapaest actually takes precedence over the trochee, with the amphibrach moving up to fourth place. Other striking features about the third Book are the absolute predominance of the iamb over all other metres combined, and the virtual eclipse of the doVniki.17$ 17S The figure in parenthesis immediately to the right of the number of poems gives the percentage of this number in terms of the total number of poems in that metre. 174 The second figure in parenthesis in each case indicates the percentage of such poems in terms of the total number of poems of all kinds contained in the volume in question. Example: The 27 anapaests contained in Book II represent 26% of the total number of anapaestic poems (104), and 12.9% of the total number of poems contained in Book II (210). 1,5 In the totals column on the right, the percentages refer to the total number of poems in the respective metre in terms of the grand total of all poems (766). 17$ In the passage already referred to (vide supra, p. 109, note 172), Bonneau further gives the iamb and the anapaest as the dominant feet of the First Book and the iamb in the case of the Third (the Second, as we have seen, being allegedly dominated by 'the amphibrach, and especially the trochee'). Of the iamb, this is true, but somewhat misleading, inasmuch as it also 'dominates' the second Book, albeit to a lesser extent. That the trochee is 'dominant' in the second Book is true in a relative sense, but this is quite untrue of the anapaest in the first Book, where it is outdone as a single group by iamb, trochee, and even doVniki. (Indeed, Book I actually has the

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

111

5. SUMMARY A N D CONCLUSIONS

The points set out in this chapter cover the more obvious differences whether of principle or of degree - between English and Russian metrical usage. These may be briefly summed up as follows: Endings. In modern English verse, the vast majority of endings are masculine (though feminine endings - usually in alternation with masculine ones - have been used by certain English poets to a larger extent than is generally realised). In Russian, by contrast, alternating (or at least combined) feminine and masculine endings are very much the rule. Relatively frequent use is also made of dactylic endings, which hardly occur in serious (as opposed to humorous) English verse. In Russian, dactylic endings usually alternate with masculine ones, but there are ample examples of other combinations, e.g. dactylic-feminine, alldactylic - as well, of course, as all-feminine and all-masculine endings. Interconnected with the ending-patterns are the stanza forms, which constitute what is probably the least original part of Russian verse; despite the presence of numerous variations and other stanza forms, Russian verse is overwhelmingly dominated in virtually all metres by the quatrain with alternating FMFM endings and abab rhyme scheme.177 Triple-time measures: In English, the amphibrach is not recognised as a metre in its own right and in practice seldom exists - even in catalectic form - throughout an entire poem. Even so-called dactylic verse is lowest proportion of anapaests of the three!) If the anapaest may be said to 'dominate one volume, it is clearly the third, where its incidence is second only to that of the iamb and some 3 % higher than its incidence in either of the first two volumes. As for the amphibrach, it is scarcely more dominant in Book II (14 poems, 6.7 %) than in Book III (13 poems, 5.4%); moreover, in neither instance does it achieve an incidence comparable with that of the dactyl in Book I (25 poems, 8.0%), which, however, the author does not mention. The most incomprehensible of all Bonneau's remarks in this connection is her general statement concerning Book III: "... Blok atteint, en son Troisième Volume de Vers, à un vers tonique sévère et sobre. En même temps, dans une parfaite mesure, il utilise alois, pour une large moitié de ce Troisième Volume, un vers assez proche du vers syllabo-tonique régulier." (p. 313). In point of fact, as we have just seen, tonic verse is virtually absent from Book III altogether, being represented by exactly 9 poems. Even if one include as 'tonic' those other poems in Book III which exhibit occasional anisosyllabic substitution (Nos 553, 566, 571, 653, 697, 711, 759 - vide infra, Ch. VII, passim), we are still left with 226 poems out of 242 which follow strictly regular syllabo-tonic schemes in every respect - something very much more than "une large moitié" and more than "assez proche" to syllabo-tonic regularity! On this point, cf., inter alia, Russian Versification, pp. 73ff. As applied to Blok, vide infra, Ch. IX, esp. p. 293.

112

METRICAL FACTORS

marked by frequent catalexis and anacrusis, with the result that all English triple-time verse tends towards what is regarded as the anapaestic form with anacrusis variations - an approach probably encouraged by the presence of predominantly masculine endings in English verse generally.178 In Russian, by contrast, all three types of ternary metre normally exist in entirely independent and 'pure' form - though occasional examples of mixed 'amphipaests' 179 occur (e.g. Lermontov) and even, in freer verse, of mixed triple-time measures generally (e.g. Blok, q.v. infra, Ch. XV). Line-Lengths. In iambic verse, the staple line in English is the 5-foot one - though the 4-foot line is the older metre, and has, in fact, been employed (like the feminine ending, with which it is to some extent associated) more widely than is commonly supposed. In Russian, on the other hand, the 5-foot line is in modern times comparatively rare, particularly in lyric verse, and the 4-foot iamb holds sway in virtually all genres of iambic verse to an even greater extent than the 5-foot line in English. In trochaic verse, it is, in both languages, the 4-foot line that is by far the most widely used, the 5-foot line being in English extremely, in Russian comparatively, rare. In triple-time verse, English tends to prefer the 4-foot line - though numerous examples (predominantly anapaestic) of the 3foot line also exist (e.g. Praed, Swinburne), also the 4-foot and 3-foot lines in combination. In Russian, triple-time verse, introduced relatively late, first preferred the same 4-foot and 4 x 3 forms (2ukovskij, Puskin, Lermontov) but, with the passage of time, the 3-foot line emerged in its own right (Fet, Nekrasov) and is, in fact, the line-length most widely used by Blok in all three types of ternary metre. Only in dactylic verse do we find the 4-foot line even approaching the 3-foot variety in popularity a fact easily explained in terms of stress positioning and distribution. The general tendency is thus for Russian to use, for any given metre (except trochaic), a line-length one foot shorter than that usually favoured by English poets - though numerous examples of the reverse phenomenon could, of course, be found. Commonest metres. Triple-time verse in all three forms is considerably more widespread in Russian than in English verse, Russian distinguishing far more clearly than English between stressed and non-stressed syllables 1,8

Strakhovsky's attempt to prove the viability of the amphibrach in English fails sadly. His model (translation from Axmatova) has disyllabic anacrusis in 3 lines out of 8, and disyllabic substitution (his 'paeons'!) in 13 out of 32 'feet'. So far from being the 5-foot amphibrach he claims, it is simply a 4-stress doVnik\ (Cf. Problems in Translating Russian Poetry into English, p. 263.) Bobrov's trexdoVniki (vide supra, note 52 on pp. 74/5).

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

113

and providing, in particular, far lighter syllables in thesis than English. Despite this wider use of triple-time metre, the percentages of 40 % and 50 % encountered in the work of Nekrasov and Brjusov respectively must be regarded as exceptional, even for Russian conditions, and Blok's figure of 25-30 % triple-time verse probably represents a more characteristic average. The predominance of duple-time verse is, pari passu, relatively less marked in Russian than in English, but is nevertheless still evident in the case of the leading Russian poets - Puskin, Lermontov, Tjutfcev, and Blok (64% of Blok's verse is in duple time). From about 1750 onwards, the iamb - ousting the trochee from its earlier but short-lived supremacy - has remained the dominant metre in Russian (as in English) poetry. As with triple-time verse, though to a lesser extent, rising (iambic) and falling (trochaic) duple metres tend to become intermingled in English verse, but in Russian normally exist in pure, autonomous, form. For this and other reasons (e.g. the trochaic influence of Russian folk poetry), the trochee is almost certainly more widely used in Russian than in English verse although, as stated, in literary verse it nowhere approaches the iamb in popularity. With Blok, who is broadly typical in this respect, iambs outnumber trochees by nearly three to one. The differences enumerated above are concerned almost exclusively with metrical factors. Other - and very marked - differences exist between Russian and English verse, but these are rather of a rhythmical nature and as such are less amenable to objective demonstration. Any large-scale examination of the rhythmical characteristics of English verse would obviously be well beyond the scope of the present study. Certain aspects, however, would seem to apply, mutatis mutandis, to the conditions of Russian verse also. These - largely concerned with problems of so-called 'substitution' - are dealt with in a general way in the following chapter and, as regards Blok's verse in particular, in Chapters IV to VIII inclusive.180

180

A brief comparison of Russian verse With German and English is made by Unbegaun (Russian Versification, pp. 41-44). While broadly agreeing with his conclusions, I cannot accept his remark (p. 44) that "English verse seems to drift steadily towards a syllabism of the French type". What of the tremendous frequency of anisosyllabic substitution in English?!

C H A P T E R III

R H Y T H M I C VARIATIONS SUBSTITUTION, EQUIVALENCE, A N D T H E L I K E

Like other knotty points in versification, the problem of so-called 'substitution' and its corollary, 'equivalence', has from early times been the object of conflicting views - in Russian no less than in English prosody. A general word is therefore essential in the first instance if we are to be perfectly sure what we understand by these two terms and others often used in conjunction with them ('pyrrhic', 'trochaic', 'anapaestic' substitution, etc.). In English prosody, the most extreme advocate of the theory of substitution was George Saintsbury, who described as "the most important law of English prosody ... that which permits and directs the interchange of certain ... feet with others, or, in technical language, the substitution of equivalent feet". Saintsbury continued : "This process of substitution is governed by two laws: one in a manner a priori, the other the result of experience only. Substitution must not take place in a batch of lines, or even (with rare exceptions) in a single line, to such an extent that the base of the metre can be mistaken. Even short of this result of confusion the ear must decide whether the substitution is allowable."1 Saintsbury's enthusiasm for the theory of 'equivalence' (as he called it) subsequently led him into exaggerations and patent contradictions with his own valid precepts, and few would agree with his view that "... there is nothing, from Shelley's apparently impulsive and instinctive harmonies to the most complicated experiments of Browning and Swinburne, which will not yield to the master keys of equivalent substitution (and varying of line-length) " 2 Nevertheless, Saintsbury's basic postulates are sound, 1 H.M.E.P., p. 32 (Ch. V, Rules of the Foot System, § C, Equivalence and Substitution, Rules 17-20 incl.). 2 H.M.E.P., p. 100. This remark appears in a "Note on the Application of the 'ChristabeP System to Nineteenth-Century Lyric generally"; Saintsbury, in fact, considered even Christabel as being "not in ballad stanza, but in octosyllabic couplet, again more or less freely but regularly equivalenced" (p. 98). On this point, vide infra, Ch. VIII, pp. 260/1.

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

115

and would seem faithfully to reflect the general opinion of English prosodists that substitution is a fact, and plays a large part in English verse, particularly iambic verse.3 In Russian prosody, substitution (zamena) has been recognised at least since the time of Trediakovskij, and has formed the subject of discussion by numbers of poets and prosodists ever since.4 Behind the use of the same term in both languages, however, lies a fundamental difference of approach. The key to this difference lies in the decisive distinction made in Russian prosody between what we may call, for want of better or universally recognised terms, isosyllabic and anisosyllabic substitution, i.e., in iambic verse (and it is with basically iambic verse that we are most concerned in both languages), substitution by other disyllabic feet (pyrrhic, spondee, etc.) on the one hand and substitution by monosyllabic or trisyllabic ( = anisosyllabic) feet on the other. 5 In English prosody, substitution in iambic verse is primarily concerned with the latter.® In Russian verse, by contrast, anisosyllabic substitution may be said to be almost non-existent - at least until the advent of the Symbolists, and notably Blok himself - and the only form of substitution countenanced, by poets and prosodists alike, is that which preserves the syllabic as well as the tonic character of Russian verse as a whole.7 1. ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

"Substitution" in Russian prosody, then, may virtually be taken to mean isosyllabic substitution, and - although, as we shall see, a few rare 3

Cf. inter alia: P.E.M., Ch. V, VI, VII, and XI; M.o.E.P., Ch. I, pp. \Q8.\The Making of Verse, pp. 25-28, § 46-48 incl. 4 Cf. VVM., p. 31; also Ch. II (§ 5-15) and Ch. Ill (§ 16-21), passim. 5 In triple time, of course, the reverse applies; e.g., in anapaestic metre, iambic substitution would be anisosyllabic, tribrachic substitution isosyllabic. * Saintsbury (H.M.E.P., p. 32, Rule 21) considers "the most suitable substitutes for the iamb" to be "the trochee, the anapaest, and the tribrach" - and does not even mention the spondee or the pyrrhic at this point. Similarly, Egerton Smith devotes a complete chapter (V) to trisyllabic substitution and another (VI) to monosyllabic substitution, but dismisses spondaic and pyrrhic substitution in less than a page (Ch. VII, pp. 61/62). For the an-isosyllabic character of so-called 'trochaic' substitution, vide infra, pp. 129ff. 7 Except, of course, in the case of pure-tonic ('accentual', 'dynamic') verse, q.v., Ch. VIII of the present work. It is characteristic that Zirmunskij should refer to the very rare and isolated cases of mono- or trisyllabic substitution encountered in (duple-time) Russian 'classical' verse by the name of doVniki (VVM. Ch. V, § 31, esp. pp. 214-220 - examples from ¿ukovskij, Lermontov, Tjutcev, Fet, etc.). For the few genuine examples of anisosyllabic substitution in basically syllabo-tonic poems of Blok, cf. Ch. VII of the present work.

116

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

examples of anisosyllabic substitution occur in Blok's work - it is with isosyllabic 'equivalence' that our study is practically concerned here.8 In iambic verse, such substitution normally takes one of three forms, viz.: a) pyrrhic substitution (zamena pirrixiem) - by far the most common phenomenon; b) spondaic substitution {zamena spondeem); c) 'trochaic' substitution (zamena xoreem), sometimes referred to as 'reversal of stress' (perestanovka udarenija) - but which is, in fact, as we shall later see,9 something more complex than either term suggests. a) Pyrrhic substitution. We find pyrrhic substitution referred to and accepted by Trediakovskij, in the second edition of his Method: "The feet most widely used in our present-day Versification are the trochee and the iamb. In place of both Feet, there occurs everywhere, except for a few places in certain Poems..., the Pyrrhic Foot, consisting of two short syllables, without which it is impossible to compose any poem of ours."10 The concluding words at first sight read strangely to English eyes, but they form the key to the entire problem of so-called 'pyrrhic substitution' in Russian verse - the fact, namely, that the Russian language, in theory at least, does not recognise the existence of a secondary stress in polysyllabic words - in marked contrast to German, with its Nebenton, and English. This explains Trediakovskij's subsequent reference to pyrrhic substitution: "Such a licence is essential on account of our polysyllabic words, without which it must be well-nigh impossible to compose a single poem."11 • As such, the term zamena, applied to Russian prosody, is a very relative one, and virtually amounts to no more than a question of varying degrees of stress - hence, presumably, 2irmunskij's obvious dislike of the term. At one stage (VVM., Ch. HI, § 21, p. 126), he even talks of the 'absolute need' to dispense with terms such as 'spondaic and pyrrhic substitution* in Russian iambic and trochaic verse. Later, however, he relents to the extent of allowing the word 'substitution' (zamena) 'as a general term', provided one be absolutely clear as to its relative character {VVM., Ch. IV, § 25, p. 161.) * On the problem of so-called 'trochaic' substitution, vide infra, pp. 129ff. 10 V. Tred'jakovskij, Sposob k slozeniju Rossijskix Stixov protiv vydannago v 1735 g. ispravlennyj i dopolnennyj. (1752), Ch. I, § 18 (cited in: VVM., p. 31, from the edition by A. Smirdin, Vol. I, pp. 123ff.; cf. VVM. p. 263). 11 V. Tred'jakovskij, Sposob, etc. (1752), Ch. II, § 5 (cited in VVM., p. 31). Far from objecting to the use of 'pyrrhics', Trediakovskij actually preferred them to iambs (!). In his original Method (1735), he listed trochees as the best and "most natural to us" of the duple-time feet, pyrrhics and spondees as coming in a medium category, and iambs as the least good. The strongest opposition to 'pyrrhic substitution' came, strangely enough, from that otherwise bold and enlightened reformer, Lomonosov,

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

117

In other words, in Russian iambic (or trochaic) verse, the introduction of most trisyllabic words (unless they happen to be 'amphibrachic' ^ and of all words of four syllables and upward automatically involves a 'pyrrhic foot' somewhere in the line - in the classical four-foot iamb, sometimes in two out of the four feet combined. Instances of such 'pyrrhics' abound in almost any piece of 4-foot iambic verse one likes to choose, e.g. in the opening lines of PuSkin's Evgenij Onegin - the example originally chosen by Belyj and subsequently taken up by 2irmunskij: M o i i axJW caMBixi necTHMXT. n p a B a m . , Korfla He BI> niyncy 3aHeMori>; O H I JBAACATB

ce6a

3ACTABHJRB

H Jiynme BhiflyMamb He Mon>:

Belyj's was in fact the first really large-scale (one hesitates to say 'systematic') study of 'pyrrhic substitution' in Russian iambic verse. His findings were described in a series of articles published, with others, in his volume Simvolizm in 1910.12 in his famous Pis'mo o pravilax Rossijskago stixotvorstva (1739) ("Nepravil'nymi i voVnymi stixami te nazyvaju, v kotoryx vmesto Jamba ili Xoreja moino Pirrixija poloiif .")• True to his words, Lomonosov tried for a time to compose poems in pure iambs, but eventually gave up the attempt and adopted 'substitution' himself the one case in the history of Russian prosody in which Trediakovskij (and others) proved the more far-seeing and Lomonosov, from an unwonted excess of 'formalism', mistaken. Cf. VVM., pp. 31/32, and more especially D. D. Blagoj, Istorija russkoj literatury XVIII veka (izd. 3-oe, M., 1955), pp. 122-127 and 141-143. Unbegaun cites an example of Lomonosov's 'pure-iambic' stanza, which he aptly refers to as a 'hammering metre' (Russian Versification, p. 21). la Andrej Belyj, Simvolizm. Kniga statej (izd. Musaget, M., 1910). The articles in question are: Lirika i eksperiment: Opyt xarakteristiki russkago cetyrexstopnago jamba: Sravnitel'naja morfologija ritma russkix lirikov v jambiceskom dimetre: also "Ne poj, krasavica, pri mne ..." A. S. PuSkina (Opyt opisanija) and the Commentaries (Kommentarii) to the above. These articles - which are by no means confined to the problem of pyrrhic substitution - cover, with the accompanying commentaries, well over 250 large-size pages. Pyrrhic substitution is mainly dealt with in: Lirika i eksperiment, III; Opyt xarakteristiki ... I, (II), III, (IV); "Ne poj, krasavica ...", pp. 396-402; Kommentarii (To: Opyt) pp. 627-630; Kommentarii (To: "Ne poj ) pp. 630-633. An excellent account is given by Zirmunskij (VVM., pp. 33-45), who follows his objective description of Belyj's method with some pungent but entirely fair, and by no means exhaustive, criticism. A brief account is given by K. Mocul'skij in his work on Belyj (Andrej Belyj, YMCA-Press, Paris, 1955, pp. 144-150), but this is entirely uncritical and to this extent tends to give an exaggerated importance to Belyj's place in the history of Russian versification. In his later work, Ritm kak dialektika (Appendix I, K voprosu o sluxovoj zapisi, pp. 235ff.), Belyj claims that most, if not all, of the inconsistencies in his original studies had already been eliminated and set to rights by himself and his circle of 'rhythmists' during the years 1910-1911, the 'corrections' being set out in a lithographed "Register" (Registr utocnenij k "Simvolizmu", 1911) which was distributed among members of his circle (p. 238) and,

118

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

This is not the place at which to enter into a detailed discussion of Belyj's method - its inconsistencies and inaccuracies, its obiter dicta and non sequitur's, its marked streaks of naïveté and subjectivism. Suffice it to say here briefly that Belyj analysed 596 (j/c!) lines o f iambic 4-foot verse from each of a large number of Russian poets - good, mediocre, and poor - for cases of 'pyrrhic substitution', i.e. those feet in which the arsis bore no full (grammatical or logical) stress. 13 A s a result, he found that only about 25 % of lines in fact consisted of four pure iambic feet, the remaining 75 % containing pyrrhics in one f o o t - sometimes even in t w o feet - of the line (p. 290). Of this 75 %, some two-thirds occurred in the third foot of the line, where, indeed, 'pyrrhic substitution' was more c o m m o n than the iambic f o o t itself (pp. 291/292). The figures arrived at by Belyj in the case of the more important Russian poets are given in the table o n p. 119. The reader may well ask himself at this point exactly what valid conclusions may reasonably be drawn from these figures14 - in particular, whether a total of 596 lines, chosen apparently at random, 1 5 is sufficient to exclude apparently, was circulated by hand further afield (p. 243). Belyj shows himself extremely sensitive to ¿irmunskij's criticisms and tries to show that he was himself aware of all these shortcomings as early as 1910, at a time "when Professor Zirmunskij was not yet a 'professor'" (p. 238). This remark is typical of the whole tone of Belyj's apologia. Since his amendments were never published, in the accepted sense of the word, it seems hardly fair to blame 2irmunskij for not mentioning them in his own work, published in 1925. In any case, the more general criticisms of Belyj's 'method' and theories remain unaffected by his sarcasm, and are, in fact, eminently justified. In contrast to Belyj's violent attacks, 2irmunskij generously recognises the "outstanding significance of Belyj's work for the study of Russian verse", which consisted, as he rightly says, in the fact that Belyj, for the first time, called the attention of metrists to "the real diversity of the rhythmic variations of the Russian iamb", in place of "the abstract schemes of traditional versification" (VVM., p. 40). For ¿irmunskij's reply to Belyj's attacks, vide supra, Ch. I, p. 30. 13 'Pyrrhic substitution' was only one of many terms used by Belyj to describe this phenomenon. Sometimes he refers to 'paeonic', or rather 'paeanic', substitution (pean, p. 264, note) i.e. by associating one iambic and one pyrrhic foot to form a paeon II ( y - ^ or paeon IV ^ ^ - ) as the case may be. At other times, he describes the weakly stressed syllables as 'half-stresses' (poluudarenijà). Most frequently of all, he talks of 'acceleration of rhythm' (uskorenie ritma), as opposed to 'retardation of rhythm' (zamedlenie ritma), or spondaic substitution. For Strakhovsky's 'paeons', vide infra, Ch. VIII, p. 245, note 17. 14 These figures are taken over from the tables on pp. 286/7 (Opyt xarakteristiki...). That the cases of double pyrrhic substitution are included in, and not additional to, the totals is clear from the totals given earlier (p. 261, Lirika i eksperiment). The totals for Puskin, Lermontov, Fet, and Nekrasov do not tally exactly (p. 261-486, 479, 505, and 450 respectively), presumably due to slight errors in one or other list. Note that the sign " throughout Belyj's tables evidently indicates, not 'ditto', but '0'. 16 One of the most lamentable omissions in Belyj's studies is his failure to give any indication of the various poems from which his 596 lines are chosen. In the

119

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION "Pyrrhic subst." in

(Analysis of 596 lines) Lomonosov

Deriavin

Zukovskij

PuSkin

Lermontov

1st foot 2nd foot 3rd foot

13 139 272

46 139 263

90 52 280

110 33 341

101 47 321

TOTAL

424

448

422

484

469

5 11

26 1

44 2

60 1

58 0

TjutCev

Fet

Nekrasov

Brjusov

BLOK

1st foot 2nd foot 3rd foot

115 62 342

139 34 330

81 42 347

73 48 286

13 173 282

TOTAL

519

503

470

407

468

76 2

62 0

44 0

36 0

Of these, combined in Feet 1 and 3 Feet 2 and 3

Feet 1 and 3 Feet 2 and 3

59 (sic!) 4

purely chance results. Detailed discussion of all these figures is clearly beyond the scope of the present study. At the same time, one factor of general application stands out very clearly, and is, indeed, our reason for reproducing these figures at this stage - namely, the extreme frequency of 'pyrrhic substitution' in the Russian 4-foot iamb, especially in the 3rd foot of the line but often also in the 1st foot and, in the case of certain poets (apparently including Blok), 16 in the 2nd foot. In view of this unusually high incidence of 'substitution' - Belyj's figures suggest that, in the 3rd foot of the line, it occurs with some poets to the tune of over 50 % - it seems reasonable to question whether such a phenomenon can in fact be considered a deviation from the norm at all which is what Belyj considered it to be, and which is, moreover, what the term 'substitution' usually implies. "Commentary" to his Opyt xarakteristiki (p. 627), there is a reference to Puskin's Evgenij Onegin, and to his longer poems (poemy). On p. 381 (Srav. morfologija), there is a reference to Blok's cycle, Zemlja v snegu, but it is not clear whether this volume formed the basis for the particular studies under review. (For the poems contained in this cycle, cf. the 12-vol. ed. of Blok's works, Vol. V., pp. 307ff.) 16 Unfortunately, the figures for Blok (of all poets!) are highly suspect - indeed, in one respect, simply impossible (13 'pyrrhics' in Foot 1, yet 59 cases of 'pyrrhics' in Foot 1 and 3 combined!). For more reliable figures generally, and the question of the 'pyrrhic' 2nd foot in particular, vide infra, Ch. IV, pp. 161 ff. (figures from Sengeli, Timofeev, and the present author).

120

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

One 'solution' to the problem, of course, lies in the recognition, in Russian duple-time verse, of the existence of a secondary stress or stresses in polysyllabic words. The fact that such a metrical (or at least 'mental') stress does in fact exist is, in my opinion, inescapable. Among Russian investigators, it was, it seems, F. E. Kors, in a metrical study of Russian folk poetry, who first maintained that, in Russian pronunciation, contrary to the generally held theory of reduction, the first and last syllables of a word, if separated from the main accented syllable by at least one other syllable, themselves took on a secondary or accessory stress (pobocnoe udarenie), and that, in words containing several syllables before or after the main stress, the tendency was for the accessory stresses to fall on the alternate syllables between (e.g. cjiiflywmHMu, Heflopa3yMime). 1 7

Kor§ was not slow to point out the significance of this fact for the study and 'explanation' of Russian duple-time verse, and - though it apparently escaped the due attention of Belyj, Brjusov, and others - it subsequently formed the starting-point of an exhaustive study of Russian rhythm and metre by G. Sengeli.18 In support of KorS's theory, Sengeli established that, where polysyllabic words produced 'pyrrhic' feet in duple-time verse, the arsis of the pyrrhic foot coincided in some 80-90% of cases with the alternate syllable before or after the main stress of the word in question, the wwrf-division being either 'anapaestic' (... - ^ / ^ ^ -) or 'dactylic' (... - ^ ^ / ^ -) in nature.19 Prior to this, Sengeli pointed out that such syllables tend to take on a "shade of stress" (udarnaja okraska), "usually called a half-stress" (poluudarenie), and argued that, from the point of view of intensity, syllables fell into two categories, viz. the (truly) unstressed syllables on the one hand and the half-stressed plus full-stressed on the other. In other words, the (full) stress was the same as the half-stress, except that the former was marked by increased expiration. From this, Sengeli reached the conclusion20 that, "... as a unit of articulation, the full stress is in every way equivalent to the half-stress, and both may be united " F. E. Kors, O russkom narodnom stixosloienii, I, Byliny (Izv. otd. r. jaz. slov. Ak. Nauk, 1896,1.1, kn. 1), p. 23. Cf. VVM., p. 263 and p. 273, note 59 (also: Russian Versification, p. 160). The problem generally is discussed by 2irmunskij in VVM., Ch. i n , pp. 120ff. There is also a brief reference in TomaSevskij's Russkoe stixosloienie, p. 72. 18 Georgjj Sengeli, Traktat o russkom stixe (izd. 2-oe, Gosizd., M., P., 1923) (henceforth: Traktat). " Traktat, pp. 54-57. 10 Traktat, p. 34.

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

121

within the [one] concept of the intensa." The interna theory at last made it possible to explain the real structure of Russian verse, which reposed, not on a regular sequence of (full) stresses, as earlier theoreticians had vainly tried to show, but on a regular sequence of intensy.*1 Zirmunskij apparently objects to the intensa theory, primarily on the grounds of "the insignificance in Russian pronunciation (by comparison, for instance, with German or even English) of the accessory stresses themselves, which, not being linked with the meaning of the various morphological elements (as in German), depend exclusively on the mechanical conditions of speech, and so, in the majority of cases, remain outside [the realms of] our consciousness".22 But this is surely to ignore the very real influence exercised in all syllabo-tonic verse by the theoretical, or metrical, ictus and, resulting from it, what Egerton Smith has called 'mental predominance' or the 'mental beat'. This, in fact, is virtually all that the intensa theory amounts to,23 and Egerton Smith's words, though applied to English prosody, are so apt to the general problem in hand that they are worth quoting at some length: "The metrical ictus, then, falls generally on a syllable which is already capable of classification as heavy because, quite apart from metrical considerations, it receives a natural speech-stress. ... The ictus may, however, fall on a syllable light in nature, and in this case the incidence of ictus is marked by a relative force-accent (metrical stress) which makes that syllable stronger than it would be in prose, so long as there is no violation of natural phonetic and logical values. ... "The ictus in English, then, is a metrical stress giving increased intensity to those syllables which, at the beginning or end of a unitary measure or foot, mark the rhythm of poetry. It is generally located in a naturally 11

Traktat, p. 36. " Cf. VVM., pp. 123/4. 2irmunskij takes a different view as regards compound words (q.v., infra, pp. 134ff. of this chapter). His statement (p. 121) that "Sengeli calls accessory stresses [by the name of] 'intensy'" is, of course, an oversimplification albeit a convenient one, inasmuch as the /«//-stressed syllable presents no difficulties in terms of metrical 'explanations'. It has, moreover, since found acceptance with other Russian prosodists (e.g. Timofeev, Problemy stixovedenija, p. 61). For these reasons, I have considered it preferable to use the term henceforth in Zirmunskij's sense rather than in that originally intended by Sengeli. In the present work, therefore, the term intensa henceforth applies to any syllable of a polysyllabic word other than the (main) stressed one which coincides with the metrical ictus or, for any other reason, takes on in the particular context a secondary stress of sorts. Taranovski rejects the intensa theory outright (Ruski dvodelni ritmovi [henceforth: RDR], I, § 4, pp. 34ff.). 23 Even this definition is not entirely accurate, in so far as Sengeli sometimes applies the term intensa in Kors's sense of a syllable removed from the main stress of a word yet not (necessarily) coinciding with the metrical ictus (e.g. Traktat, p. 43, illustration of 1st and 3rd modulations).

122

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

stressed syllable, but if not, it tends to provide for itself the necessary relative stress. ... ictus gives mental predominance to certain syllables which occur at periodic intervals; and that mental predominance results in perceptible predominance amongst the series of soundsZ'24 In fact, the metrical ictus and the 'mental beat' play an even greater part in Russian iambic verse (and probably all Russian verse) than they do in English.25 If we take a few examples of intensy at random from Blok's 4-foot iambs, we soon find that they themselves vary considerably in their weight in normal speech. Some of them bear only the slightest of stresses in themselves - if indeed any at all - as long as the word stands alone; this applies particularly to the endings of some adjectives and participles, e.g. H3paHHeHww, rpaflymi/i, chIhchmc, ntijiiiomeivrb, or the oblique cases of plural nouns, e.g. KaiuiflMw. Intensy coming before the main stress tend to be slightly more weighted, but some are still insignificant on their own, e.g. c/&AHHaMb, cTopnicaivrb. Yet, as soon as we place them in their metrical context - one line of verse is usually enough - they all take on an involuntary stress of sorts: H, Becb H3paHHeHbift, cnturajTb ... Cmotpio Bt rpaflymia neiajiH ... Cmokhjih CHiacHbie UBiThi ... Bt MoeMi> n b i j i a i o m e M i » Spe^y ...

(62) (63) (507) (500)

n o f f b KanjiHMH floacfla Kpyra; . . .

(513)

Koryia a cTajit ApaxjrfeTb h cTbiHyrb, Ho3Tb, npHBHKUliH Kb ct/JHHaMTj, M h 4 3aXOTijIOCb OTOflBHHyTb K o H e i i t , cy^cfleHHbiii crapuKaMb. . . .

(275) Other intensy bear a very evident secondary stress - even out of their metrical context - at least in so far as the syllable in question is obviously heavier and 'fuller' than that immediately preceding or following it; 84

P.E.M., Ch. VIII, § 18, pp. 83/84 (my italics). On the whole of this problem, which applies with equal force to Russian prosody, cf. P.E.M., Ch. VII and VIII, passim. Cf. Thompson (p. 170): "For as it is generally recognised to-day, there is in any line of verse a degree of difference between the pattern of stresses which the words and phrases would have as they might occur in the language of speech, and the pattern of stresses in the metre." 85 The very real nature of intensy is borne out by their increasing use to cover the 2nd stress (x2) of the 3-stress doVnik. (Cvetaeva 24 %, Smeljakov 43.3 %, Adalis 59.5 %!) Cf. Gasparov, Statisticeskoe obsledovanie etc., Table; also Addendum to Ch. VIII, p. 292, infra.

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

such words fully bear out Kors's theory e.g.:

123

MWHOBSJIH (63), CYAMEHCI

Here we come to the crux of the problem. What counts is not how the stress of the syllable coinciding with the metrical ictus (arsis) compares with other such syllables in the line, but how it compares with the other syllable (in tripletime, two syllables) in its own foot (thesis). In other words: "There is no necessity for a uniform degree of stress; it is sufficient if the arsis is (or is capable of being made) slightly heavier than the thesis."26 This, the interna theory enables one to do, and it is therefore not surprising to find that Zirmunskij has no sooner raised the objections mentioned above than he himself invokes the theory of the interna to explain the stronger second syllable in the 'pyrrhic' in (basically) iambic verse and the stronger first syllable in the 'pyrrhic' in (basically) trochaic verse.27 So far, we have confined ourselves to an examination of those light syllables occurring as secondary stresses in polysyllabic words. In fact, however, the key principle of the arsis/thesis relationship applies with equal force to those so-called 'pyrrhic feet' produced by monosyllabic and disyllabic words having only secondary grammatical or syntactical importance (pronouns, prepositions, conjunctions, etc.). These seem to have been the object of no less dispute - and, with some, of confusion and muddled thinking - than the problematical intensy. Belyj's method of ignoring all stress on the intensy was far from unobjectionable, but at least he adopted a principle and stuck to it more or less throughout. In the matter of mono- and disyllabic words, however, he displayed the most blatant inconsistencies - for instance, personal pronouns occurring in thesis are sometimes rated as unstressed: a) Tbi ue3aMtTHo npoxoztmia, Tbi ue cijuia h He »rjia - , fl npo6upaiocb T o p o m i H B o ... (all considered as 'pyrrhics', ^ (p. 2 6 6 ) , but on other occasions as stressed: b) Tbi nn>cem> rpy3ia neiaJibHofl ..., H npmpa.K~t. MHJIHH, POKOBOH, ..., Ero h BHoeb BOo6pa>icaK>. ... (all considered as 'spondees', — ) (pp. 3 9 9 / 4 0 1 ) , while, again, full nouns are passed over as unstressed: c) Mipb pacromaoiixm npeAt> Heft. . . . , ffoib rapojieBH ( 4 5 2 ) , HEB03M&KHHMT> ( 5 0 0 ) , KJJIHKOBMMI ( 7 3 5 ) .

26

P.E.M., p. 62, Ch. VII, § 8 (my italics). Also Ch. VIII, § 8, p. 73 ("... that is to say, it is not absolute but relative weight that counts") and again § 15, p. 80 (examples from Milton's Paradise Lost, i. 735), where, however, the first scansion (combined substitution) seems to me nevertheless the more natural. Cf. also Chap. V, infra, p. 203, incl. note 25. 27 VVM., Ch. Ill, § 21, p. 126. For this reason, Zirmunskij maintains, with Roman Jakobson, that the so-called pyrrhic (and the spondee) in iambic verse are in principle distinct from the same combinations in trochaic verse (VVM., p. 126, and ref. to Jakobson, p. 273, note 63, and p. 264: R. Jakobson, Brjusovskaja stixologija i nauka o stixe, p. 229).

124

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

, ffyxb eAy6ntthi H BMCOTM (all c o n s i d e r e d a s 'pyrrhics', --) 28 (p.266). Prepositions, even when they appear in arsis, Belyj seems indiscriminately to have considered as being unstressed, whether monosyllables: coBMtcTHJia

a ) H Hadb MorHJioio pacicpHTOH . . . ( p . 2 6 6 ) , T a i p o a a 6e3b m r n i o B i p a c -

Ten. (p. 291), or disyllables: b) Korfla otce wpe3i

m y M H t r a rpafli... (p. ... (p. 290), Ho T H noenib - u npep,o 29 MHOH ... (pp. 399/401). All of these are considered as pyrrhics. In his Science of Verse, Bijusov30 produced an equally variegated assortment of stresses, so much so that a study of the book, in Zirmunskij's view, "could easily lead to the erroneous idea that, in Russian dupletime verse, substitution of the iamb by trochee and spondee, or of the trochee by spondee and iamb, occurs in every foot [of the line], under every possible condition, and with extraordinary frequency."31 Whereas Belyj tended, albeit inconsistently, to ignore stresses and so exaggerate the incidence of 'pyrrhics', Brjusov erred in the opposite direction, placing a (metrical) stress on all monosyllabic words, irrespective of their logical or syntactical importance or their metrical position in the line.32 Between these two extreme and undiscriminating points of view, of course, lies the fundamental truth that a great many monosyllabic words - and at least some disyllabic words - occupy, from the point of view of stress, a 'neutral' or 'dual' position, i.e. they may equally well bear a metrical stress or not, depending on a number of extrinsic factors, of which by far the most important is the question as to whether they occur in arsis or thesis and, secondarily, their general place in the metrical scheme.33

266),

IlepeRO

MHOH aBHJiact T H .

28 If anything, of course, the personal pronouns in a) tend to be relatively more stressed than those in b), given the lighter stress on the second syllable in the former. In group c), the nouns are obviously heavier than the intensy of the following words, and these amount to cases of 'reversal of stress', q.v. infra, pp. 129if. of this chapter ('trochaic' substitution). 29 Belyj seems to have been more consistent with regard to personal pronouns occurring in arsis, where he admits the stress. Conversely, the conjunction u is for him unstressed, whether in arsis or thesis. ,0 Nauka o stixe, M., 1919 (Cf. VVM., p. 264). 91 VVM., p. 96. 88 The absurdity of Brjusov's 'method' was pointed out by Jakobson (Brjusovskaja stixologija, pp. 227/8), who demolished his thesis to such effect that, in the second edition of his work, Brjusov excluded all but two examples of this type of 'spondee' (cf. VVM., p. 96, and p. 271, note 51a). M In duple time, of course, disyllabic words will always bear a metrical stress of sorts, in contrast to triple time, where both syllables may - and not infrequently do - occur in thesis. Of other extrinsic factors influencing stress, the chief are logical emphasis, syntactical position, and, in Russian, the peculiar phenomenon of enclitics and proclitics. On all of these, vide infra.

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

125

This basic truth - at least with regard to monosyllables - was recognised by Trediakovskij in his Method, where he described such words as "common" (obscimi). Lomonosov went a stage further, dividing monosyllables into three groups, of which some were "unconditionally stressed" (bezuslovno-udarnyja), some "unconditionally unstressed" (bezuslovno-neudarnyja), and some "variable" (peremennyja). Neither writer, it seems, was entirely sure of his ground, and the problem has since been the object of considerable differences of opinion among such Russian prosodists as have taken it up from time to time.34 One would have thought that the basic fact of such 'duality' was self-evident, yet the shattering inconsistencies of Belyj and of Brjusov show to what extent confusion reigned on this point at the beginning of this century; this, in turn, helps to explain the quite extraordinary importance attached to it by Zirmunskij himself, who finds it, "for Russian verse, and especially [for] duple-time metres ... one of the most essential laws of prosody."38 Certainly, the importance of recognising the dual character of these words would be hard to exaggerate. But, once given the overriding importance for such words - as for the intensy - of the metrical ictus and the relativity of stress generally (arsis/thesis relationship), all further analysis and subdivision of them tends to become purely academic and at times even misleading. Like Lomonosov before him, 2irmunskij also subdivides monosyllables into three groups - "unconditionally stressed", "unconditionally unstressed", and what he terms "metrically dual" (metriceski-dvojstvennye) words.36 34

For a brief but succinct historical sketch of this rather unrewarding problem, cf. VVM., Ch. Ill, § 17, pp. 98/102. For ¿irmunskij's own views, cf. esp. Ch. EI, §§ 18 and 19, pp. 102/120. 35 VVM., p. 106. Unbegaun (Russian Versification, pp. 16/17) refers to "ambiguous stress" in words, "... especially adverbs and various kinds of pronoun, which are normally unstressed, but which in certain circumstances can be given stress". Of English prosody (where conditions are admittedly somewhat different), Saintsbury uses the term "common" (compare Trediakovskij!), which he defines in his Glossary as: "The quantity or quality in a syllable which makes it susceptible of occupying either the position of a 'long' one or that of a 'short';... Almost all (English) monosyllables, other than nouns, are common; and in a very large number of others the syllable can be raised or lowered to long or short by considerations of arsis, thesis, stress, emphasis, position, etc." ( H . M . E . P . , p. 275). On this latter point, as applied to Russian conditions, vide infra. 38 Cf. VVM., pp. 102ff. The first group comprises "1. substantives; 2. adjectives; 3. verbs (except auxiliaries); 4. adverbs (except pronominal adverbs)." The second group comprises, "in addition to dependent particles (-xce, -AU, -6U), monosyllabic prepositions and conjunctions occupying a purely functional (formal) significance in the sentence". The 'dual' group comprises "pronouns and pronominal adverbs (and conjunctions), monosyllabic numerals, auxiliary verbs, and interjections . . . "

126

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

As regards the first group, he maintains that they "retain their stress" even in thesis, while admitting that in most such cases they are still not so strongly stressed as the words in arsis, so that the stress relationship, and so the characteristic rhythm (in this case, iambic) is yet maintained. For this reason, he even considers it wrong to talk of 'spondaic substitution' in such cases. Conversely, the "unconditionally unstressed" words "always remain unstressed", whether in arsis or thesis, although under special circumstances they may become "heavier than the unstressed syllables of polysyllabic words" (i.e., presumably, the intensy). Finally, the "metrically dual" words are ««stressed in thesis, half-stressed (poluudarenija) in the normal arsis, and (/u//-)stressed when occurring in rhyme,37 or in special cases of, say, logical emphasis, etc.38 By and large, such a classification probably corresponds roughly with the actual conditions prevailing in Russian duple-time verse. At the same time - once given the primordial part played by the metrical ictus in determining the amount of stress that falls on any syllable at any particular moment - such a cut-and-dried form of classification perforce takes on a somewhat unreal air. It is probably true to say that all words in group 1) retain at least some stress, even in thesis; far less certain that words in group 2) - notably conjunctions and prepositions - never acquire any stress at all, even in arsis. It is also highly questionable whether, among the 'dual' words, monosyllabic numerals altogether lose their stress in thesis.39 But these considerations raise wider issues, which apply no less to 'spondaic' and 'trochaic' substitution than to the pyrrhic form; and it is to these that we must first turn our attention before we can fairly or adequately pass judgment on the system as a whole. b) Spondaic substitution. Towards the end of his article, Sravnitel'naja morfologija, Belyj postulated, among the allegedly "objective principles" on which his 37 I.e., normally speaking, in the last foot of the line (apart from caesural or other internal rhyme), and provided, of course, they occur in the arsis of the foot in question; in feminine or dactylic endings, such words may equally well occur in thesis, in the form of compound ('broken') rhyme, e.g. with Blok:

J l n i i i b y T p o M i . CM4K> n o K H f l d T b « . . . ( :

raiaTba)

(500)

H36pajii> HHyio Aopory « , - . . . ( : cTporafi) (193) On this point, cf. esp. Ch. IX of this work. 38 Cf. VVM., Ch. Ill, § 18, pp. 102 et seq. 39 E.g. Blok's line: Tpu, «a eme ceMb pa3i> nofli. pnm> (749). The third foot, if not actually a 'spondee', is certainly heavier in thesis than the usual iamb; while the opening foot, thanks to the weight of the first syllable (numeral), almost certainly provides an example of so-called 'trochaic' substitution. On this point, vide infra, p. 136 (example from Fet, quoted by Belyj, wrongly, as a 'pyrrhic' foot).

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

127

method was based, the fact that the total incidence of spondees (retardation of rhythm) to that of pyrrhics (acceleration of rhythm) was in the ratio of 1:10 - incidentally drawing from this the totally unwarranted conclusion that, in ignoring cases of spondaic substitution in the 4-foot iambs he analysed, he had only diverted his attention from the real rhythm "extremely little". 40 One would have thought, on the contrary, that the very generous attention he devoted to cases of 'pyrrhic substitution' would have demanded, if only as a counterpoise, an equally searching enquiry into the opposite trend of rhythmic variation, in order to arrive at a reasonably representative picture of the whole. Be that as it may, Belyj's proportion of 1:10 would give us an incidence of spondaic substitution of the order of 7.5 % (his incidence of pyrrhics - with intensy approximating, as we have seen, to 75 %). However, to judge from the false 'spondees' cited by him in his analysis of Puskin's " N e p o j , krasavica, pri mne" and elsewhere, it would seem that he tended to overestimate the frequency of spondaic no less than that of pyrrhic substitution. 41 Brjusov likewise - though for slightly different reasons - greatly exaggerated the incidence of spondees in the first edition of his Science of Verse, due to his insistence on considering all monosyllables as "unconditionally stressed". In Russian prosody, 'spondaic substitution' (whether we call it by this name or any other) presents a simpler and more straightforward problem than its 'pyrrhic' counterpart in so far as, unlike the latter, it is not complicated by such thorny questions as that of secondary stress and/or intensy. Since no one word in Russian is capable of bearing a full stress on two consecutive syllables,42 the sine qua non of a spondaic 10 Simvolizm, p. 394. From this, Belyj went on to declare roundly that the "richness of rhythm" was directly proportional to the incidence of pyrrhic combinations - a statement which affords some idea of the 'objective' nature of his method! 41 Cf. the examples already cited earlier (pp. 123/4). Where the second syllable (arsis) was fully stressed, Belyj seems to have classified 'dual' words in the thesis {a, mu, etc.) as also stressed, thus producing a 'spondee'. Where the arsis was less stressed (interna, etc.), he considered the same words in thesis as light, so producing a 'pyrrhic'. In other words, Belyj tended to exaggerate the importance and incidence of both forms of deviation at the expense of the normal iambic rhythm. His strange ideas on what constituted a spondee are also revealed in the line from Baratynskij he cites in illustration of this foot:

H f i HCHTB I 0MI>, HH | n a c a T i . e m e He H a f l o i j i o . (Simvolizm, p. 280) " At any rate, not in (syllabo-tonic) verse, where "the general law is that the metrical stress or sentence-stress can, in words of two or more syllables, fall only on those syllables which receive the word-accent" (P.E.M., p. 78). In this section (pp. 77/78), Egerton Smith points out the error of the notion of 'spondaic' disyllabic words

128

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

foot is, in practice, the occurrence in thesis of a monosyllable bearing at least some considerable degree of stress - certainly more than the 'half-stress' of, say, an intensa or a 'dual' word. For those who accept 2irmunskij's three categories of monosyllables, the problem is presumably simple and clear - any "unconditionally stressed" word in thesis followed by a full-stressed word in arsis must ipso facto produce a 'spondee', 'heavy foot', or whatever one chooses to call it. If the monosyllable in thesis is "dual" or "unconditionally unstressed", the foot remains an iamb. For those pinning their faith in the rather more subjective 'mental beat', some border-line cases will inevitably occur here; by and large, however, such a definition is probably correct, and typical (as opposed to borderline) cases of 'heavy feet' are easy to distinguish. The vast majority tend to occur in the first foot of the iambic line, e.g. (from Blok's verse): a) with two monosyllables: Houb, AibCb h cufcra. H a Hecy . . . (690), Cnunn cnoMb HeBtflOMMMt h crpaHHbiMb . . . (595), Ilumb nan, OTmejiKHBaa cnerb ... (749), Bmpb, dpyzb moh, CKa3KaMi>: si npHBMKi» ... (760); b) with monosyllable + disyllable: flootcdb MeAKm, pa3roBopi> HecniniHbifi, ..., CMibXb Aezvm h hcmhokko rptuiHbiii ... (631), IlAaub, cepmiz, rniaib ... (731), Mdu, cmapbw ,npyri>, Tepnn, TepnH ... (760); c) with monosyllable + trisyllable: Horn, jjiHua, 4>OHapb, anTeica . . . (539). More rarely, in feet other than the initial foot: Bcio HOHb Abwmb cemmb Bb tboh cejieHbH ... (628). So long as the word in arsis bears a full stress, then, all is fairly plain sailing. However, as soon as the syllable in arsis is anything less than fully stressed, the problem of what really constitutes a 'spondee' arises anew. The key nature of the arsis/thesis relationship, once accepted, must logically be held to work in both directions; and the characteristic of the spondee - in so far as it may be held to exist at all in syllabo-tonic verse43 - is surely the presence of a word in thesis bearing a more or less marked stress not very much less (if, indeed, at all) than that of the syllable in arsis. This may occur, for instance, where the same word is repeated, and so appears in thesis and arsis: TaMb, maMb, rjiy60K0, noflb KopHHMH ... (8), Bee, see - aa craHerb jierKoft nbuibio ... (586). Or where the structure of the sentence (word division, punctuation, etc.) introduces an involuntary pause between the two words concerned: ffa\ B3ZAHKOMt - bm 6oHTecb caceib ... (702), or: MraoBeHba Taifflt! ('hovering stress') in English; in Russian, of course, the question does not arise, save possibly in compound words. 43 For the nature of the 'spondee' in accentual verse, vide infra, pp. 274ff.('x = 0').

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

129

7W, eibuHa« JiioSoBb! . . . (213) - in contrast, say, t o : Tbi noMmamP. BH

rained 6yxrk COHHOH ( 6 2 9 ) . 4 4 Again, the weight of the thesis may be increased by logical emphasis (e.g. contrast), as in the following: TaMb, eb ceojiaxt - cyMpaici. HeH3BiCTHMH, 3dtbCb - XOJlOflb KaMCHHOH CKaMbH. . . . ( 1 5 6 ) , MHJIbOHbl BaCb. Hacb - mbMbl, H TbMbl, H TbMbl. (CKU(fibl).

Certain words occurring in thesis form border-line cases. The matter of monosyllabic numerals has already been mentioned (and will be again), but there are other words which frequently recur in thesis and there tend, pace 2irmunskij, to form a foot that is 'heavier' or, to say the least, markedly more 'even' than the normal iamb. For instance, the auxiliary, nycmb: Ilycmb uoub. ^OMHHMCH. CtoapHM KocTpaMH ... ( 7 3 1 ) , Ilycmb dem aajieicb - y Hact. Bee rfe a c t . . . ( 5 9 5 ) , Ilycmb MMXMTI, flHKyio MOJiBy: ... ( 7 2 8 ) , or the word eecb and its derivatives: Ben, ara p03CKa3HH aajiene - . . . ( 2 7 5 ) , Becb dem>, KaKb .neHb:... ( 5 4 8 ) , Ee3CMbrcjieHHOCTb ecrbXb drb/ib, ... (548); also the possessive adjectives/pronouns (MOU, meou, ceou, etc.): Ceou XMe/ib, ceou com, CBOIO Merry . . . ( 5 0 0 ) , CBJIHCH y3JiOMi> njiaTOKb meou nepnbm ... ( 4 0 3 ) , IIOKJIOHI MOU HU3OKT>, JIHKT. MOU

cmpozb. ... ( 5 0 8 ) .

All these examples illustrate the difficulty - if not impossibility - of classifying words as words into cast-iron categories, and emphasise once more the virtually unlimited degrees of stress which any syllable may acquire in verse as a result of various extrinsic factors. 45 c) Trochaic substitution

or "inversion of stress".

In all the examples of substitution examined so far - however light the arsis of the 'pyrrhic', however heavy the thesis of the 'spondee' - the basic iambic rhythm of the lines in question was never seriously affected; 41

Exactly how much of the effect here is one of prolongation (quantity) and how much one of stress as such, it is hard to say. The general effect, however, is towards equalisation of the 'prominence' of the two syllables of the foot in question, and so away from the normal iambic rhythm. 46 According to ¿irmunskij's method, nycmb, as an auxiliary verb, is 'dual' and therefore 'unstressed' in thesis (?). The other words (eecb, MOU, etc.) form border-line cases even by his standards, since they may occur either as adjectives ("unconditionally stressed") or as pronouns ('dual', hence "unstressed" in thesis) - though, if anything, they tend to bear more stress as pronouns than as adjectives, e.g. as pronouns: 3-ro Bee, 3TO Mofl; as adjectives: Bcfc KHHTH, 3TO MO8 flpyra. Even in the examples given above, the spondaic rhythm of the feet in question varies with the syntactical structure of the sentence. For instance, the full stop makes Ilycmb mtb. rather heavier than, say, Ilycmb dem daaexb; in the example from No. 508, the MOU is rendered more prominent by coming after, and in a different foot from, the noun it qualifies in each case.

130

RHYTMXC VARIATIONS

some lines read more quickly, others more slowly, but the 'rising rhythm* was everywhere maintained. There are, however, instances in basically iambic verse where the syllable in thesis seems to establish predominance over the syllable in arsis, the main stress in the foot concerned apparently shifting from the latter to the former, e.g. O , ecjra6T> 3HajiH b h , flpy3i>H, XoAodb h MpaKt rpjwymiixt flHeii!

...

(566)

Cnerm norepsnb HonaMt h nnaMb, ...

(749)

rpiniHTb 6e3CTMflHO, Henpo6yflHO,

This phenomenon - whose existence in Russian as in English iambic verse has long been recognised - is referred to by most prosodists as "trochaic substitution" and by 'accentualists' as "inversion of stress", while others - including 2irmunskij - appear to accept both terms more or less indifferently.46 It was left to Egerton Smith, in a brilliant analysis of 'the conditions of equivalence' in English verse, to point out the error of such 'trochaic' scansion, and hence the misleading nature of both terms to describe a phenomenon which in reality amounts to a form of combined monosyllabic and trisyllabic substitutionIn other words, in a line such as Shakespeare's His silver skin, laced with his golden blood.

(Macbeth, II, iii, 119)

the real scansion is not: His sil|ver skin, | ldced with | his gol|den blood. but: His sil|ver skin, | x Meed | with his gol|den blood. the third foot consisting of a compensatory pause + full arsis (monosyllabic substitution), the fourth of an anapaest (trisyllabic substitution). " Among English prosodists, Saintsbury accepts 'trochaic substitution' (H.M.E.P., p. 32, Rule 21, et passim) but, having declared war on 'accentual or stress prosodists', considers the term 'inverted stress' "unnecessary, if not erroneous" from the point of view of his book (pp. 284/285, Glossary). The Russian terms (VVM., Ch. Ill, § 18, p. 103) are zamena (Jamba) xoreem and perestanovka udarenija respectively. The fact that Zirmunskij puts the word 'xoreem' in inverted commas suggests a dislike of this term; but his description of the phenomenon makes it clear that its real nature has escaped him. On this point, vide infra. Sengeli talks of 'choriambs' in such cases (Traktat, Ch. I, pp. 37-53). Unbegaun refers to 'inversion', and speaks of the iamb being replaced by the trochee (Russian Versification, pp. 38/39). 17 P.E.M., Ch. VII, pp. 55-65. The whole problem is here set out in masterly fashion.

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

131

For anyone who takes the trouble to beat out the time of a line such as this, there can, I think, be no doubt whatever but that Egerton Smith is right, and it remains a matter for wonder that no one before him seems to have but his finger on this vital point.48 The main reason is undoubtedly that given by Egerton Smith himself - namely, that the existence of combined substitution such as this "has unfortunately been obscured by the fact that the two kinds of equivalence balance each other syllabically and the total number of syllables in the line remains normal."*9 This factor of 'line isosyllabism' goes a long way towards explaining the absence of any recognition of the true nature of "trochaic" substitution in Russian prosody, so far as I know, to this day.60 Russian verse (as already briefly mentioned, and as we shall later see) scarcely knows anisosyllabic substitution, hence the tendency to overlook what is in reality a double instance of it in cases such as these. An additional reason in Russian - as opposed to English - prosody lies in the fact that, by and large, such substitution occurs only in the first foot of the line, and this tends to obscure the existence of the compensatory pause before the first ictus. That this nevertheless exists is best brought out by scanning the preceding line also, as in Egerton Smith's example: X Riiled | in this isle, | and ever wdging war X E&ch | upon oth |er, wasted all the ldnd. (Coming of Arthur, 6/7) Applied to the lines from Blok cited earlier, then, the correct scansion (by which I mean no mere theoretical ideal, but that corresponding to the actual conditions of declamation or recitation) should be, 48 T. S. Omond (English Metrists in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries, p. 233) refers to M. H. Liddell's observation (An Introduction to the Scientific Study of English Poetry, 1902, Ch. II, p. 48) that 'inversion' occurs only "after a pause", "where the thought took a new turn". While Omond has no difficulty in disproving this, citing Shakespeare's: And yet dark night strangles the travelling lamp, and Shelley's: And wild roses, and ivy serpentine, the observation of the pause was in itself correct; but it is a metrical pause, not necessarily always a 'thought' one. Cf. also Ch. IV, p. 176, infra. 49 P.E.M., p. 55 (my italics). On the other hand, of course, the theory of "trochaic" substitution constituted an anomaly in the widely-held doctrine of the «on-interchangeability of 'rising' and 'falling' rhythms - an anomaly which "combined substitution" solves satisfactorily, since both feet in question (monosyllabic as well as trisyllabic) remain in rising rhythm, i.e. with the arsis at the end of the foot. 60 On this point, vide infra, Ch. IV, pp. 175 if.

132 not:

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS O, 6C|JIH6I> 3H£|JIH B£I, | JPY3BH,

Xojidfflb | ft MpdKt | rp«fly|mHxi> «Hefi!

but:

O , 6C|JIH6I> 3H£[JIH B£I, | /IPY3BA, X Xo|ji6ffb H MPDKT | RPHFLYLMAXI. FLHEFI!

and not:

rptmiiTb | 6e3CTbm|HO, He|npo6ya|Ho, Cnerb n6|TSpjm> | Honaivrb | H AHHMT.,

but:

...

TptniHTb | 6e3CTbm|HO, He|npo6ya|Ho, X CNET-B | NOTEPATB | HOH£MT> | H AHSMI., . . . 5 1

The first example cited above (Xoaodb u Mpaia>...) represents "trochaic" substitution in its extreme and most undisputed form, i.e. where we find, at the beginning of an iambic line, a disyllabic word having a full stress on the first syllable and none on the second. Such examples are comparatively rare in Russian verse - even in Blok's verse - and such substitution is, even in the first foot of the line, far less common than in English.52 in the same poem (No. 566), we find, it is true, four further instances of "trochaic" words at the beginning of the line, but, as we shall later see, this whole poem is full of highly interesting and eifective, but by no means typical, rhythmic variations. Elsewhere, we encounter them on a much reduced scale, and even then mostly in other poems of a somewhat freer structure than, say, the strict 4-foot or 5-foot iamb; for instance, in the basically iambic coda to No. 759: CrapHKi», Tepnn TAotcKiu

Heayrb,

H Tbi, MOH apyrb, Tepnli H cnn, ...

(759)

51

Those still not convinced of the existence of the compensatory pause may recognise it more easily by taking the two lines as one 8-foot line, as follows:

O, ¿c|jiH6i»3Ha|jiHBbi, | Apy3bH, | x Xo|jiofli> h Mp&icb | rpaayjmnxi> flHeii!

Alternatively, they may substitute for X o n o f l i an 'iambic' word - say, rieiajib. If this then be scanned against the original line, beating time for thesis and arsis, it will be found that the Xo- of Xojiojrb coincides with the beat occupied in the alternative line not by the first but by the second syllable of Ileiajn.. Yet another test is to introduce, experimentally, an additional initial light syllable, e.g.

M XOJIOflt H Mp&CT> ...

This syllable will be found to occupy the position of the compensatory pause in the original line, and the scansion, in terms of time, remains identical - thus proving that the syllable Xo- in fact coincides with the (iambic) arsis, and not the thesis, of the opening foot. 52 On this point, vide infra, Ch. IV, pp. 180ff.

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

133

At the same time, a similar effect is easily produced by other combinations, and - once these are recognised - it is fair to say that combined substitution, though far less frequent than in English, is yet far more widespread in Russian verse than is generally recognised. 2irmunskij may be right when he says that cases of such substitution strike one immediately as exceptions which only serve to 'prove' the rule, but there seems little doubt that he greatly underestimates the incidence of such cases generally.53 Such other combinations include, firstly, a monosyllabic word of some weight (especially, but by no means necessarily, a noun or verb) at the beginning of the line, with a light monosyllable (particle, preposition, conjunction, etc.) following: 5KHByio ayrny yKaiajia, X Pycb, | Ha CBOHXT. | HpOCTOpaXT», TBI, . . .

(383)

X Mipb | ne BejiHKt | h He 6orarb -

H He rjiafltn» 6w B30p0Mi> lepHMMt! ...

(510)

H e c y n . acnyraHHOH PocciH X Bibcmb | o c3KHr£|K>meMT» X p a c T i .

(730)

Sometimes, the first syllable may be considerably less heavy in itself; but, where the second syllable is lighter still, the same basic effect is still produced: X Bee | 6 Te6t, | pacnjieTHiefi KOCH fljia apyra Taimaro, BI> H36i. . . .

(390)

X Tbi | dnn m§hh | ocraHOBHJia BpeMeHi) 2KHByio nepeay. ...

(368)

In other words, it is, once again, not the absolute but the relative stress that counts.54 The same phenomenon occurs where the second syllable in the line is the intensa of a polysyllabic word and the first syllable a heavier monosyllable (Cuemb nomepnmb ...). This is, in fact, by far the commonest form of combined substitution in Russian iambic verse: 53

Cf. VVM., Ch. Ill, § 18-20, pp. 102-126, generally, for various instances of combined ("trochaic") substitution in Russian verse - some recognised as such, others not. ¿irmunskij's conclusions are contained in § 21 (of Ch. Ill), p. 127. 54 To talk here of the arsis/thesis relationship could, for obvious reasons, easily lead to confusion. What counts in bringing the effect of "trochaic" substitution about is that the first syllable in the line shall, in the particular context, bear more stress, or be more prominent, than the second.

134

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

JI noMHK) fljiHTem>HbiH Myxn: X H6nb | doropd|jia 3a OKHOMB;

...

(513)

«... ITycKaii KpbiJio ayuiH npocrptjieHO X Kpdeb | o6arpHTi> | a n T a p t JIK>6BH».

(632)

X Pycb, | onoajcaHa pticaMH H ae6p«MH OKpyxeHa, . . .

(383)

X CbiHb | ¥ejioBt|qecKiH He 3Haeri> r f l i npHKjiOHHTb eMy rjiaBy.

(728)

Other factors being equal, or nearly equal, logical emphasis - here as elsewhere - may decide the rhythm, e.g.: a) two monosyllables X A | He flocTHr|Hy npHMHpeHba, X Tii | He noHMeim. | npoKJiaTwxi. HHCJIT.!

(63)

b) monosyllable + 'interna' Rh. Tii | - poflHaa Tammies X

Mum

| - HeBocKpec|uieMy X p n c T y . . . .

(728)

There remains one other important instance of combined substitution - one, moreover, that would seem to have been either passed over or misinterpreted by the majority of Russian prosodists hitherto. This occurs in the presence of certain compound words, usually at the beginning of, but occasionally elsewhere in, the metrical line. In such words, the first component normally bears a stress markedly subordinated to the stress of the second component; but stress there undoubtedly is, even in the first part of the word, and this stress remains, normally speaking, on the same syllable as when the first component stands alone as a word in its own right, e.g. 3d/iomo=Kydpbiu, nepeo=HaHdAbHbiu, 6jiaeo=

cAoeAkto, etc.55 In words such as these, the theory of'alternate syllables' noted by Kors in longer polysyllabic words breaks down (in so far as it ever exists as a rule) and a new set of conditions arises, in verse no less than in prose or in normal speech. In the case of words bearing the main stress on the fourth syllable and a secondary stress on the first, we then get the same 'choriambic' effect as in the preceding examples, e.g. X 3D|JIOTOKY|APBIH AHREJRB AAS

B i HoiHyjo 4>eio o6paTHTca, . . . 55

On this point, vide infra, p. 137.

(197)

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

135

H BOTB, oHa He 3anaTHajia

X /7e/>|BOHaHdjib|HOH HHCTOTM. ... X Ejtd |rocJioBJia|k> Bee, hto 6bijio,

SI Jiynmefi flojra He HCKajii....

(383) (630)

From time to time, this type of substitution also occurs in the middle of the line, e.g.: TBOHXT> | x ndp|BSHaiajn>|Hbixi> Jiin>. ... B"b XOJIOflHOH MTJlt | X nd I pgflpa3CBtT |hoh ... H bt> r p o 6 i | x n6|penjiiBjia|io Mfeflb. . . .

(120) (1) (336)

Occasionally, the same effect is produced by polysyllabic words (usually adjectives) that are not compounds in the strict sense of the word, e.g. a) at the beginning of the line: X A|flp!aTH|HecKOH JHO6OBH - ...

(599)

b) in the middle of the line: -fl3bIHHHKT> CTajIT. | X XpH|cTlaHH|HOMT> ...

(62)

The explanation here would seem to be the presence in each word of an 'independent' root which retains a secondary stress even in the face of the main stress (Adpix; Xpucm-). Alternatively - or perhaps additionally the effect might conceivably be produced by the extremely light nature of the syllable 'V in each case - the 'ia' tending to elide into 'we' and so throwing the stress back on to the virtually 'alternate' syllable. Whatever the explanation, the first syllable of each word, however lightly we read it, is yet heavier than the second, and any attempt to place the predominance on the '/' in either case (AdpiammecKou juo6oeu: R3bmHwa> cma/a xpucmianuHOMb) leads to gross distortion of the natural pronunciation. Belyj, as we have already seen, made no allowance for secondary stress in the form of intensy. Nor did he do so in the case of compound words one more factor which inevitably tended to exaggerate the incidence of 'pyrrhics' in his calculations. Such lines, for instance, as: B6ronofl66Haa uapeBHa . . . (Simvolizm, p. 292), rpoMOKHnamiii icy6oKT> ci. He6a . . . (p. 290), Bjiaroyxan. t h He Morjia. . . . (p. 266) were all

136

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

considered by Belyj as examples of 'pyrrhics' in the first foot of the line. He adopted the same approach to lines beginning with a stressed monosyllable followed by an intensa, e.g. Tpexi

noKOjitmii KpacoTy .ZJOHb KOpOJieBbl COBMtCTHJia.

(p. 266)®'

In theory, at least, Belyj recognised the existence of "trochaic substitution" (as he also considered it) - though the example he chose to illustrate it was rather unfortunate.67 In practice, he seems to have been seldom capable of recognising it when it occurred. Belyj, however, was by no means alone in his underestimation and misinterpretation of'inversion'. Zirmunskij - usually so refreshingly sane in his approach - makes extremely heavy weather of this particular problem, and his final views on the subject are very far from clear. One has the impression that he, too, is anxious to ignore or explain away this uncomfortable 'deviation' wherever possible, though in his case the tendency is rather to 'argue' such cases into being iambs (where Belyj found pyrrhics). In compound words, for instance, he maintains that the accessory stress in the first component is a 'hovering' one, coinciding in each instance with the metrical stress - a claim which leads him to such manifest distortions as: EjiaroyxaiomHe cjie3bi... EcTb B oceHH nepBdHaHajibHoii . . .

(VVM., p. 124)

" This pair of lines, incidentally, affords a good illustration of the danger of categorising monosyllables too inflexibly. In the first line, mpexb, as a 'dual' word, would, by ¿irmunskij's 'rules', bear no stress in thesis, while no-, as an intensa, would be half-stressed; the foot would thus remain 'iambic'. In the second line, doib, as a noun, would 'retain its stress' and so, presumably, predominate over the half-stress of the intensa Ko(-poAeebi). In practice, however, both lines would almost certainly be read by most persons in the manner of combined ('trochaic') substitution, viz. X Tp6xi> | noKoni|HiH KpacoTy X A 6 l b | K6pOJie|BbI COBMtCTHJia. 67 Belyj's example was the line beginning: H j i h npopOKl>, HJIH n03Tb . . . (Simvolizm, p. 565) Right or wrong, it remained unconvincing because of the two possible pronunciations of the word wiu, viz. wiu in Russian but uau in 'literary Slavonic', according to Tomasevskij (Russkoe stixosloienie, p. 69). Zirmunskij also seems to accept this view {VVM., Ch. Ill, § 19, p. 117, and p. 272, note 56). Butseealsop. 140, including note 65, infra.

137

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

The same 'hovering stress' (though he does not actually use the term) is claimed for compound words of the 3osiomoKydpuu type - "words of this category freely admit the metrical stress on the conjunctive vowel", and "the accessory stress is transferred to the metrically-stressed syllable".58 This leads to such scansions as B HpKo=6jiecT5meM ih.IUIHOM 3ajie ... C TeMHO=KyflpflBOH rOJIOBOH ... IIoJI_P=np03paHH0K> KaK flllM ... (VVM.,

p. 125)

Of these, the last two are, admittedly, just possible (perhaps due to the fact that meMHd and nony exist - albeit in other contexts - in their own right, and so strike one as not entirely artificial). Even here, however, such affectation is entirely unnecessary, and inevitably destroys much of the poetry of these lines. The 'trochaic' scansions: X Bt> ¿p | KO=6jrecTH |meMT> nbinraoMi. 3ajit ... X CT> T6M |HO=Kyflpa |BOH TOJIOBOH ... are incomparably the better ones, and are, in fact, those given by N. V. Nedobrovo in his study of Rhythm, Metre, and their Interrelationship; Nedobrovo, in fact, seems to have been more sensitive to the effect of combined substitution than most Russian prosodists.59 Another "escape clause" is that by which Zirmunskij also claims the existence of a 'hovering stress' for "certain lightly stressed conjunctions and prepositions", which include not only u/iu {q.v. supra) but also 80 nmo6bi, uepe3, neped, Meotcdy, npomue, etc. By this means, he arrives at such scansions as: 68

VVM., p. 125. Cf. Ritm, metr i ix vzaimootnoSenie, p. 20. (The former line is here given as: Bb nptco 6Aecmniqeu nbiwnou 3aAn> but this, of course, does not affect the issue at stake.) While the metrical nature of combined substitution escapes Nedobrovo also - he talks of 'trochaic substitution' and later of a line with '2 choriambs' - he is yet keenly aware of its existence and pleasing effect (e.g., in reference to the second example above: "... pronunciation in two words, with a clear trochee, sounds very melodious here" (oieri zdes' blagozvucno). For Sengeli's views, vide infra, Ch. IV, pp. 175 ff. M VVM., p. 117. TomaSevskij (Russkoe stixoslozenie, pp. 68/69) takes another view. Quoting from PuSkin's Mednyj Vsadrtik the lines: 59

YBH! Ero CMHTeHHMH yM IlpoTHB yacacHtix noTpacemm ... He ycTOHJi ...

he makes the astounding assertion: "Evidently (ocevidno), in using the word npomue,

138

R H Y T H M I C VARIATIONS ripoTUB yxcdcHbix HcieyineHHH ... jiaHHT m>uiain>e ...

Hto6£i npoimio

IlepeA noMepKinHMH aoMaMH ...

Prior to this, Zirmunskij at one time seemed to be heading in the opposite direction, showing such a keen eye (or ear) for "inversion" that he claimed to detect it in cases where in fact none exists. He begins with the observation that, at the opening of the iambic line, in the absence of stress on the second syllable, "the strongest of the three unstressed syllables apparently (povidimomu) remains the first one", 61 e.g.: /7epecKa3aTb MHe H e a o c y r . . . / / e o T p a 3 H M o e hhtom ...

- perfect examples, certainly, of 'light' combined substitution.62 So far, so good. From here, however, 2irmunskij goes on to note the same tendency, allegedly somewhat more marked (neskol'ko zametnee) in cases where it does not exist at all, e.g.: a) where there is an initial vowel: 0 3 a p e H a JiyneM .ZJaaHbi . . . OnapoBaTejibHMx a m p a c ...

b) light monosyllable followed by an intensa (which latter, having previously been classed as a 'half-stress', now suddenly becomes an 'absolutely unstressed syllable' (absoljutno neudarnyj slog): M npoMOTajica HaxoHeu ... c) light monosyllable followed by secondary stress of a compound word (also considered as 'absolutely unstressed'!): Ee3 npeflHCJioBbH b t o t xce n a c . . .

In point of fact, none of these instances (a, b, or c) can reasonably be considered as other than a 'light foot' ('pyrrhic' if you will); certainly, PuSkin did not reckon with its (having any) stress, pronouncing it like a proclitic." He disposes of compound words in the same manner. In lines such as:

B /j/wo-GjiecTameii hhihhoh 3ajie ...

and:

C onaMH meMHO-TOJiySbiMi ...

he again roundly declares that "poets did not reckon with a stress in these words" (i.e., in the first half of them). VVM., p. 123. 62 Though not (as will be seen) for the reason stated. On this point, vide infra, p. 141, note 66.

139

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

they bear no relation whatever to any of the instances of 'inversion' cited earlier. On this particular score, 2irmunskij's analysis becomes a case of "confusion worse confounded". The proper scansion of some lines is admittedly complicated further by historical considerations - the possibility, to say the least, that changes in pronunciation may have taken place in the course of the last two centuries or so. TomaSevskij, for instance, maintains that: "In the case in point, one must base oneself not on the living pronunciation but with (sic) a definite, clearly expressed literary tradition." 63 Zirmunskij observes that examples of what he calls "pereaccentuation" (e.g. npomue, nepè3, ÓAazòyxàHbé) occur much more frequently among the poets of the 18th and early 19th centuries whereas, among the poets of the second half of the 19th century, such instances become rarer, giving way to the forms "usual in prose speech".64 Exactly how Puskin, Lermontov, and their contemporaries pronounced these words must perforce remain a matter of speculation. In the absence of concrete proof to the contrary, however (and proof must be considered lacking so long as even the experts cannot agree), there remains the possibility (terrifying to some in its simplicity) that the classical poets pronounced their words essentially no differently from what we do to-day, but merely ventured rather more boldly and freely than prosodists like to admit into the realms of 'inversion' : X IIpò|THBi> y»àc|Hbixi. noTpaceHiii ...

- blissfully unaware that in so doing they were committing the heinous crime of combined substitution, owing to the fact that the total number of syllables in the line was maintained. The onus of proving an alternative pronunciation would seem to lie rather on those who would fit all these cases into the framework of pure and simple iambic feet. I for one have yet to meet the Russian who reads his verse in the "pereaccentuated" manner, whether it be Puskin : EjiarocjioBjiiuo HOBOcejibe . . .

(NovoseVe, I/p. 432)

or Blok: EjiarocjioBJiHio Bee, HTO 6HJIO . . .

(630)

In any case, we are concerned here with the prosody and scansion, not of PuSkin, or Lermontov, or even Tjutòev, but of Blok himself - a poet who, 63

"

Russkoe stixosloienie, p. 69. VVM., Ch. Ill, § 19, p. 117.

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

140

had the Fates willed otherwise, might easily be with us still to-day. In his case, then, none of these historical enigmata can possibly be held to apply. 65 Blok's pronunciation, broadly speaking, is ours, and it is left to us to explain, if we can, that which we all know and feel to be not only great but perfectly 'correct' and highly rhythmical verse in terms of metrical 'rules', which - let us never forget - at most represent certain general guiding principles, drawn up a posteriori in the light of a study of poets (preferably the better poets) and their work. The 'rule', or explanatory principle, in this case is that of combined (mono- and tri-syllabic) substitution - commonly but misleadingly referred to as "trochaic substitution" or "inversion of stress" - and it is this principle which provides (and explains) the only proper scansion for lines of the type which follow below - 'proper', because alone conforming to the actual conditions of normal, spontaneous speech, utterance, or declamation in Blok's time and our own. Let us now examine, with examples taken from Blok's verse, the various forms that combined substitution may assume: a) First, with light disyllabic conjunctions, prepositions, etc. (i.e. those words alleged to undergo 'pereaccentation'): i. At the beginning of the line HEPESB CHMIIJI6HT>, Mopa, nycraHH, . . .

(628)

Hmo6bi MyiHTeJibHoio cTpacrbio . . .

(496)

Ilepedb

(240)

TO6OK>, 3JIAT0KY/IP0H,

...

ii. In the middle of the line O, acajioKt k X nepedb TO6OH!

(138)

b) Compound words (which sometimes include the same prepositions as in a) above): i. At the beginning of the line IJeped3aK&jHoe cejieHte . . .

(201)

IJepexoTKy o r b Ka3HH KT. Ka3HH . . .

(500)

EAdeocjioBem* rpflflymia flem>. ...

(77)

' 5 Zirmunskij, to do him justice, admits, in the light of Nedobrovo's study of Baratynskij, that: "In our present-day pronunciation, ... pereaccentuation not infrequently gives way to transfer of stress on to thefirstsyllable." (VVM., pp. 125/126).

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

141

EAàzoyx&Bhttxb HHJU>CKHXT» JIHJIÌH ...

(487)

CàAfOflepjKàBHblH KJIOHHTb COHT>. ...

(431)

ii. In the middle of the line J\di, uàpb x cójwoflep3KàBHMH - Tbi. ...

(634)

c) Other polysyllabic words (not c o m p o u n d s in the n o r m a l sense, b u t beginning with a particle, prefix, etc. which tends t o establish slight p r e d o m i n a n c e over the second syllable): i. At the beginning of the line X //eycTaiomHM'b cjiyxoMb JIOBHTT» . . . H e Jiaxcerb Meayiy h k m i h mhoeo X CoeflHHaiomaH rpycrb . . .

(75)

(639)

ii. In the middle of the line CTO p d 3 t xn/?0H3HecTH: AK>6AK>. . . . d) Monosyllable i. Noun

+

(701) 66

interna

ffanb onycTHJia CHHiii n o j x o r i . . .

(388)

ffeub o6o3Haqnjn. Kynojia; . . .

(513)

Biimp* HajieTHTt, 3aBoerb c H t r b , . . .

(690)

rndrrib j f l a j i o r o jiaxana . . .

(514)

Cnhmb, )>6aK>KaHHbie jitHbio . . .

(730)

ii. Verb

66 Some examples above are admittedly borderline cases, and the method of scanning them almost certainly varies from one reader to the next. As we have seen (p. 138, supra), 2irmunskij is incorrect in assuming that, where the three first syllables are unstressed, the heaviest is always the first. Even He-, for instance, does not always seem to establish predominance over the second syllable, e.g. contrast the line from No. 75 cited above with another from the same poem: Hepa3JiyHeHHtiH cep/ma . . . The explanation here is probably the heavier nature of pa3-, which, unlike the previous examples, does not begin with a vowel. For other borderline cases, vide infra.

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

142

iii. Other words BdppZb 836op03mBT>

MrHOBeHHOH MOJlHbeft 3HEHbH

...

(689)

Tpa pa3a npeKJioHHTbca aojiy, CeMb

- ocifflm»

ce6a

KpecTOMi,

...

(749)

Bomb noneMy a - TBOH IIOKJIOHHHKI» H n o s T b ! (726) e) Combined substitution twice in one line (extremely rare - both examples are from poems atypically free in general structure): X 0, Hacmuzdul

x 0, doeoHul FLHH. CROJLTTBFL MHHyTb. 3eMJiH ocTWHen>. . . .

IIOMepKJIH

(468)

x ByffbTe HCT> flOBOJIbHbl %H3HbK) CBOefi,

X Tuuie eodbi, x mince mpaeii\

(566)87

The above examples - by no means exhaustive - should yet suffice to make clear that combined substitution, at any rate at the beginning of the iambic line, is by no means so infrequent as is generally supposed. At the same time, a close examination, even of these comparatively few examples, reveals the existence of an almost infinite range of degree. While the scansion of many lines is established beyond all doubt, others (notably those in c) above) may legitimately involve purely subjective differences of approach as between one reader and another. Borderline cases also include lines such as, say: 3aTO, KaKb Mbl, noaTbi, uiHHMb 7Ku3Hb 8b JWMMOJieTHblXb MejioHaxb! . . .

(615)

CnaMb 6biiin TM npeflnonjia OTBiica Hec6biTOHHyK> HBB . . .

flail

MHn>

naxyHHXt, aynmbixT» 3ejiift

(689)

...

(390)

" Of these two examples, the first (No. 468) is open to individual interpretation there is nothing impossible in the scansion:

O, Ha|cTHrdii! | O, ao|roHii! with light 'spondees' in the fust and third feet. The second (No. 566), however, is definite combined substitution, given the disyllabic opening in each half of the line. For further possible examples, vide infra, Ch. IV, p. 184 (lines from N o . 536 and N o . 408).

ISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

143

In each of these cases, of course, the first syllable - a heavy monosyllable is unquestionably heavier as such than the second; but this is not necessarily sufficient of itself to bring about 'inversion', since the 'mental rhythm' is acting in an opposite sense, leading us to expect an iambic cadence (rising rhythm). Such lines, then, despite the presence of heavy stress on the first syllable, present, to say the least, questionable cases of combined substitution. Conversely, other lines (e.g. in groups a) and b) above) have at most a medium stress ('half-stress'?) in the first syllable, yet indisputably do bring about 'inversion'. This only serves to underline the fact that - here as previously - it is the relative stress that is important in deciding the rhythm, i.e., in this case, the relation in stress between the first and second syllables in the line.68 At this point, we must be absolutely clear as to what is entailed. To say that, in cases of 'inversion', "the arsis and thesis interchange" is, of course, utterly wrong - indeed, it is a patent contradiction in terms. What really happens is this. Where the first syllable (of the two in question) establishes predominance - for whatever reason - over the second syllable, then that first syllable establishes itself in the arsis of the first foot (the thesis of which is the preceding compensatory pause [X] which the stress on the first syllable instinctively entails); the (original) second syllable then becomes the first syllable in the thesis of an anapaestic second foot viz. X - | ^ ^ - | . . . To bring this effect about, the first syllable must be considerably more prominent than the second (in order to offset the expected iambic 'mental beat') - but need not necessarily bear anything approaching a full stress. The term "trochaic substitution" widely used to describe such a phenomenon is doubly misleading because - apart from giving a false picture of the regrouping of syllables entailed - it tends to infer that the first syllable must be a heavily stressed one, as in the normal trochee. This, we have seen, is by no means necessarily the case; but this false inference probably accounts for the serious underestimation of the incidence of combined substitution in Russian verse.69 The 'acid test' of combined substitution - the one criterion by which its presence or absence must be judged - is this: " The full definition (to include cases in the middle of the line) would be: " . . . or between two syllables which, by virtue of their position in the iambic line, would normally together constitute one foot." " The fact that the first syllable is not always markedly stressed helps, of course, to explain why Belyj and others should have mistaken so many examples of combined substitution for 'pyrrhic' substitution.

144

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

Does the first syllable, in the particular context, establish sufficient predominance over the second syllable to bring about the regrouping just described, which itself entails: a) The instinctive introduction by the reader of a compensatory pause [X] before the first syllable, and b) The consequent displacement of the second syllable into the thesis of the second foot, which thus becomes anapaestic. If the answer is 'Yes': then combined substitution is already a fact, and the rest is merely a matter of degree - the absolute weight of the first syllable, for instance, being of no moment. If the answer is 'No': then the foot remains basically iambic, though it may - depending on the weight of the two syllables involved - take on a greater or lesser 'pyrrhic' or 'spondaic' character, as the case may be. This is the core of the entire problem of isosyllabic substitution in iambic verse. Having examined in some detail the three forms generally said to occur, it now remains briefly to review their interrelationship, in order to arrive at a fair and comprehensive picture of the whole.

2. CONCLUSIONS To the extent that 'pyrrhics' are feet consisting of two light syllables, and 'spondees' those of two heavy syllables, both types of foot do in fact occur in Russian iambic verse. Extreme examples of each type are not difficult to recognise, and there would seem to be no a priori objection to labelling as 'pyrrhics' the feet in italics below: Hano\Maaà\ioufiù | HanpâcHO ...

(701)

BÏ. pacxji«|5a«Hw|^ Ko|jieé ...

(736)

O xô\Aodn> | u 06b | o r a i . . . .

(593)

or as 'spondees' such others as : ffénb 6r>jihh ci> HOHbK) rojiyôoio ... - Hibmb, Mâmb. il

3aaoxHyjica

bt>

rpo6t, ...

(378) (627)

At the same time, we have also noted the virtually unlimited shades of stress that almost any syllable may, under given circumstances, acquire, and the existence of numerous borderline cases makes clear the highly

CONCLUSIONS

145

relative and conditional nature of such terminology. It is, in fact, against these borderline cases that the too inflexible terms, 'pyrrhic' and 'spondaic' substitution, stumble; the more so since - even in clear-cut instances of both such types of foot - the underlying iambic rhythm is never seriously interfered with, beyond a certain degree of acceleration or retardation. Add to this the problematical nature of the intensy in Russian - syllables usually lighter than most secondarily-stressed syllables in English, yet undeniably acquiring some stress when occurring in arsis70 - and the unsatisfactory nature of the terms 'pyrrhic' and 'spondaic' substitution, as applied to Russian verse, should be apparent. All in all, we shall do far better to admit the 'sliding scale' of possible degrees of stress and refer to such instances simply as 'light' or 'heavy' (iambic) feet - which is, incidentally, what Egerton Smith also advocates in relation to English prosody.71 Only where the first syllable establishes sufficient predominance over the second to bring about the redistribution just examined (X - | VJ ^ - |...) are we dealing with a concrete phenomenon which may generally be held to exist or not to exist, and only here is there really any justification for speaking of 'substitution' if we choose. This particular form, as we have seen, is combined (monosyllabic + trisyllabic) sub74

Even intensy may acquire a very considerable degree of stress, e.g. in No. 505, where several occur in rhyme, in the arsis of the final foot of the line, viz.: . . . TaMi. ci. nocBHcroMi», fla cb npHCBHcmoAro r y j i H i O T i a o 3apH, KycroHKH THXHMT> mejiecmoMb K a B a i o r b M H i : cmotph. C m o t p i o a - pyKH BCKiffly/ia, Bi> mapoKiH ruiiicb n o n u i a , LjBtTaMH B c t x i j OCblDSUld H bt> n i c H t H3oiuuia . . . Such cases are admittedly rare in 'literary' verse, but comparatively common in folk songs and poems, of which this is, of course, a deliberate imitation. For an analogous phenomenon in the Russian bylina, vide infra, Ch. VIII, p. 277, including note 65. For evidence that these are in fact masculine, not dactylic, endings, and hence are stressed, cf. Ch. X, pp. 345/6, infra. 71 P.E.M., Ch. VII, § 8, p. 62. Egerton Smith gives as his reason " . . . to avoid possible misleading implications of the classical terms", i.e. 'pyrrhic' and 'spondee'. At the same time, he makes the good point that: "The term spondee ... is not so inapplicable to English (read: Russian) verse as some accentualists would think, for it represents much the same thing as in classical verse, viz. a foot of two long or heavy syllables, one of which is distinguished by receiving the metrical ictus. In neither system, therefore, are the two syllables equal in every respect." (p. 62, Note 1, my italics). In English as in Russian verse there are, in fact, more cogent reasons for opposing the terms, q.v. infra.

146

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

stitution, i.e. it is in reality a combination of two forms of awisosyllabic substitution. Since, however, syllabically, the two forms, occurring simultaneously, cancel each other out, even this form amounts, as far as the complete line is concerned, to wosyllabic substitution; and it is this overall isosyllabic character which explains its comparatively high incidence in Russian iambic verse - in direct contrast to anisosyllabic substitution in the normal sense, viz. mono- or tri-syllabic substitution occurring in isolation and so altering the total number of syllables in the line. From every point of view, then, combined substitution - as a definite rhythmical 'upset' which either is or is not - belongs to an entirely different category from so-called 'pyrrhic' or 'spondaic' substitution, which latter ultimately amount to no more than varying degrees of stress as applied to any syllable in any position in a basically iambic line. Moreover, the use of the terms 'pyrrhic' and 'spondaic' substitution inevitably tends to perpetuate the illusion that given words or syllables are by nature ('unconditionally') 'stressed' or 'unstressed'. Zirmunskij rightly opposes this persistent fiction, emphasising on more than one occasion the relative nature of stress and hence of the terms 'pyrrhic' and 'spondee', to which he raises fair objection.72 Unfortunately, however, he then proceeds to eat his own words by subdividing monosyllables into three cast-iron categories - a procedure no less unreal and misleading than the system of categorising feet, to which he is rightly opposed. To the extent that monosyllables may occur in arsis or thesis in Russian iambic (or trochaic) verse - and this is what counts - they are, metrically speaking, dual in nature, and it would seem that, in classing them all as 'common', Trediakovskij was not so far off the mark as some of his successors have suggested. In most cases, the degree of prominence is decided less by any intrinsic factors inherent in the words themselves73 than by a number of purely 78

Cf. VVM., Ch. i n and Ch. IV generally, esp. § 21, pp. 126ff. and § 25, pp. 160ff. ™ One intrinsic factor too often overlooked is that of quantity, which undoubtedly plays some part, even in syllabo-tonic verse. This, however, only strengthens the argument against grouping monosyllabic or other words into categories according to their grammatical or syntactical function - a system which lumps together such quantitatively different words as, say, Ha and BflOJib (monosyllabic prepositions) or, among nouns, 6oki and kh3hi>. The real part played by quantity is one reason for preferring the more general term 'prominence', unless specifically applied to wordstress or metrical stress as such. Egerton Smith also uses 'accent' in this wider sense, but is quick to point out that: "The wary prosodist probably will not commit himself to any specific theory of the constitution of accent, merely taking it as the prominence, however produced, of one sound over another." (P.E.M., p. 76, my italics). For an exhaustive study of the whole problem - virtually all of it as applicable, mutatis

CONCLUSIONS

147

extrinsic influences, of which by far the most important, as we have seen, is the metrical ictus and its corollary, the 'mental beat'. Inextricably bound up with these two is the time factor, which some regard, understandably, to be the ultima ratio. "Periodicity is the essential quality," says Omond of English verse, "accentuation its usual, but not invariable, exponent. ... Accentuation does not constitute the sole and invariable basis of our verse; its essential unchanging element must be sought in that which underlies both syllables and stresses ...", namely, time.74 True, English verse is far freer in this respect than Russian, but basically Omond's remark holds true in both instances.75 In any case, as Egerton Smith points out, the two views of 'periodicity' and 'accentuation' are ultimately not so far apart, since "... the ictus must still exist, mentally if not physically, subjectively if not objectively"; this really amounts to saying the same thing in a different way, and, however we look at it, we can agree with his view that: "In any case the primal importance belongs to the mental beat." 74 Metrical ictus, periodicity, mental beat (which, in a sense, combines the other two) - these are the factors which mainly decide the degree of prominence; and they are all, as I have emphasised, outside the nature of words or syllables as such. So, too, is the factor of logical emphasis, examples of whose effect on prominence we have also seen (pp. 129 and 134, supra). Yet another extrinsic factor at work is the general syntactical structure of the sentence involved - the position of a dash or full-stop, the existence or absence of a comma, sometimes helps to shift the rhythm in the direction of combined substitution or, alternatively, helps to strengthen the iambic cadence of the line.77 Finally, there is, mutandis, to Russian as to English verse - cf. esp. P.E.M., Ch. VIII (Weight and Accent) and Ch. IX (Quantity), pp. 65-84 and 84-95 respectively. 74 A Study of. Metre, p. 24, p. 29, and pp. 14-16 ("... time ... is the most important and the most fundamental principle of English metre". "All metre really depends on time"). " Nothing could better demonstrate the dangers of ignoring the time factor than the confusion that has hitherto reigned concerning the problem of combined substitution. On paper, i.e. independently of the rhythmical beat, "trochaic" scansion appears unobjectionable - the first syllable is stressed, the second unstressed, and the remaining feet (let us suppose) are pure iambs. In other words, the sequence of stressed and unstressed syllables is correct, but in no way accords with the actual time factor in declamation. .'• P.E.M., p. 72 and p. 75. " Sengeli (Traktat, p. 35) contrasts the line: Tpo3a. flootcdb xjiiiHyji. Jlyn ... which is rhythmically unobjectionable, with another: Ilomeji doMcdb. CBCTJIMH Jiyi . . .

148

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

in Russian verse, the phenomenon of enclitics, which, by drawing virtually all stress away from the noun concerned, may produce what is perhaps the purest form of 'pyrrhic' of all, e.g. ...

H rpyCTb, H HtjKHOCTb, H HCTOMa,

Kaici. npeacfle, 3a cepdtfe 6epen> ...

(756)

We find, then, that few if any syllables can reasonably be termed "unconditionally stressed" or "unconditionally unstressed" per se, since in verse all syllables are prey to the overriding influence of extrinsic factors, of which the mental beat is the most important but by no means the only example. We have also seen that, although very light feet undoubtedly exist which could justly be called 'pyrrhics', and very heavy feet which could justly be called 'spondees', there exists, between these two extremes, an almost infinite range of possible stress which may devolve upon virtually any syllable in the metrical line. Leaving aside for a moment these infinite shades, we may, for purposes of argument and analysis, fairly approximate by saying that, in iambic (or trochaic) metre, each of the two syllables in a foot may, as regards stress (or, better, as regards prominence) take on a character ranging from 1. light through 2. medium to 3. heavy. As regards the rhythmical effect of any foot, it may produce one of three general impressions, viz.: a. clearly rising rhythm; b. approximately 'even' rhythm; or c. apparently falling rhythm (i.e. so-called 'inversion'). The essential point to grasp is that these two sets of values are in no way necessarily interconnected. That is to say, any foot may combine any one degree of weight {prominence) with any one type of rhythmical effect. Muddled thinking on the matter of 'substitution' largely results from a confusion of these two independent sets of values with each other; excessive importance tends to be attached to the 'weight' index at the expense of the 'rhythmical' index, though it is, of course, the latter which, in assessing the rhythm, is the deciding factor. which is obviously much less happy, despite the fact that the word flo*wb in each case occurs in the third syllable in the line (thesis) between two fully stressed disyllables, i.e. the purely 'stress' conditions are as near identical as possible. Sengeli's attention to syntactical influences is extremely valuable, though his ingenious reasoning sometimes leads him into exaggerations, notably in some of the obiter dicta to be found in Prakt. Stix.

CONCLUSIONS

149

Thus, an a-type foot (i.e. one in clearly rising rhythm) will always be considered iambic, irrespective of whether the syllables it contains be lighter or heavier or roughly 'medium' in weight. Conversely, a c-type foot will create the schematic impression of a 'trochee', or - to get to the root of the matter - will bring about combined substitution, with all that this entails, both subjectively and objectively, for the rhythm of the line. On the other hand, a ¿-type foot (i.e. one producing an effect of roughly even rhythm)78 will, if light in weight, be considered by traditional advocates of substitution as a 'pyrrhic'; if heavy, as a 'spondee'. The 'even' foot of'medium' weight will, however, always remain problematical to advocates of the substitution theory, and it is in fact just such feet as these that constitute the vast majority of borderline cases.79 The same thing may be put in diagrammatical form, as follows: ''Prominence' (Stress, Weight, etc.) Rhythmical Effect

1. Light

| 2. Medium

3. Heavy

a. Rising

iamb

iamb

iamb

b. Even

'pyrrhic'

V.

'spondee'

c. Falling (apparent only)

so-called 'trochaic substitution' or 'inversion of stress' - in fact, combined substitution in all cases.

,8 In iambic verse, this normally presupposes that in fact the first of the two syllables is the heavier by a certain amount, so that it offsets the iambic 'mental beat' to produce an overall effect of approximate evenness. In trochaic verse, of course, the opposite applies. " One example from many must suffice here. The first line of No. 63 runs: Bt> mn> y/wiOMyflpeHHwe r o f l b i . . . How should one classify the first foot of this line? Belyj would undoubtedly have considered it as a 'pyrrhic'; others might well do the same. Yet, if a pyrrhic, it is certainly a good many degrees heavier than, say, H onapoBaHHyio fldjib. . . . (438) or H edoxHOBHTejibHO MOJinaHbe . . . (156) Heavier than a typical pyrrhic, yet roughly 'even': is it, perhaps, a spondee? Hardly, when we compare it with, say,

IlAdHb, cepjwc, njiinb. ...

(731)

It is possible (though unlikely) that some would read it as a case of combined substitution: X Bi> T t | ufejioMy | apeHHbie roflM . . . The only fair conclusion seems to be that the foot is yet an iamb of sorts, containing two words which, in the context, are each of roughly medium weight, and so produce a more even rhythm than the typical iambic rise.

150

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

When all is said and done, then, we have, in iambic verse, not three types of foot substitutable for the iamb, but two basic possibilities, namely: i) Preservation of the iambic rhythm throughout, whereby, of course, any syllable, and hence any foot, may be considerably lighter or heavier than the norm, and the rhythmical effect may range from being clearly rising to approximately 'even'. ii) Combined substitution, where - for reasons already examined - the first of two syllables which would otherwise constitute an iambic foot takes precedence (i.e. establishes predominance) over the second syllable and produces the effect found in lines such as Xojiodb h MpaKt rpnaymaxi. flHefi! . . .

(566)

In these cases also, any syllable may in itself be considerably lighter or heavier than the norm, the only point at issue being whether or not the first syllable predominates over the second sufficiently to bring about the redistribution in question. The first possibility thus embraces all those instances sometimes labelled as examples of 'pyrrhic' or 'spondaic' substitution, terms which misleading and impossible to define accurately except in a few extreme cases - are best discarded in favour of references to 'lighter' or 'heavier' {basically iambic) feet, as the case may be. The term 'substitution' - as applied to (line!) isosyllabic substitution in iambic verse - is best reserved for instances of combined (monosyllabic + trisyllabic) substitution, as defined under ii) above.80

3. ANNOTATION OF STRESS

There remains the problem of how best to indicate the various degrees of possible stress (or prominence) when analysing the rhythm and scansion of metrical lines or whole poems - degrees which, we know, are virtually infinite, and certainly extend far beyond the general groupings of 'light', 'medium', and 'heavy' of which, for purposes of convenience, we have made use so far. 80 Notwithstanding sharp differences of opinion on certain points of detail and degree, this summing-up more or less corresponds with the conclusions reached by 2irmunskij. He likewise deprecates the use of the terms 'pyrrhic' and 'spondaic' substitution (VVM., § 21, p. 126) - at any rate, in all but the most conditional sense (§ 25, p. 161) - and emphasises the fundamentally different nature of combined substitution ("trochaic substitution") from its alleged 'pyrrhic' and 'spondaic' counterparts (§ 21, p. 127). Vide supra, p. 116, note 8.

ANNOTATION OF STRESS

151

Conscious of this wide range of stress, prosodists in many countries have, from time to time, devised ingenious methods of annotation. For German, Saran proposed a system for recording 9 different degrees of emphasis ranging from —3 to +5, grade 0 representing the normal degree of 'non-stress' ("indifferent") and + 3 the stress of a normal accented syllable of an independent word taken "in lexical isolation" ("in lexikalischer Isolierung").81 In France, Grammont suggested a scale of 1-5, with the use of intermediate fractions (e.g. 2i, 3}) where necessary.82 Long before this, A. J. Ellis had proposed, for English verse, his own scale of 9 grades, as follows : 9 - superstrong 8 - strong 7 - substrong 6 - supermean 5 - mean 4 - submean 3 - superweak 2 - weak I - subweak Of these, he considered the three grades 8, 5, and 2 (strong, mean, weak) as the indispensable minimum for purposes of metrical analysis.83 Egerton Smith takes much the same view: "At the very least, three degrees of stress must be recognised; more profitably four: (i) absence of stress, or rather absence of emphasis ; (ii) light, weak, or secondary stress; (iii) normal or full stress; (iv) heavy stress or strong accent."84 For Russian prosody, Zirmunskij also considers four degrees of stress as the minimum, though he arrives at this conclusion from a further 81

Fr. Saran, Deutsche Verslehre, pp. 47ff. (cf. VVM., p. 161 and p. 262). M. Grammont, Petit traité de versification française, pp. 98ff. (cf. VVM., p. 162 and p. 262). 88 A. J. Ellis, in: Transactions of the Philological Society, 1875/76, pp. 435-449, also pp. 456-469. Ellis originally took up the problem in his Elements of Phonetics (1848), and also referred to it in a number of other works, e.g. Early English Pronunciation (1869 seq.) and a paper on The Physical Constituents of Accent and Emphasis (Trans. Philol. Soc., 1873/74, pp. 113-164). (Cf. VVM., pp. 162/3 and p. 275, note 82; also T. S. Omond, English Metrists of the 18th and 19th Centuries, pp. 169-173). 84 P.E.M., pp. 67/68. Egerton Smith goes on to advocate a fifth grade ('extra-heavy stress'), but this need hardly concern us here. Indeed, as will be seen, even his fourth grade is of doubtful use to us, and the first three cover all but the most exceptional eventualities. 82

152

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

subdivision of his categories of 'stressed' and 'unstressed' words. His four grades would thus cover, in decreasing order of emphasis: 1. (normal) stressed syllables 2. (weaker) stressed syllables, or 'half-stresses' (jpoluudarenija) 3. (stronger than normal) unstressed syllables 4. (normal) unstressed syllables.85 In view of the unreal nature of this subdivision of words, such a system could lead to endless confusion, since, in point of fact, a syllable from, say, group 3 easily may - and not infrequently does - acquire a stress greater than one from group 2. Zirmunskij later goes on to propose his own form of sliding scale, from 0-1, these two figures corresponding to the 'traditional concepts' of 'unstressed' and 'stressed' syllables respectively. Between these two indices, he proposes the use of quarters (b i> i ) f° r intermediate grades of emphasis, supplemented where necessary by eighths (J, i , f, £, etc.). On this basis, he would consider a true 'pyrrhic' foot as equivalent to (0-0); an intensa - whose existence in arsis he is yet disposed to consider 'probable' - as equivalent to i (?!); an "unconditionally unstressed" preposition or conjunction in arsis as and so on.86 Apart from the danger of dividing words as such into cut-and-dried categories, this method has all the objections inherent in every overelaborate system in any language - namely, the inevitable introduction of a high degree of subjectivism into the assessment of degrees of stress. As soon as we start marking off emphasis on a scale of more than four grades at most - let alone the nine grades of Ellis, Saran, and 2irmunskij himself (if we include the eighths) - we arrive at a point where the margin open to purely subjective and individual apprehension is far too wide, and no two experts are likely to agree. As Sir Oliver Elton once put it: "Some phoneticians use half a dozen degrees of emphasis, but this is hopeless in actual prosody, if only because it enlarges the chances of disagreement as to a particular scansion."87 What we most need, on the contrary, is a system which - while retaining such flexibility as is essential - is yet simple and clear enough to enable more or less everybody to apply it in the same way, so that at least each understands what the other is talking about, instead, as all too often happens, of arguing at cross purposes. 85

VVM., p. 127, and Ch. Ill, § 21, pp. 126-130 generally. VVM., pp. 129/130. (Zirmunskij here admits the 'conditional' nature of such a system, and of the 'principle of stress' as a whole.) 87 English Prose Numbers (in: A Sheaf of Papers, pp. 130-163), pp. 131/2. 86

153

ANNOTATION OF STRESS

Bearing this aim in mind, I feel that this need is best met - at any rate in the present study - by a modest system allowing for 3 main degrees of emphasis, which we may label: i) Light (or very light) stress, marked by the sign ^ ii) Medium (or half-) stress, marked by the sign iii) Heavy (or full) stress, marked by the sign H ¿CTb J i a H H T l 3KHB&H a j I O C T b , n e H & J I b CBHfldHiii H pa3JiyKT> . . .

Ho ¿CTb nafleHbe, ft ycr£jiocn>,

H TOpacecTBO npeflCMepTHbixb MyKb.

(399)

Normally speaking, we are only concerned, as in the above example, with marking the stress in arsis, i.e. that stress which coincides with the metrical ictus, and so with the 'mental beat'. It is primarily for this reason that I have chosen the sign ^ to denote light (even very light) stress, as opposed to the conventional 'short' sign of classical prosody (-), which denotes complete absence of metrical stress, i.e. normally in thesis', this will only be used on special occasions, e.g. to explain cases of combined substitution: X X 6 | j i 6 f l i VL M p a i f b | r p a A y l m f i x i ¿ m e n !

(566)

Conversely, heavy stress in thesis may also occasionally be marked - say, to demonstrate heavy 'spondees', e.g.: Hoib,

Jiicb | H cHtrb. |

H

a | Hecy

...

(690)

Medium stress, similarly, in medium-stress (or '^-heavy') 'spondees', e.g.: B e t 3|TH pd|flocTHbi|e JJHH:

(60)

Intensy. There remains, however, the problem of intensy, i.e. the marking of syllables other than the main stressed syllable in polysyllabic words where these coincide with the metrical ictus and so take on a secondary stress of sorts - irrespective of whether or not they may be held to do so in ordinary prose speech. Our preliminary investigations have already shown that there is - to put it at its least - a definite and appreciable difference in kind and in cadence between the intensa that precedes and that which follows the main stress of the word to which it belongs: OroHb He3jiiinHnxT> eoofeniJieHiii B3flWMaeT"b fliBCTBeHHjio r p y f l b .

(77)

It therefore seems essential, in addition to the signs already suggested, to introduce some simple graphic means of distinguishing between these

154

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

two types of intensa; two further symbols have therefore been adopted to meet this need, as follows: a) For secondary stress preceding the main stress b) For secondary stress following the main stress OrOHb He3flilHHHX'b BoamtjieHiii B3flbiMdeTi> fliBCTBeHHyio rpyflb. 8 8

Such a system is simple to apply, and affords a general idea of the relative distribution between these two types of secondary stress, without entailing 88

At the time these lines were originally written, this distinction between pre-stress and post-stress intensy was based on nothing more than personal observation and perception, at first in relation to binary metre, but subsequently, and very much more markedly, in ternary verse, in those rare instances in which the two types of intensa occurred (vide infra, Ch. VI, pp. 212/3). Meanwhile, interesting supporting evidence has been found in the commentary by F. Zelinskij to his Russian translation of Ovid's Ballads and Epistolae (Russkij elegiceskij distix, in: Ovidij. BalladyPosianija, M., 1913, pp. 312ff.). Taking as his axiom that "the Russian elegiac distich is a tonic conversion (pretvorenie) of the quantitative Roman (and Greek) distich" (i.e. in which a stressed syllable corresponds to a 'long' and an unstressed one to a 'short'), Zelinskij enumerates the rules which, in his view, should govern such Russian translations from the classics. Rule 3 (p. 313) lays down that an unstressed syllable is normally inadmissible in the arsis of a dactylic foot. For Zelinskij, this excludes the use of "words with two stresses", e.g. in a line such as: CrpauiHO MHt nepecKOMumb, n HcnojmeHa HedoyMnmn ... He does, however, countenance three exceptions to this rule, viz.: 1) The use of "those compound words, both parts of which have their own full (polnovesnoe) stress", e.g.: KJMJICH TaHHCTBeHHOH MTJIOH (||) CefbmoUeHOCHblXb 6orHHh. HTO npOTHBT> 3KH3HH TBOeH (||) 3JldyMbHUJlAAa He H. 2) The use of an unstressed syllable in the opening foot (i.e. the first syllable) of hexameters and pentameters (on this point, vide infra, Ch. VI, pp. 220/1, on the "light opening foot" in dactylic verse). 3) In the case of proper names, where it is sometimes a case of force majeure. - "In all these cases," continues Zelinskij, "the unstressed syllables raised into stressed ones [are such as] precede the main stress of the word [in question]. Under no circumstances is it permissible to raise in this way syllables which follow the main stress, as, for instance, in the opening lines of one bad translation of the Iliad: 3jio6y, 6orHHH, Bocnoii Ile/ieeema AxHJiJieca,

ru6e/tbnyib,

HTO MHOI"HXI> H T.FL.

In his History of the Russian Hexameter, R. Burgi refers to the free and unashamed use of what he regards as 'tribrachic substitution' practised by Trediakovskij in his translations from the classics (in contrast to 2ukovskij), and goes on to suggest that the former is rivalled in this freedom only by Pasternak (pp. 61/62). Burgi does not, however, tackle the problem of pre-stress and post-stress intensy, and his statement (pp. 168/169) that Zelinskij's arguments "differ in no way from his predecessors' understanding of the question in the early nineteenth century" appears to refer to the specific "problem of the accentual equivalent of the classical spondee" and not to the question at issue here.

ANNOTATION OF STRESS

155

the over-complicated system of sub-grouping into 'modulations' (based o n word division) adopted by Sengeli in his Traktat The further problem now arises: T o what do these intensy correspond in terms of degrees of stress? Obviously, none of them ever represents a heavy stress (-). It is possible to argue that some of the more emphatic ones - notably those in 'semi-compound' words - are equivalent, or very nearly so, to a half-stress. This argument is reinforced by the fact that such prefixes (i.e. intensy of the - type) often assert themselves to the extent of bringing about combined substitution: nepeA3aKdTHaS 3apa.

(392)

EjiarocjioBjijuo Bee,

(630)

HTO 6MJIO,

The vast majority, however, cannot be held to correspond to more than a light stress, and - again with a view to avoiding overcomplication in matters of analysis and statistics - it is with the light syllables that all these 'intensy are classified in the present work.90 To sum up, the system of stress annotation adopted henceforth throughout this work is as follows: 1. Light Stress a) Minor monosyllables (and a few disyllables) 91 (e.g. u, a, HO, ne, HU, na, nadb, o, uado, 060)

Symbol —

89 Sengeli was, of course, perfectly right to call attention to the influence of word division on the rhythm of a line. Such sub-division into modulations, however, inevitable complicates the problem still further and makes it extremely difficult to keep a clear overall picture of the whole. For the 4-foot iamb alone, for instance, Sengeli lists no less than 38 possible modulations, depending on how word division takes place in the line in question (Traktat, pp. 139/141, et passim). An interesting example of Blok's own interest in the role of word division is given by Timofeev in: Aleksandr Blok (M„ 1957), pp. 172/3. 90 Generally speaking, true compound words are considered as bearing a half-stress (A) on the 'main' syllable of the lesser component, e.g.: H cyMpairb AijmHo-r6jiy6oH. (201) Sometimes, hyphenated words are really equivalent to 2 words, and hence 2 full stresses, in their own right: 3Bt3dd-npeflBtcTHHud B3oiujia. (218) In all other polysyllabic words, however, the symbols - and A are employed, irrespective of the exact shade of stress involved, purely and simply to denote such syllables for what they are - namely, secondary stress (of some degree) preceding or following the main stress of the same word, as the case may be. For the position in combined substitution, vide infra, Ch. IV, pp. 182/3. 91 Subject, of course, to the influence of special extrinsic factors which may increase the degree of prominence (logical emphasis, enclitics, etc.).

156

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS

b) Secondary stress in polysyllabic words ('intensy') i) preceding the main stress ii) following the main stress 2. Half-Stress, comprising, very roughly speaking, those monosyllables and disyllables which are dual in character, i.e. which may and often do appear in arsis or thesis, by the symbol As such, these words are clearly less emphatic than the vast majority of nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc., which normally bear a 3. Full Stress, which is indicated by the symbol

± -

A

-

N.B. Except in a few special cases, these symbols are designed to denote stress (or prominence) in arsis (p. 153, supra). Where necessary, absence of stress (in thesis) is designated by the conventional symbol w Illustration of the System of Stress Annotation Henceforth Used Throughout this Work : ¡a, ÓTpOKB, 3à)KHràlO CBÌHH, OrÓHb KaaóubHMH 6èpery. OHà 6e3T> MBICJIH h 6e3i» p i ™ Ha TÒMI» CMIÉTCH 6èpery. JIK>6JIK> B e n é p H e è MOJiém>e Y 6ÌJIOH IlépKBH hàat ptKÓH,

nèpefl3aKàTHoè cejiéin>e H CYMPAKIJ MYTHO-ròJiy6ÓH.

etc.

(201)

PART

III

RHYTHM AND METRE IN BLOK'S VERSE

CHAPTER IV

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

1. L I G H T F E E T ( " P Y R R H I C S " )

a) The 4-foot iamb. In his exhaustive study of the commoner Russian metres, Sengeli, following up the earlier researches of Belyj, listed 8 theoretically possible variations, or forms, which the 4-foot iambic line might take, depending on the distribution of light syllables or, as he described them, 'pyrrhic' feet, in arsis.1 Of these, two forms (in Sengeli's scale, Nos. V and VIII) never, or hardly ever, occur in practice, and do not directly concern us here.2 1

These forms should not be confused with the modulations (based on word-division) mentioned earlier (p. 155, note 89). The latter constitute sub-divisions within each form. The forms are concerned exclusively with 'pyrrhics'. The incidence of 'spondees' and 'choriambs' (combined substitution) is examined later (q.v. infra). * Cf. inter alia, Traktat, pp. 139/41. Here Sengeli simply writes 'not used' against the 2 forms in question. Elsewhere, however, he lists the fifth form without comment, and gives the example: H He 3ammueH& HHKCM

i.e. the line with light arsis in first and second feet combined. This form is thus not altogether impossible, but practically never occurs. For the eighth form, only ad hoc examples are ever given, e.g. by Timofeev (Problemy Stixovedenija, p. 209): HO HHTepHailJIOHajIHCT i.e. the line with only one stress, in the final foot. The first seven forms were, of course, already listed by Belyj (Simvolizm, pp. 289-295). Belyj's one example of the fifth form: X o T b H HE 6E3I> npe,ny6toK,N;EHBH

Unbegaun lists, more aptly, as an example of the eighth form. In view of the virtual non-existence of Sengeli's Forms V and VIII, Unbegaun lists the others as 1 to 6 inclusive, Form V becoming No. 7 and Form VIII remaining No. 8 (Russian Versification, pp. 17/18). Taranovski (RDR, p. 85) lists seven forms. By comparison with Unbegaun, his Nos V and VI are transposed. His No. VII is the same as Unbegaun's (virtually negligible) No. 7. - Unbegaun's strikes me as the most satisfactory system and - in the. interests of uniformity in the English literature on Russian prosody - is the one adopted in the present work (p. 160, infra).

160

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

The remaining 6 forms, with examples from Blok's verse (No. 392), are: No. (Sengeli) (Taranovski) Type of Line 1. I. I. Stresses (in my reckoning, medium or heavy) in the arsis of all 4 feet. O flißt CT» TaHHOH BT> CBtTJIOMl. B30pt 2. II. II. Light arsis in 1st foot only. H na aMBÖHt HceHCKiii rojiocr.

3.

III.

III.

Light arsis in 2nd foot only. O 3KH3HM, ¿OrOpißllieH BT> XÖpt

4.

IV.

IV.

Light arsis in 3rd foot only. O TOMHbixij flieyiuKaxb y flBepa,

5.

VI.

VI.

Light arsis in 1st and 3rd foot combined. KaKb aacBiTjitBiwa^ oti> Mapa

6.

VII.

V.

Light arsis in 2nd and 3rd foot combined. M m CTQAeMCH nadb ajirapeMT.,

(392) Viewed from this angle, the history of the Russian 4-foot iamb from the time of Lomonosov onwards is, according to Timofeev, one of a progressive reduction in the total incidence of (full or half) stresses and a corresponding increase in the use of the lighter stressed syllables in arsis. Thus, while Lomonosov's earlier poems contained 71 % of full-stressed (i.e. 4-stress) lines, this figure fell in his later works to 57%; with Derzavin, it was only 34%; and by the 19th century the average incidence had dropped to as little as 30% and even 20%. Parallel with this reduction came a rise in the incidence of lines containing one light foot; with time, lines combining two light feet began to appear, at first mainly the 5th form (light 1st and 3rd foot), later, with the 20th-century poets, the 6th form (light 2nd and 3rd foot).3 The incidence (percentage) of each type of line-pattern for some of the leading Russian poets is given by Timofeev as follows:4 3

Cf. Problemy Stixovedenija, pp. 210/214. A succinct account is also given by Unbegaun, who reproduces the more important of Timofeev's tables (Russian Versification, pp. 18/21). For greater detail, cf. Taranovski, RDR, § 6, pp. 66-92, § 18, pp. 333 ff., and esp. Tables II and III. 4 Thesefiguresare selected from the table on p. 214 of Problemy Stixovedenija, which is said to include data from Sengeli's Trdktat. Timofeev lists the forms à la Sengeli, viz. 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7. The (complete) table is given by Unbegaun (Russian Versification, p. 19) with the numeration 1-6 incl. (cf. note 2, p. 159, supra).

161

LIGHT FEET

PuSkin Lermontov Tjutiev Fet BLOK Axmatova

1

2

3

4

5

6

27.5 30.0 25.0 27.1 29.2 26.0

6.5 6.0 6.5 11.1 8.2 6.0

8.5 6.5 9.4 7.0 13.5 9.5

47.5 50.0 44.3 43.4 41.2 47.5

10.0 7.0 14.2 11.2 7.9 7.0

0.2 0.5 0.5 0.2 0.0 3.0

The figures quoted for Blok are those given by Sengeli in his Traktat (pp. 153/4), and are based on an analysis of 846 lines occurring in 41 poems in the 3rd Book.6 It is interesting to compare these with the results of my own investigations into exactly 1,000 lines from 55 of Blok's poems in 4-foot iambic metre: 6

My findings (1,000 lines) Sengeli (846 lines)

1

2

3

4

5

6

26.2

8.7

10.1

46.0

8.3

0.7

29.2

8.2

13.5

41.2

7.9

0.0

The results show differences of varying degree - nowhere tremendous, yet in some cases appreciable, notably as regards the 1st form (4-stress line) and the 3rd and 4th forms (light 2nd and light 3rd foot respectively). The immediate questions that spring to mind are: a) Were the 'light feet' assessed according to the same criteria in each case? b) Was the material examined similar, or roughly similar, in both instances? As regards a), a few differences are probably inevitable, since there will always be isolated syllables hovering, for one reason or another, between the 'stressed' and 'unstressed' categories. While Sengeli does not state his criteria exactly, a study of the various examples he gives makes it clear that his assessment is basically identical with mine, viz., 5

Sengeli refers, both here and again on p. 177, to the "edition of Pasukanis" ("v izdanii Pasukartisa"), but gives no further details. * For details of the poems examined by me, vide infra, p. 162, note 8 of this chapter. All the poems concerned follow the standard pattern of quatrains with F M F M endings and abab rhyme scheme. It is impossible to compare these results with those of Belyj for the reasons already mentioned (Ch. Ill, note 16, p. 119, supra). (See, however, Taranovski, RDR, Table IV!)

162

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

ceteris paribus, all intensy and the less emphatic monosyllables and disyllables in arsis are considered 'light', while virtually all other words (which would include my own medium and heavy-stressed groups) are regarded as 'stressed'. The two sets of criteria may therefore fairly be considered as largely identical, and any slight subjective differences there may be would certainly not be enough to explain variations of even 3 or 4%.7 As regards b), the answer is that the material examined differs considerably - and deliberately so. The 1,000 lines I investigated were purposely taken, in 3 practically equal portions, from 3 separate stages of Blok's development, as follows: Group A. 332 lines from 25 poems written between March 1900 and Feb. 1902; Group B. 336 lines from 15 poems written between Oct. 1905 and Aug. 1908; Group C. 332 lines from 15 poems written (or completed) between Jan. 1912 and June 1916. Total: 1,000 lines from 55 poems. The corresponding totals, with percentages, for the three groups separately are as follows :8

Group A.

%

Group B.

%

Group C.

%

1

2

3

4

5

85 25.6 93 27.6 84 25.3

28 8.4 26 7.8 33 10.0

12 3.6 33 9.8 56 16.9

181 54.5 150 44.7 129 38.8

26 7.9 30 8.9 27 8.1

262

87

101

460

83

6

No. of lines

0

332

-

4 1.2 3 0.9 7

336 332 1,000

From this, we see that certain forms tend to remain more or less uniform throughout all three periods, while others show sharp variations. To the ' For possible slight discrepancies in the assessment of lines opening with combined substitution, vide infra, p. 183. • The poems examined, in chronological order, are: Group A: Nos 36, 37, 38, 39, 42, 54, 60, 62, 63, 69, 72, 75, 77, 84, 89, 99, 102,110,119,120,131,140, 156, 157,160; Group B: 368, 376, 378, 379, 383, 387, 388, 390, 392, 394, 395, 399, 403, 404, 408; Group C: 630, 536, 539, 704, 629, 705, 707, 639, 749, 730, 752, 713, 554, 555, 565. (In Group C, the dates of final revision are considered operative, e.g. No. 536 is dated "1910-Jan. 1912", and No. 629 "1911-1914".)

163

LIGHT FEET

former belong the 4-stress line, the line with a light 1st foot, and the line with light 1st and 3rd feet combined (Forms 1, 2, and 5 respectively). As regards the others, the line with a light 3rd foot (Form 4) shows a steady decrease from 54.5% to 38.8%. The most spectacular change, however, is the emergence of the line with a light 2nd foot (Form 3). In Group A, this line occurs about once in every 30 lines; in Group B, once in every 10 lines; and in Group C, once in every 6 lines or so. It is also interesting that this tremendous increase does not entail any substantial change in the 6th form, which remains, with Blok, extremely rare. 9 Since, as we see, the incidence of Forms 1, 2, and 5 remains more or less constant, the obvious assumption is that the increase, with the passage of time, in the frequency of the light 2nd foot must take place in more or less direct proportion to the decrease in the incidence of the light 3rd foot. This is easily demonstrated by adding together the percentages for Forms 3 and 4 in each group, which gives us:

Form 3 Form 4

Group A

Group B

Group C

Overall %

3.6 54.5

9.8 44.7

16.9 38.8

10.1 46.0

58.1

54.5

55.7

56.1

Sengeli's figures give us:

Form 3 Form 4

13.5 41.2 54.7

- in other words, much the same percentage for the 2 forms together as that obtained in my own studies. As regards the ratio between Form 3 and Form 4, the poems examined by Sengeli would appear to fit in with the general trend noted in my three groups, at a point roughly half-way between Group B and Group C. Taken as they are from Blok's 3rd Book, it is perfectly possible (though unfortunately impossible to confirm) that the poems in question also fit chronologically into approximately the same position - covering, say, the years 1908 to 1912. In this respect, it * Sengeli found no examples, Belyj (apparently) four. Even among the 20th-century poets, its average incidence is only 1.5 %, the highest figures noted by Timofeev being Anna Axmatova (3 %) and Gumilev (2 %). (Problemy Stixovedenija, tables on pp. 213/4). Taranovski gives 3.8% (Gumilev 1912-18) and even 4.2% (Belyj 1903-09), but his overall mean is only 1.4%. For Blok, he gives 0.5% (1904-08), 1.5% (1907-16), and from 1.8% to 2.4% for Vozmezdie. (Ruski cetvorostopni jamb ... XXveka, Table.)

164

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

is also interesting to compare the averages given by Timofeev in respect of 9,063 lines taken from eight leading 20th-century poets (from In. Annenskij to Anna Axmatova, and including Blok), namely: 11.1% and 43.1 % respectively = 54.2 % together. In so far as there can fairly be held to be a chronological significance in the ratio of Form 3 to Form 4, these poems, taken as a whole, would come between Group B of Blok's poems on the one hand and Sengeli's group on the other. The progressive trend in the increase in Form 3 and the decrease in Form 4 would then look something like this:

Form 3 Form 4

Group A

Group B

Timofeev

Sengeli

Group C

3.6 54.5

9.8 44.7

11.1 43.1

13.5 41.2

16.9 38.8

To sum up, the general picture, as regards Blok's own verse, would seem to be: 1. A more or less constant incidence of 4-stress lines (Form 1), to the tune of about 26%. 2. A more or less constant incidence of lines with light 1st foot only (Form 2, 8-10%) and light 1st and 3rd foot combined (Form 5, 8-9%). 3. A progressive increase, with the passage of time, in the frequency of the line with light 2nd foot only (Form 3), accompanied by a more or less parallel decrease in the line with light 3rd foot only (Form 4), these two forms together accounting for about 55 % of lines at all times. Naturally, there are isolated poems - and especially isolated verses within poems - which reveal unusual, atypical, stress patterns. By and large, however, the overall picture would seem to reflect fairly faithfully certain general tendencies in stress distribution (or 'light foot' distribution) in Blok's 4-foot iambic verse - tendencies which in some cases remain more or less constant throughout but in others undergo changes apparently associated to some extent with the course of the poet's development.10 b) The 5-foot iamb.

With the 5-foot line, naturally enough, the number of possible com10 The very existence of these changes, incidentally, underlines the inescapable obligation incumbent on all investigators to give exact details of the material they are examining, and to select their material in such a way as either to eliminate the combination in one group of statistics of poems widely divergent in nature, or to make it possible to identify such divergencies and so exercise the necessary caution in interpreting results. These elementary principles are too often ignored. A shining exception is Taranovski. (Cf. Addendum to this chapter, p. 187, infra.)

165

LIGHT FEET

binations of stressed and unstressed (light-stressed) feet increases. In practice, 9 main types occur, viz. : u 1. Stresses in the arsis of all 5 feet. HeABibKHbiii cTpiarb, - xpaHHJii. orom. JiaMndflt.

(235)

2. Light arsis in 1st foot only. JaiweBejiHJiCH JIHCTI

(199)

CBHIUCHHOH

KHH™.

3. Light arsis in 2nd foot only. H JitcTHUz/a KpjrrdH B t TbMy BOflHJia. 4. Light arsis in 3rd foot only. MOH MeHTa, MOU 6e3MHTe»cHbiH apyrt.

(189) (196)

5. Light arsis in 4th foot only. YBliacy B c i x i > . . . H

cjia6o j>Jibi6Hycfe.

(300)

6. Light arsis in 1st and 3rd foot combined. Ocmeper&wufiu

cTpyiijica CBFRN».

(154)

7. Light arsis in 1st and 4th foot combined. M «epeniejrt rpaHiroyw nepry.

(85)

8. Light arsis in 2nd and 3rd foot combined. TOMWNEABHBIE NPOXORVUM MHRA.

9. Light arsis in 2nd and 4th foot combined ii H^BCTeyro, H B k p y w , H 3Haio,

(199)

(85)

Blok's poems also contain one extremely unusual line - apparently having light arsis in the 3rd and 4th foot combined - which we may provisionally call Form 10. The line has other peculiarities, and is examined later in this chapter (vide infra, pp. 185/6). Investigations into the pattern of the Russian 5-foot iamb have to some extent been handicapped by the relative scarcity of material available from any one poet - at least as far as rhyming verse is concerned. The Russian 5-foot line is, as we have already seen,12 nothing like so common as either its English counterpart or the Russian 4-foot line. This applies with particular force to the more modern Russian 11

The numeration of these 9 forms is the same as that given by Unbegaun (Russian Versification, table on p. 24, after Sengeli). Forms 6 and 8 are comparatively rare, but I feel that adherence to the same system will help to avoid confusion, and perhaps contribute towards some degree of uniformity, at least in the English literature on Russian versification! 1! Vide supra, Ch. II, p. 84.

166

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

poets, and Blok is no exception in this respect. My analysis is limited to a total of 464 lines from 30 poems, of which 25 are from the first Book and 5 from the third. There is thus little chance of drawing any 'chronological conclusions' similar to those noted for the 4-foot line. I have, however, again divided the material into 3 groups - this time unequal, and on a different basis, as follows: Group A. 18 poems from Book I having FMFM endings and abab rhyme scheme throughout and exclusively 5-foot lines, i.e. 100 % 'regular' poems. Group B. 7 further poems from Book I. Of these, 4 have MFMF endings (with abab rhymes). The other 3 have FMFM ¡abab, but contain occasional 4-foot or 6-foot lines (never more than two per poem); these lines are not, of course, included in the statistics. Group C. 5 poems from Book III, as 'regular' as those in Group A (with very minor exceptions).13 The totals and percentages for the three groups are as follows: 1 A.

2

3

4 16 7.2 4 4.2

%

54

12

4

24.2

5.4

1.8

%

24.8

B.

C.

24

2 2.0

9 9.3

5

6

1

8

97

3

21

0

43.4

9.4

—

37.0

1.0 2 2.0

36

5 5.2

9

10

Lines

0

224

0

97

1

143

1

464

17 7.6

2

13

2.0

13.4

%

35

8

16

8

53

0

5

2

15

24.5

5.6

11.2

5.6

37.0

—

3.5

—

10.5

%

113

22

29

28

186

5

31

4

45

24.4

4.7

6.3

6.1

40.0

1.1

6.7

0.8

9.7

—

—

—

—

100

Clearly, the examples of the rarer forms (6, 8, 10, and to some extent 2) are so few as to render even percentage values highly erratic and misleading. By contrast, factors which seem to be representative, and so of some significance, are : 1. The steady incidence of the 5-stress line (Form 1) - slightly lower than that noted for the 4-stress line in the 4-foot iamb (averages 24.4 % and 26.2 % respectively). 2. A fairly steady incidence of the line having a light penultimate " The poems in question are: Group A: 85, 100, 101, 108, 111, 114, 129, 149, 153, 154, 172, 180, 186, 196, 235, 250, 251, 300; Group B: 189, 213, 173, 199, 88, 104, 112 (of these, the first 4 have MFMF endings; all but the first two have one or two lines of other than 5 feet); Group C: 543, 567, 681, 638, 538 (No. 538 has MFMF endings in v. 1 and contains two 4-foot lines; No. 638 has MFFM/aW>a in v. 1).

167

LIGHT FEET

(here, 4th) foot (Form 5) - 40%, as compared with 46% in the 4-foot iamb (Form 4). w No deductions beyond this can be based on anything more than conjecture. It seems possible, however, that the sharp increase in light 2nd feet in the Book III poems 'corresponds' to the increase noted in the 4-foot line - though this would not explain the comparatively high incidence of such feet in the poems of Group B, which date from the same period as those in Group A.15 c) Make-up of light syllables in arsis. Let us now examine the composition of these light feet - or rather of the light syllables in arsis - with regard to the three types distinguished at the end of the previous chapter, viz.: 1) Secondary stress in polysyllabic words (intensy) coming before the main stress coming after the main stress 2) Unemphatic monosyllables (and occasionally disyllables) For the 4-foot iamb, the totals for each group are as follows: 1st Foot X

Group A. Group B. Group C.

-

-

,

44 40 47

—

131

Total

—

10 16 13

54 56 60

—

39

170

14 This, of course, applies to lines with light penultimate foot only. The total incidence of lines with light penultimate foot (i.e. including those combined with other light feet) shows a remarkably close resemblance between the two line-lengths, viz.:

Form

4-foot iamb

Form

5-foot iamb

4. 5. 6.

46.0 8.3 0.7

5. 7. 9.

40.0 6.7 9.7

Total 16

55.0%

Total

56.4%

Whether the M F M F ending-pattern in 4 of the Group B poems accounts for the discrepancies in distribution, it is hard to say. The incidence of light 2nd feet is nearly double that obtaining in the other 3 poems of this group (18/61 = 29.6% and 6/36 = 16.7% respectively, including combinations with other light feet) - but a mere total of 97 lines cannot be relied upon to exclude purely chance results.

168

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

2nd Foot Total

-

-

8 15 23

2 15 23

2 7 13

12 37 59

46

40

22

108

61 74 46

105 75 88

41 35 25

207 184 159

181

268

101

550

X

Group A. Group B. Group C.

3rd Foot Group A. Group B. Group C.

Putting these together, we get: 1st Foot 2nd Foot 3rd Foot

131 (77%) 46 (42%) 181 (33%)

40(37%) 268 (49%)

39(23%) 22(21%) 101 (18%)

170 108 550

TOTAL

358

308

162

828

%

43.2

37.2

19.6

100

These figures speak more or less for themselves. All in all, about 80% of the light syllables in arsis are formed by intensy and only 20 % by the lighter monosyllables and disyllables. This applies to all three feet. In the 1st foot, however (where the - type obviously cannot occur), the 80% or so is constituted entirely by the - form. In the 2nd foot, the two types of interna are about evenly divided (in Groups B and C, exactly so). In the 3rd foot, the - type predominates, constituting nearly 50% of all light syllables, while the * type makes up only about one-third of the whole. (In Group B, exceptionally, there is virtual parity between the two types). This is all more or less as we should expect, inasmuch as the i type must perforce dominate the first foot, while the - type naturally tends to become more frequent further along the metrical line. What of the lines containing 2 light feet in combination? For statistical purposes, this means, in practice, the line with light 1st and 3rd feet. Here, there are 6 possible combinations, viz.:

LIGHT FEET

a) * in the 1st arsis.

x

in the 3rd arsis. =

169 xx

H, 6H£M4BI> OTI, yflHBjiein»«, b)

(565)

x

in the 1st arsis. ~ in the 3rd arsis. = In this type, the ictus of the first 3 feet cover a single polysyllabic word, e.g.:

H, oKOJWOBaHHaa MH6H, c)

x

(565)

in the 1st arsis. ~ in the 3rd arsis. = H a yTtuieHbe, Ha 3a6lBy

(554)

d) ~ in the 1st arsis. x in the 3rd arsis. = ~ x H 6tt> KpyaceHta oxpaHio

(565)

e) ~ in the 1st arsis. ~ in the 3rd arsis. = ""

H Him MHCTHTOCKOH 3ard,njCOH

(102)

f) ~ in the 1st arsis. ~ in the 3rd arsis. =

H 6631. JIK>6BH, H 6&n> bcchm.

(84)

The distribution of these 6 combinations for the three groups of poems is: Light 1st and 3rd foot combined Group

Total

a (xx)

b(x-)

A B C

26 30 27

8 11 6

10 10 10

TOTAL

83

25

30

d("x)

e(")

f(")

5 2 5

0 5 3

2 0 2

1 2 1

12

8

4

4

c(x-)

In view of the predominance of £ over - in the first foot already noted, it is obvious that the first 3 forms will likewise predominate in the combinations. In fact, of the 83 cases under review, no less than 67 are formed by types a, b, and c. Light 2nd and 3rd foot combined. Only 7 examples of such lines were found (Group A - 0; B - 4 ; C - 3 ) . Of these, all four from Group B and one from Group C are of the ^ pattern, e.g.: H ,ne6pHMH oKpyaceHa (383) The remaining two in Group C have - in place of i in the 3rd foot, i.e. —, e.g.: H B3rjiHflbiBaeTi. Ha MeH».

(639)

In the 5-foot iamb, the light syllables in arsis are made up as follows:

170

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES -

X

1st Foot 2nd Foot 3rd Foot 4th Foot TOTAL

%

50(86%) 8 (10%) 26(68%) 95 (36%) 179 41.0

-

Total

66(85%) 4(11%) 127 (48%)

8(14%) 4(5%) 8(21%) 41 (16%)

58 78 38 263

197

61

437

14.0

100

45.0

The 1st and 4th feet show much the same pattern here as the 1st and 3rd feet of the 4-foot poems. In the 1st foot, the predominance of - is even greater (86 % as against 77 %), while the distribution of the three types in the penultimate foot is very similar in both cases. In the grand total, we find the proportion of much the same (41.0%: 43.2%), that of ^ somewhat less (14.0%: 19.6%), with the - form increased at the expense of both (45.0%: 37.2%). However, while the - form dominates the 2nd foot (and 4th foot), it is the - form which dominates the 3rd foot. This suggests that the 5-foot line tends to separate - from the point of view of word-division - into two halves (with or without actual caesura), many polysyllabic words ending on the 4th syllable of the line (more rarely, on the 5th), while others tend to begin on the 6th syllable of the line (more rarely, on the 5th). This is best illustrated by 4 examples: i) - on 4th syllable. Word ending on 4th syllable : M ì h j h o t c k , TeMHiioTT., r j i ó x H y r b c t Ì h m .

(213)

ii) - on 4th syllable. Word ending on 5th syllable: Be3pàflocTHbw Bcxóflan. ciMeHà.

(213)

iii) - on 6th syllable. Word beginning on 6th syllable: Ee3yMHbiH c m 4 x t > h

cj?Macmé,zpHÌH icpóia»!

(149)

iv) - on 6th syllable. Word beginning on 5th syllable: C M y m à e r b B à c i o u i n e H Ì B i n i è BHAI>.

(108)

If we look at the 5-foot line in this way, we find a rough equivalence in the distribution of light syllables for each 'half of the Une, viz. : X

Feet 1 and 2 Feet 3 and 4

58 (42.6%) 121 (40.2%)

-

66 (48.6%) 131 (43.5%)

-

12(8.8%) 49(16.3%)

Total 136 301

LIGHT FEET

171

2 light feet in combination. In the 5-foot iamb, two combinations of light feet occur with comparative frequency - the line with light 1st and 4th foot (Form 7) and that with light 2nd and 4th foot (Form 9). In the former, the same 6 possibilities apply as for the 4-foot iamb with light 1st and 3rd foot, viz.: Light 1st and 4th foot combined a (xx) b(x') 7 18

c(x") d f x ) 2 4

e(") 0

f(") 0

Roughly speaking, this follows the trend of the corresponding 4-foot line, the virtual absence of the - type of syllable being even more marked. Examples of the four types occurring in the lines examined are: a)

y H3rOJIOBbH, BT> TäÄHOH BÖpOXcGt,

(196)

b)

CbäpeHti uepKÖBHbiä cTyneHH,

(153)

c)

Ä H3Mtpäuii>, 6jiaaceHHbiH, y pyjiH.

(186)

d)

Mirfc h6 HaÖTH poaHbie 6eperä.

(114)

(Incidentally, all four examples of the type d) line noted are possible cases of [light] combined substitution in the opening foot.) In the line with light 2nd and 4th foot combined, 3 further possible combinations arise, as a result of the presence of - in the arsis of the second foot, viz.:

j) ~ (Of these, forms g) and j) have already been encountered in the 4-foot line with light 2nd and 3rd foot combined.) The figures in this case are: Light 2nd and 4th foot combined a (xx) b(x") c(x-) d("x) e ( " ) f C ) gfx) h r ) 2 2 0 0 18 19 0 0

i n 4

This is again as we should expect, given the marked predominance of -

172

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

in the 2nd foot. The eclipse of the - syllable (c, d, e, f, and j) is here almost complete. Examples of the five types actually encountered in Blok's verse are: a)

Bi BejiHKoii, H&ipecTciHHOH t h i h h h 4 .

b)

Th

g)

HecTpoHHbie jnoflcide rojiocd.

(250)

h)

O fl66jiecTHxi, o noflBHraxi, o cjiaBt

(567)

j)

cjibiunmib h&ctohiiuh

(85) (538)

cuoBa:

This is one of Blok's best known lines, and sets up a lilt, or cadence, all its own; it creates something of a paeonic impression, which is not surprising when one reflects that the distribution of the first 8 syllables is that of 2 perfect paeon II's. Indeed, with a feminine ending, as here, the line in isolation could be regarded as 3-foot paeonic II catelectic.1® (108) KpHKJiHBbM xyjieHb» Ha TBopua.

It remains to mention briefly the rare examples of Forms 6 and 8 (light 1st and 3rd foot; light 2nd and 3rd foot): Of the 5 examples of Form 6, 1 is of the — type: H b i OTxoAJimeH yBHA^Tb Becejibe. (199) 2 are of the ^ type (each covering one word, as in the 4-foot line): OcTeperdioiiiiH CTpyHJica cBtrb.

(154)

iicenpOHHK&IOmiH H 6jIH3Kift Kfc utjIH.

(173)17

1 has flHa,

(196)17

Tbi Hafli> MorHJioH - JiyHe3apHbiH xpaMt.

(114)17

Cb HUMb 3aoflHo h Ha 3axaTt and 1 has —: 14

This 'paeonic' interpretation applies, of course, to all the lines of Form 9, but is here reinforced by the word-division (diaeresis). The contrast with the usual English conception of iambic pentameter is very striking - though something of the same effect is produced, for instance, by Milton's lines (structurally, type j): His ministers of vengeance and pursuit (P.L. i. 170) or The sojourners of Goshen who beheld (P.L. i. 309) (Examples of lines with only 3 full stresses, cited by Egerton Smith, P.E.M., p. 74). 17 The lines from Nos 114, 173, and 196 are possible cases of combined substitution in the opening feet. On this point, vide infra, pp. 182ff.

LIGHT FEET

173

Of the 4 examples of Form 8, 3 follow the — type, e.g.: 3aBtmaHHoe HSIK>,ABH>KHOH niTopon,

(189)

n^tHHTejlbHblH ffflk 5KHBMXÏ. CJIOBâ,

(538)

while 1 has —

In the ^ type, we find the rare combination in one line of the tendency noted earlier for a polysyllabic word to end with the 4th (or 5th) syllable of the line and another to begin from the 6th (or 5th) syllable (vide supra, p. 170).

2. HEAVY F E E T ( " S P O N D E E S " )

a) The 4-foot iamb. In the 1,000 lines examined, I found only 20 instances of feet which could conceivably be labelled 'spondees' - and all of these at the opening of the line. As we have already seen, such feet do occur in other parts of the line, but they are extremely rare, with Blok as with most Russian poets.18 Of the 20 heavy feet in question, no less than 12 begin with what we may call - for want of a better all-embracing term - 'auxiliary' words, viz.: 3fffeci, (4), TaMi (3), IlycTi, (2), Bet (2), and Bee (1). Of these, the 18 Cf. examples in Ch. Ill, pp. 128/9 (Nos 628, 213, and 548). Belyj noted the maximum incidence of 'spondees' in the verse of Vjaceslav Ivanov (Simvolizm, p. 627) but, as we have seen, his examples are highly suspect, and his estimated incidence (one-tenth of that of 'pyrrhics') is certainly far too high, as applied to other than the first foot of the line (cf. Ch. Ill, p. 127, incl. notes 40 and 41). - 2irmunskij mentions the wider use of heavy feet among some 18th-century poets, notably Derzavin, whose verse he describes as producing a 'laboured' impression in consequence {VVM., pp. 50/51, with examples from Derzavin; also pp. 102/103). - In his Russian Versification, Unbegaun begins by declaring that, "... whether in an iambic metre strong (even) syllables can be stressed or not, weak (odd) syllables are always unstressed." (p. 38). True, he goes on to admit that sometimes the first syllable in the line "commands the stress", but maintains that this stress is "purely emphatic" - by which is presumably meant that it is syntactical or logical stress rather than metrical. The examples from Blok listed earlier (pp. 128/9, supra) should be sufficient to disprove this surprising assertion. Sengeli only deals en passant with the 'spondee' in his Traktat (e.g. pp. 35/6), and likewise in his Prakt. Stix. In the latter (pp. 61/2), he states that " . . . all iambic metres allow the substitution of iambic feet by the spondee on condition that the first word of the spondee be monosyllabic" (!). As far as the opening foot is concerned, this 'condition' is, of course, not so much a rule to be adhered to as the prerequisite of the existence of a 'spondee' at all.

174

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

last two are probably no more than half-stresses, followed in each instance by another half-stressed word ('medium spondees'), e.g.: Bern 3TH paflocTHbie a h h : Bee mo, nero He cicaaceinb CJIOBOMI,

(60) (630)

5 others have monosyllabic nouns or verbs (full stress) in thesis, followed either by a further monosyllable (2 cases), e.g.: Ilumb uaii,

OTmejiKHBaa cHen>,

(749)

a disyllable (1 case): ffeHb 6ii,Abiu

ci. HOHbK) rojiy6oio

(378)

or a trisyllable (2 cases), e.g.: TKapb toHocmu npocTbijn> - H BOTT.

(555)

The remaining 3 feet are 'spondees', if at all, largely by virtue of the punctuation, which in each case tends to arrest the rhythm after the first syllable and so lend it added emphasis, viz.: Hmo MCb\ Tlycmb npomefliueMy 3a6Bem>e ffa. Hacb

roaa

He H3M!>HHJIH.

(63)

(379)

K a K i MaJIO BI. 3TOH »CH3HH HaflO

HaMb, dmrnxMb - H T e 6 t H MHT. b ) The 5-foot

(629)

iamb.

In the 464 5-foot lines examined, I found 12 examples of 'spondees' again, only at the opening of the line. Of these, only one begins with a 'main' monosyllable (noun),19 viz.: Bb dnu ceadedb,

B t AHH poxeflemfi, n o x o p o H t ;

(154)

The remaining 11 examples have 'auxiliary' words in thesis, namely: TaMt (6, including 4 in No. 189), 3fltcb (4), and Bet (1), e.g.: TaMb zyjib rnaroBi, Tepajica H ncne3i.

(189)

" For another possible spondee (monosyllable followed by half-stress in a compound word), vide infra, pp. 185/6 (line from No. 538).

HEAVY FEET

175

c) Incidence of "spondees" in first foot. The incidence of heavy opening feet in Blok's iambic verse is thus: 4-foot iamb. 5-foot iamb.

20 cases in 1,000 lines = 2.0% 12 cases in 464 lines = 2.6%

Together

32 cases in 1,464 lines = 2.2%

The significance of these figures will be discussed later in this chapter, after an examination of the third unusual type of opening foot - namely, that involving combined substitution.

3. COMBINED SUBSTITUTION

a) Incidence. In analysing the incidence of combined substitution ('trochaic substitution', 'choriambic substitution', 'reversal of stress', etc.), we again run up against the problem of numerous borderline cases, the exact interpretation of which may well vary from one reader to the next. In particular, the English investigator must beware of seeing, or 'reading"1, such substitution in places where, for the Russian, it often does not exist the whole phenomenon (whatever it may be called) being far more marked and more widespread in English iambic verse than in its Russian counterpart. 20 At the same time, there is clearly much difference of opinion (or of sensation) between English and Russian prosodists themselves (i.e. each as regards his own native verse). We have already seen that Belyj, in practice, largely failed to recognise examples, while both Tomasevskij and Zirmunskij tend to disregard, or at least 'play down', cases which are yet accepted as self-evident by Nedobrovo and, notably, by Sengeli in his Traktat.21 True, none of these investigators recognises the combined nature of this form of substitution, but the last two are at least clear as to the so Not only is the incidence of combined substitution as such far higher in English verse but it may occur in virtually any foot (or feet) of the iambic line - a point mentioned, inter alia, by Zirmunskij (VVM., pp. 83/4). For English usage, cf. esp. Egerton Smith, P.E.M., Ch. VII (pp. 55-65), passim. While the degree of stress in Russian verse is often far less than in English, the decisive factors - this cannot be overemphasised - remain the relativity of stress between the syllables in question and, in particular, the existence of a compensatory pause (even if no more than a fractional hesitation) in recitation. On this point, vide supra, Ch. i n , pp. 143/4. 11 Cf. Traktat, Ch. HI, pp. 24-33 generally.

176

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

predominance, in scansion, of the first syllable in the line over the second. In fact, Sengeli comes probably as near as any Russian investigator to understanding the real nature of the phenomenon. On the one hand, he points to the triple-time nature of the 'choriamb' (as he calls it) ;22 on the other, he recognises that the 'trochee' in mid-line (at least when preceded by a 'pyrrhic') invokes a preliminary pause - which, however, like others before him, he mistakes for a 'thought' pause (smyslovaja ostanovka) instead of a metrical one.23 On the other hand, his explanation of the predominance, in Russian combined substitution, of his '1st modulation' ( = monosyllable as first word) is ingenuous as well as ingenious, and confirms that the combined nature of the substitution still escapes him.24 In view of the uncertainties and purely subjective differences of sensation that exist on this point, I have tried to draw a distinction, in analysing Blok's verse, between cases of combined substitution which must, I feel, by any standards, be considered definite and those others which may be termed either probable, possible (as I prefer), questionable, or even doubtful, according to individual approach. In so doing, the tendency has been, if anything, to err on the side of caution, i.e. to underestimate the number of definite cases at the expense of the possible ones. The vast majority of cases occur in the first foot of the line (more accurately, in the lst/2nd feet). My findings here were as follows: Definite 1. 4-foot iamb

M

A. B. C.

Possible

Maximum

No. of lines examined

18 16 12

17 6 8

35 22 20

46 (4.6%)

31 (3.1%)

77 (7.7%)

1,000

2. 5-foot iamb

21 (4.5%)

19 (4.1%)

40 (8.6%)

464

3. Total

67 (4.6%)

50 (3.4%)

117 (8.0%)

1,464

332 336 332

"From the metrical point of view, the choriamb ... is nothing else than a dactylic dimeter truncated by two syllables ... or, to put it more simply, a segment of any triple-time metre from [one] arsis to the arsis of the following foot inclusive." (Traktat, p. 40, my italics). But vide infra, note 32 of this chapter, pp. 181/2. 83 Prakt. Stix., p. 62. For a similar interpretation in English prosody, cf. Chap. HI, p. 131, note 48 (Liddell, cited by T. S. Omond). " Traktat, p. 43. Sengeli throughout uses the vertical line to indicate word division, and gives his 1st modulation as: - | *-» ^ - (p. 38). If we keep this scheme, but apply it to the more usual indication of foot division, we have almost the complete picture of true combined substitution! Nor is this altogether chance. The predominance of the monosyllabic opening in Russian combined substitution (which is a fact) is probably

177

COMBINED SUBSTITUTION

In the 4-foot poems, there is perhaps a slight decrease in frequency with the passage of time but, with so few examples to work on, it is impossible to exclude purely chance results. By and large, the incidence seems fairly constant, both between the 4-foot groups separately and between the 4-foot and 5-foot poems as a whole. The overall average incidence is thus at least 4.6% and at (absolute) most 8.0%, depending on individual interpretation. Let us now compare these results with Sengeli's figures for some of the leading Russian poets (including Blok) : 28

Puskin Lermontov Tjutcev Fet BLOK

No. of lines examined

'Choriamb' in feet 1 and 2

Incidence

12,806 1,847 1,879 1,078 846

514 100 189 91 58

4.0 5.4 10.0 8.45 6.85

%

The figures for Blok suggest that Sengeli would consider the majority of my 'possible' cases as 'definite' - 6.85% of 1,464 would represent a total of 99 cases, i.e. would include 32 of my 50 'possibles'; or - if we confine ourselves, like Sengeli, to the 4-foot poems - 69 out of an absolute maximum of 77 (i.e. 23 out of 31 'possibles'). b) Make-up. Analysing the make-up of the lines opening with combined substitution, we find:26 For the 4-foot iamb: 1. 14 lines open with monosyllabic nouns or verbs (full stress). Of these, 11 are followed by intensy (-) in polysyllabic words, the latter being either of 3 syllables (4 cases); Honb nojibixuemb 3ejieHbiMi cBfrroMT., 4 syllables (3 cases); Houb, jiedxHax pa6b

KaHaJia,

(376) (539)

not least due to the fact that it brings about diaeresis - i.e. word-division, for once, coincides with foot-division, at least for the opening foot. Cf., for example: X KpoBb | oGarpiin. | ajiTapb | JIK>6BH. (632) (where, exceptionally, diaeresis is maintained throughout the line). 25 This table is selected and adapted (with the addition of percentage values) from Table 11 on p. 39 of Sengeli's Traktat. " In order to avoid needless confusion, only the 'definite' cases are discussed here.

178

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

5 syllables (2 cases); Iflumh

ocAibnume/ibHO

CBepKyniif

(404)

or 6 syllables (2 cases); Cum

yMupawufazo

nun.

(395)

The remaining 3 are immediately followed by light monosyllables (-), which are followed in turn by words of 2, 3, and 4 syllables respectively, viz.: Pycb, m ceouxb

n p o c T o p a x t , TM,

(383)

flau MHJb naxynuxb, ^yuiHbixi. 3ejiiii

(390)

Bmcmb o coKuzaioufeMb

(730)

XpacTi.

2. 12 lines open with 'auxiliary' monosyllables (including, in addition to those mentioned under the 'spondees', such words as: Bdpyzb, Bnoeb, Jlutub, TaKb). Of these, 9 are followed by polysyllabic words, i.e. with intensy (-) as the second syllable in the line, as in group 1 above, e.g.: Bmeb pa34UAucb

BI>

ayuit

Moeii.

(62)

The remaining 3 are immediately followed by light monosyllables (-), e.g.: Bee

3a J i y n o M i c T p e M H T c a TaiiHO

(38)

3. 4 lines open with a monosyllabic personal pronoun immediately followed by a further light monosyllable, e.g.: Tbi 6AH MeHH ocTaHOBHjia

(368)

Two of these - in consecutive lines - undergo combined substitution by virtue of logical emphasis (contrast), and have already been noted earlier (cf. Chap. Ill, p. 134, example from No. 63). 4. 9 lines open directly with intensy (-) in polysyllabic words of 4 syllables (2 cases), e.g.: EndzocAoeeHb npomeaniiil com».

(77)

5 syllables (4 cases), e.g.: TlepeoHandAbHou

HHCTOTM.

(383)

179

COMBINED SUBSTITUTION

6 syllables (2 cases), e.g. : HdeopoMcdemoMy

(36)

HaBcrpiny

7 syllables (1 case): CdedmAwufdn rpycTb...

(639)

5. 7 lines open with disyllabic words. None of the examples noted here bears more than, at most, a medium stress. They include the words MAU (5 cases), Hmo6bi (1 case), and Ilepedb (1 case). These are followed by: 2 monosyllables (1 case): MAU MOU eudb BHymaerb acaJiocTb?

(639)

Monosyllable + polysyllable (1 case): Hmo6u omb ucmumi xoflaneii

(394)

Disyllable (2 cases), e.g.: Ilepedb To6ou He naaaTb

(54)

HHUT>.

Tetrasyllable (3 cases), e.g.: MAU - 3a6eeHHbin MCJTM

(131)

For the 5-foot iamb: The 5-foot lines include in addition one of the rare examples of a trisyllabic opening, viz.: nepedo

MHOH

cismo Ha CTOJIT

(567)

which we may call Type 6. Also one 'miscellaneous' line: HtbftVb, xomb

BT> KOHIJT TpeBOHCHarO CKHTaHbH

(112)

which we may classify, for simplicity's sake, under Type 2. The distribution of the various types of opening for the 4-foot and 5-foot lines is thus as follows: Type:

1

2

3

4

5

6

Total

4-foot: 5-foot:

14 4

12 15

4 0

9 0

7 1

0 1

46 21

Together

18

27

4

9

8

1

67

It is at once clear that the monosyllabic opening (Types 1, 2, and 3) is

180

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

by far the commonest - a feature already noted by Sengeli in his TraktatP It is however, patently untrue to assert, as Sengeli did on another occasion, that in combined ('trochaic') substitution the stress of the 'trochaic foot' must fall on a monosyllable.28 Nor does there seem the slightest justification for Zirmunskij's denunciation of a disyllabic opening by 20th-century poets as constituting an "artificial deformation of the iambic movement".29 Rare such examples may be - as Tomasevskij admits;30 particularly rare if we disregard, like 2irmunskij, those disyllabic prepositions and conjunctions which in fact constitute all 9 of the cases just cited from Blok. But to say that other, indisputable, cases are rare, or unusual, is not at all the same thing as saying that they 'must not' occur, or that they constitute an "artificial deformation". In Blok's poem No. 566 (mentioned in the previous chapter, but not included in the 1,000 lines examined above), we find no less than five instances

of full-stress

opening feet

disyllables

of basically XoAodb

h

iambic

producing lines,

combined

MpaKi> rp$mymHXT>

flHeñ!

CoAHife He BCTaHerb. Eydbme

substitution

in

the

namely:

(twice: lines 4 and 29) (line 23)

act j o b o j i l h h j k i o h m o CBoeft,

Tuuie BOflbi, x HÓxce TpaBbi!

(line 26) (line 27)

In the same way, we already observed an example in the basically iambic opening to the coda of No. 759: CrapHio.,

TepnH

T.HMCKÍÜ

HEAYRB,

H Tbi, Moii apyri., Tepnn h cnn, etc. 27

(759)

Vide supra, p. 176 (incl. note 24). The proportion of monosyllabic to disyllabic openings in the figures listed from Sengeli (p. 177, supra) is: Puskin 456:58, Lermontov 91:9, Tjutcev 170:19, Fet 90:1, Blok 55:3 (Traktat, p. 39, Table 11). 28 Prakt. Stix., p. 61. 29 Zirmunskij's assertion (VVM., p. 50) that disyllabic openings were not used by 18th and 19th century poets is belied by Sengeli's statistics, also by Taranovski ( R D R , pp. 15-22 and 33/34). Makovskij (p. 153) accuses Blok of a 'rhythmical lapsus'' in line 10 of No. 615, but the lapsus is in fact his own ("Bcma/ia so eceMb..." in place of Blok's: "Bcmaemb bo B c e M i . n i a i n n a H C K O M t 6 n e c K i , " ) ! ,0 Russkoe stixoslozenie, p. 27.

COMBINED SUBSTITUTION

181

It is, of course, possible to regard all combined substitution as a type of 'deformation'. What is difficult to see, however, is what deformation any of the above lines produce that is not equally produced by the monosyllabic opening, such as, say: JIMCU

u KOBapcTBy

Mtpw

h£ti>

(566)

Yet this is what 2irmunskij's statement inevitably implies. On the contrary, there seems every reason to support Unbegaun's view that, in cases of combined substitution, "... the first word of the line may also be a disyllable".31 Indeed, I would go even further and say that there is no a priori reason why the first word should not be a trisyllable. The one example noted in the lines under review: Ilepedo mhoh ciflJio Ha c T O J i t .

(567)

opens, it is true, with no more than a half-stress (even less, perhaps), but there can be no doubt whatever as to which of the first three syllables takes up the metrical stress, and combined substitution is here a matter, not of perception, but of fact. Nor can it be ruled out of court as simply an example of 20th-century "artificial deformation." Did not the great, the 'classical', Puskin write, in 1825: Si noMHio nyflHoe MrHOBem>e:

Ilepedo mhoh ABHJiacb tm, (Kb A. IT. Kepm. I/p. 310) To sum up. Where combined substitution takes place in the opening feet of the line, the first word is, in the vast majority of cases, a monosyllable (Types 1, 2, and 3). It may, however, perfectly well be a disyllable (Type 5, and examples just mentioned), and possibly a trisyllable (Type 6, of the Ilepedo kind). Finally, it may be - and quite often is - a polysyllabic word (of 4 syllables and upwards) in which the pre-stress intensa (*) falls, for some reason, not on the second syllable of the word but on the first (Type 4). The combinations that may follow the opening word are such as provide a definite stress (though not necessarily a full one) on the fourth syllable of the line - assuming, of course, that this is not already covered by the first word itself.32 31

Russian Versification, p. 38. Unbegaun refers to trochaic 'replacement'. On p. 39, he cites a disyllabic opening from Dolgorukij. ai In all the 29,419 lines he examined, Sengeli apparently found no single example of the trisyllabic opening (Traktat, p. 39). At the same time, he would presumably have recognised the Ilepedo opening, inasmuch as he recognises Ileped among the disyllabic

182

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

c) Combined substitution and'light' feet. The fact that combined substitution can - and frequently does - take place even where the first stress is no more than an intensa (-) of a polysyllabic word raises the question as to how such lines should be regarded, in general, from the point of view of the presence or absence of light feet. The fact that the second syllable in the line (which normally coincides with the arsis of the first foot) is always unstressed in such cases is no reason for classifying such lines automatically with those having light opening feet, since - even for those who persist in regarding tbe first foot as a 'trochee' - the foot as such still has its own stress (of greater or lesser degree) in arsis. Indeed, the very fact that the first syllable (even if only an intensa) establishes predominance over the

words producing 'choriambic' substitution (p. 40). The theoretical example he gives for the trisyllabic opening (or 3rd modulation, as he calls it) is:

TeMHaa

hohb

This seems unobjectionable enough, and it is hard to see why it should produce any more 'deformation' than his 2nd modulation: A j i m h 3aicaT Where, however, a rather similar line occurs at the end of an otherwise iambic poem of 2ukovskij's (19 Marta 1823):

. . . TaMl> Bet CBHTbia O H e 6 t MbicjiH. 3Bt3flbi He6eci>! Tuxan h o h b ! Sengeli maintains (p. 52) that it (and the line preceding it) are formed, "not by choriambs of the second and third modulation, but by two-foot dactyls catalectic". (But see his Texnika stixa [1960], where Sengeli contrasts the free use of di- and trisyllabic openings in English, and refers to recent attempts to introduce such a 'long' ('dolgim') choriamb into Russian verse also [p. 139].) - For a trisyllabic opening from Derzavin (!), cf. RDR, pp. 33/34, note 43. - Apart from the single case of ITepedo, certain polysyllabic compound words produce what is virtually the equivalent of a trisyllabic opening, e.g. Blok's

3djidmd(=)Kyxpbw

Anrem> ahh ...

(197)

and even (though not a compound): AdpiarwiGCKoVL j i i o 6 6 b h - . . .

(599)

(vide supra, Ch. Ill, pp. 134/5). There is also the interesting case of two trisyllabic openings in No. 362:

ffibeyiuKd nijia bt> uepKOBHOMt xopt ... and:

Cemm/iyio hch3hi> ce6t o6p£jiH. Though this poem is a doVnik (i.e. in pure-tonic metre, with mixed disyllabic and trisyllabic 'feet'), the remaining 14 lines of the poem all open with 'iambic' feet (monosyllabic anacrusis). These two openings may therefore fairly be considered as 'equivalent' to combined substitution. On this point, vide infra, Ch. VIII, p. 271.

COMBINED SUBSTITUTION

183

second syllable (which latter is always 'reinforced' to some extent by the expected iambic mental beat) is proof that the former bears, relatively speaking, a clearly marked stress of sorts. At first sight, then, it would seem logical to consider all lines opening with combined substitution as 'stressed' in the first foot. Since, however, in our statistics, the - syllable (pre-stress interna) is normally considered as producing only a light-stressed foot, we have adopted the same system of classification even in lines opening with combined substitution, where intensy are likewise regarded as equivalent to light stress (and are included with other examples o f s y l l a b l e s in arsis), while lines opening with full or half-stress (monosyllables or disyllables) are considered as constituting 'heavy' feet. This method is not so illogical as might at first appear, inasmuch as: i) The object of the - - distinction is primarily to establish the actual ratio between these three types of light syllable as such, irrespective of their (greatly varying) degrees of stress.33 ii) The 'light' foot, as its name implies and as I have always been careful to point out, is in fact lightly stressed, and not '««stressed'. There is thus nothing illogical in even a 'light' syllable establishing predominance over another syllable which, by relapsing into thesis, is deprived of stress altogether.34 d) Combined substitution outside the first foot. In the 4-foot iamb, I noted 11 instances of possible combined substitution outside the first foot of the line (i.e. other than in feet 1 and 33

Cf. Ch. Ill, p. 155, note 90, supra. Sengeli's attitude towards polysyllabic words introducing combined substitution is not quite clear. The fact that he mentions only 3 possible modulations (mono-, di-, and tri-syllabic opening words) suggests that he disregards them altogether for purposes of calculating combined ('choriambic') substitution. On the other hand, he considers disyllabic components of compound (hyphenated) words as coming within Modulation 2 (Traktat, p. 40). It seems probable that he would disregard, say, openings such as: Coe/iHHaiomaa rpycTb... (639) Whether, on the other hand, he would see 'choriambs' in lines like: 31

or

EjiarocjioBjiHK) Bee, HTO 6biJio,

(630)

nepefl3aKaTHaa 3apa

(392)

we cannot tell, however definite they may seem to us. If, as I believe, Sengeli disregards at least the 'lesser' interna openings, this might explain the difference between his average figures (6.85 %) and my maximum (7.7 %). But the difference is not large, and could, of course, perfectly well exist even if the two studies were carried out according to identical criteria but with different material. Cf. in general Traktat, pp. 38/40.

184

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

2); on rare occasions, the two phenomena occur in one and the same line. Of these cases, 8 may be regarded as 'probable' and 3 as 'possible'. Of the probable cases, five occur in the 3rd foot (3rd/4th) of the line. Of these again, four involve intensy, e.g. : Ha rójioci» t b ò h |

x KÓJioKOJià

A ò h i , u b ì t m I x népeflaBàa,

(408) (639)

while one is based on a disyllabic preposition : IloBéprHyTb h h u t . | x n è p e f l t eflHHbiMi

(62)

One other occurs in the 2nd foot (2nd/3rd) of the line - also with an intensa: TBOHXI. I x nèpBOHaHàjibHMX'b JIÌTI».

(120)

The remaining two possibly involve combined substitution in 1st and 3rd feet combined (i.e. strictly speaking, in all 4 feet of the line). The first is: (536) X Hjih BOCTÓpri. | x càM03a6BéHbH The second is admittedly somewhat questionable, and depends on syntactical emphasis (in this case, contrast) for its 'choriambic' scansion, viz.: X A nofloméjib - | x mbi OTOuuià,36

(408)

The 3 'possible' cases all depend, in the last resort, on one and the same consideration - the predominance or otherwise of the particle ne- when it opens (as in all 3 cases concerned) a pentasyllabic word, e.g.:36 riycKaìi flyinà | x HeHcufcjiHMa -

OHà h bì. cHaxi> | x Heo6wiaHHa.

(77)

(383)

In the 5-foot iamb, 1 noted a total of 6 instances (in 464 lines). Of these, one occurs in the 3rd foot (logical emphasis) : Tbi CKàxeeim> BCK0Jib3b: - | x Kàici. | ò h i jik>6hjii> | m c h h ! (196) 35

For a further example, cf. Ch. Ill, p. 135 (example from No. 62). On the problem of He- in polysyllabic words, vide supra, Ch. Ill, p. 141, incl. note 66. A good example of how He- can take the stress in such words is provided by Tjutiev's famous line: 36

HènCTOmÓMblfl, HèHCHHCJIHMbW, which is, of course, in dactylic metre (Slézy, p. 134). For a similar example from Blok, vide infra, Ch. VI, p. 210 (example from No. 711).

COMBINED SUBSTITUTION

185

Four others occur in the 4th foot of the line (4th/5th). Of these, three involve intensy, e.g.: CKpeacemymiii Hecen> | x TaKC0M0T0pt.

(538)

while the other again derives from the word nepedb: H T&Hb MOH npoiifleTb | X n^peflt TO6OK>

(638)

The sixth example affords us one of the most 'irregular' - and scansionally most interesting - of all Blok's iambic lines. It is, together with the line immediately following it: B t 3ajn> MHOROJUOFLHBRA H MHOFOKOJIOHHWH C n i m a r b MepTBeu,i>. Ha HCMT. - H3HIUHMH 4>paia>.

(538)

If the second half of the line were 'normal', the opening might be read as combined substitution, viz.: X B i 3djn. | MH6rojiibfl|HbiH . . .

i.e. with the full stress of 3am> predominating, and so taking much of the (secondary) stress off the first syllable of the following word. In the second half of the line, however, it is precisely this secondary stress on MHOZO which itself asserts supremacy and brings about combined substitution, the first syllable being separated from the main stress of the word not, as earlier, by one but by two intervening syllables (MHSBOKOJlOHHblii).

Have we, then, simply combined substitution in the 1st and 4th feet? If so, the 'theoretical' scansion would then be: X Bl> 3cUTb | MH6r6jIK>fl|HMH H | X MHd|r6KdjIOH|HHH In practice, however, this meets the requirements neither of the metre (since the conjunction V is not strong enough to correct the 'upset' done to the rhythm by the first case of combined substitution); nor of the sense (since V leads on to the next word, and cannot well be separated from it by a compensatory pause). The answer, then, seems to be to transpose the relative position of the pause and the u. This involves putting a compensatory pause in place of the arsis of the 3rd foot - an unusual but, as we shall see elsewhere, by no means impossible arrangement. 37 Our scansion would then be: X Bl> 3ajll> | MHOrOJIIOfl|HMH i | ft MHO |TOKOJIOH |HblH 37

On this point, cf., for instance, Ch. VII, p. 230, infra (No. 566, line 6).

186

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN IAMBIC METRES

which seems to correspond most closely to the conditions of natural (prose) declamation. If we reject combined substitution in the opening part of the line, the first foot must be regarded as a type of spondee, the half(?)-stress of MHO (-rojnoflHbffl) being reinforced by the iambic 'mental beat' to equate it with the full stress on 3am (itself 'weakened' by being in thesis) : 38 Bi> 3 MH6|roJiK)fl|mjiH ^ | h MHo|roKoji6H|Htiii

An interesting commentary on this line is the fact that - although it reads well enough within its 5-foot iambic context - it would, taken in isolation, almost certainly be mistaken for a 4-foot dactylic line catalectic, viz.: Bfc 3cUTt> MHOr6|jIK)AHMH H I MHOrOKO jjIOHHLlif (x)

Such is the power of metre, and of the mental beat! To sum up, these findings suggest that, apart from the opening foot (actually, two feet), combined substitution tends to occur most often in the 3rd foot of the 4-foot line (less often in the 2nd foot) and in the 4th foot of the 5-foot line (less often in the 3rd); in other words, like the 'light' arsis, mainly in the penultimate foot of the line. With so few examples to work on, the average incidence is hard to gauge - is, perhaps, altogether meaningless. In the 4-foot line, it would seem to lie between 0.8 and 1.1% (8 to 11 cases in 1,000 lines!). This figure, for what it is worth, closely corresponds with the average incidence noted by Sengeli among 12 poets ranging from Derzavin to I. Severjanin, and including Blok.39 In the 5-foot poems, the incidence would seem at first sight to be roughly the same (6 cases in 464 lines = 1.3%). Here, however, we must beware. Whereas the 11 cases in the 4-foot poems are fairly evenly distributed among different poems and the different (chronological) groups of poems, 40 five of the six cases noted in the 5-foot poems are concentrated in 2 poems out of the 30 investigated - and both these 58

For other spondees opening 5-foot iambic lines, vide supra, p. 174. The average overall incidence noted by Sengeli among a total of 29,419 lines is 0.85% for the 3rd foot (250 cases) and 0.22% for the 2nd foot (65 cases). Strangely enough, the only poet in whom he found a higher incidence in the 2nd foot than in the 3rd was Blok (0.47% and 0.24% respectively). But this result - representing a mere 4 and 2 cases respectively (!) - is of little significance, and is, in fact, not supported by my own findings, as we have seen. (Percentages calculated from Table 11 on p. 39 of Sengeli's Traktat). 40 The distribution is: Group A - 3 probable, 1 possible; B - 3 probable, 2 possible; C - 2 probable, 0 possible. 3 poems contain 2 examples each (Nos 62, 408, and 383 2 possible); otherwise, each example comes from a single separate poem. 38

187

COMBINED SUBSTITUTION 41

belong to the small group from the 3rd Book. The chronological significance of this is not clear. What is clear is that we are, in the circumstances, hardly justified in suggesting an incidence of 1.3% for 30 poems (464 lines) when in fact the incidence for 28 of these poems (381 lines) is precisely 0.26% (i.e. 1 case) - another warning, if ever there was one, against the dangers of reading too much into statistics which are not based on uniform material and are thus in no way representative.42

ADDENDUM

Taranovski's exhaustive work on the 4-foot iamb during the first quarter of the XXth century43 was received too late for incorporation in the main body of this study. His figures for Blok's lyrical verse (adapted to Unbegaun's categories) are as follows: No. of lines examined

1

2

3

4

5

6

Ante Lucent 1898-1900 1901-1904 (Book II) 1904-1908 (Book III) 1907-1916

358 874 1308 1865

33.8 27.0 29.7 29.6

8.1 7.3 10.3 9.4

2.2 6.8 10.5 13.0

49.2 48.6 40.0 39.6

6.7 10.3 9.0 6.9

— — 0.5 1.5

Mean of 11 poets (33 chronological groups)

17375

30.0

7.9

11.2

40.9

8.6

1.4

By and large, these figures tally with my own findings - in particular, as regards the progressive rise, with time, in Form 3 and the roughly parallel fall in Form 4 (vide supra, pp. 163/4). At the same time, Taranovski's figures for the full 4-stress line (Form 1) are consistently somewhat higher, while those for Form 4 (except in Book III) are lower than mine. His figures for Form 2 all come virtually within my limits of 8-10%, except the 1901-1904 group ( = 7.3%). 41

I.e. Group C. Two are from No. 538, three from No. 638. For three examples of ('light') combined substitution mid-line, concentrated in a poem only eight lines long, cf. Lermontov's Blagodarnost1 (lines 1, 7, and 8): 3 a BCÒ, 3a Bcè T e 6 » | x ö j i ä r o a a p i ö A . . . 42

YCTPÓFI JIHIUB TÄKI, I X HTÒ6M T e 6 a OTHLIHÌ

H e f l ó j i r o à e m è | x 6jiäro,napHjn>. 43

(11/89)

Ruski cetvorostopni jamb u prvim dvema decenijama XX veka (In: Juznoslovenski filologa XXI, pp. 15-43, + 1 Table).

CHAPTER V

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TROCHAIC METRES

1. L I G H T F E E T ( " P Y R R H I C S " )

a) The 4-foot trochee. In the Commentary to his study of the comparative morphology of the 4-foot iamb, Belyj also gave a preliminary list of figures based on a study of the 4-foot trochaic line, likewise from the point of view of the incidence of 'pyrrhic' feet. His material was nothing like so extensive as for the iamb, but it did constitute a starting-point, and subsequent studies have since confirmed, broadly speaking, the general tendencies to which Belyj originally called attention. These were, very briefly, that, compared with the 4-foot iamb: i) The total incidence of light feet ('accelerations of rhythm') was higher; ii) The incidence of 'pyrrhics' in the 3rd foot was rather less; iii) The incidence of 'pyrrhics' in the 2nd foot was far less; iv) The incidence of 'pyrrhics' in the 1st foot was nearly twice as high. Moreover (a point not mentioned by Belyj), the incidence of lines having 2 light feet in combination is also appreciably higher in the trochaic form - usually 2 to 3 times as high as in the iamb. The significance of this we shall see shortly. The figures given by Belyj in respect of 4 leading poets were:1 Light Feet

Zukovskij PuSkin Lermontov Brjusov 1

Of which, combined

1st

2nd

3rd

Total

lst/3rd

2nd/3rd

lst/2nd

226 272 270 179

9 3 6 0

294 321 276 265

529 596 552 444

94 150 126 60

2 0 0 0

1 0 0 0

Cf. Simvolizm, p. 628. As with the iamb, the figures for combined pyrrhics (two in one line) are included in the other totals. (The total for Brjusov is wrongly given by Belyj as 384.)

189

LIGHT FEET

If we now take the same 6 forms (line patterns) as for the 4-foot iamb, and convert these figures into percentages, we get:2

¿ukovskij Puskin Lermontov Brjusov

1

2

3

4

5

6

27.6 25.0 28.5 35.5

22.0 20.5 24.2 20.0

1.0 0.5 1.0

33.1 28.8 25.0 34.4

15.8 25.2 21.3 10.1

0.35

—

— — —

At first sight, it may seem surprising that a higher total incidence of light feet (as compared with the iamb) should go hand in hand with an equal, if not higher, incidence of 4-stress lines also. This is explained by the fact that the incidence of lines containing two light feet (mainly Form 5) is appreciably higher than in the iambic line.3 The corresponding figures obtained by Sengeli, in a study of Puskin's Tales, are:4 1

2

3

4

5

6

23.3

19.9

1.9

31.7

23.1

0.3

In Blok's verse, I examined a total of 1,331 lines in 4-foot trochaic metre, taken from 66 poems. 5 These were divided, for purposes of analysis, into four roughly equal groups, as follows: Group Group Group Group Total

2

A. B. C. D.

330 lines 336 lines 331 lines 334 lines

from from from from

24 poems 14 poems 14 poems 14 poems

in in in in

Book Book Book Book

I II II IU

1,331 lines from 66 poems. 6

Cf. Ch. IV, p. 159, note 2. Unbegaun adopts the same system of numeration for the 4-foot trochee also (Russian Versification, p. 29). Taranovski (RDR, p. 64) lists seven forms, of which his V and VI are transposed, and his VII (light 1st + 2nd foot) is here omitted. 3 Cf., inter alia, Ch. IV, supra, tables on p. 161. 4 Traktat, p. 176, Table 88. Taranovski's mean figures for the pre-Symbolist poets are: XVIIIth cty. 24.8 20.2 9.7 28.1 16.4 0.7 XlXth cty. 22.6 22.8 1.1 30.6 22.9 0.1 (RDR, p. 66, also Table I, lines 27/28). For a further study of the 4-foot trochee, cf. V. Cudovskij, Neskol'ko utverzdenij o russkom stixe (Apollon, 1917, 4-5). 5 The 3 standard Books contain a total of 79 poems in this metre. Of these, 7 were considered unsuitable for analysis on account of various uncharacteristic deviations. This study thus covers 66 poems out of a 'possible' 72. 6 The poems concerned are: A: 6, 14, 24, 32, 78, 83, 86, 87, 96, 113, 121, 125, 142, 147, 148, 151, 162, 171, 209, 222, 241, 276, 290, 305; B: 330, 338, 340, 342, 344a,

190

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TROCHAIC METRES

These yielded the following results: 1

2

%

93 28.2 84 25.0 80 24.2 107 32.0

49 14.7 65 19.3 80 24.2 69 20.6

TOTAL

364

263

%

27.3

19.8

Group A.

%

Group B.

%

Group C.

%

Group D.

3

5

127 38.6 123 36.6 123 37.2 98 29.4

61 18.5 64 19.1 48 14.4 60 18.0

—

471

233

1,331

—

35.4

17.5

100

—

—

—

6

No. of lines

4

330 —

336

—

331

—

334

There are, of course, inevitable variations here and there. By and large, however, there is also a considerable degree of uniformity, notably as regards Forms 4 and 5, in each of which three of the four groups yield very similar results. Group C displays the widest deviations from the average - the highest incidence of Form 2 and the lowest of Forms 1 and 5. There are, however, no marked chronological or other obvious trends such as we noted in the 4-foot iamb, and it seems fair to take the total figures, and the percentages they yield, as being broadly representative. If we compare these figures with 3 other sets of results, namely: a) Sengeli's figures for Puskin's Tales', b) the average of the 4 poets studied by Belyj quoted earlier; c) the average of the first 3 of these poets (Bijusov showing marked differences from the other three), we find, broadly speaking, that Blok shows much the same incidence for Forms 1 and 2, with Form 4 higher, Form 5 lower, than the average, and Forms 3 and 6 (in any case rare) non-existent: Study a) b) c) d)

Sengeli Belyj (4 poets) Belyj (3 poets) BLOK (present study)

1

2

3

4

5

6

23.3 29.1 27.0 27.3

19.9 21.6 22.2 19.8

1.9 0.6 0.8

31.7 30.5 29.0 35.4

23.1 18.1 20.7 17.5

0.3

—

— — —

344f, 348, 369, 372, 393, 411, 414, 484, 490; C: 347, 365, 366, 384, 386, 396, 398, 418, 448, 453, 456, 479, 480, 483; D: 522, 541, 546, 549, 550, 583, 605, 613, 635, 662, 672, 676, 748, 753.

191

LIGHT FEET

The general pattern is thus clear. Compared with the 4-foot iambic line, the incidence of the 4-stress line (Form 1) remains about the same, but all the other forms show marked shifts in emphasis.7 The light opening foot occurs (alone) in about 1 line in every 5; the light 2nd foot does not occur at all; while the light 3rd foot, though still the commonest single form, is yet far less frequent than in the iamb (36 % as against 46 %). By contrast, in accordance with the commoner light 1st foot, the line with light 1st and 3rd foot combined occurs more than twice as often. If, disregarding for a moment the distinction drawn between lines with single and combined light feet, we take the total number of 4-foot trochees having a) light first feet and b) light third feet, we arrive at figures of 37.3 % (Forms 2 and 5) and 52.9 % (Forms 4 and 5 Respectively. b) The 5-foot trochee. For the 5-foot line, the material available is less than one-tenth of that used for the 4-foot trochee - in fact, a mere 120 lines from 5 poems.8 Obviously, such results cannot be 'representative' in the wider sense. However, they probably suffice to reveal certain broad general tendencies. Thus, in each of the 5 poems concerned, the light 4th foot shows the highest incidence, followed, at varying intervals, by the light 1st foot; 9 the light 2nd foot and light 3rd foot remain in the minority. The total figures for the incidence of light feet (including, for the moment, those occurring in combination with other light feet) are as follows: No. of lines 120

%

Light arsis in 1st foot

2nd foot

3rd foot

4th foot

44 36.7

14 11.7

15 12.5

64 53.4

Total 114.3

The corresponding figures given by A. Astaxova in her study of Blok's 5-foot troch ee are: 10 54. 5

8.0

13.5

48.5

Total 124.5

7 This is, indeed, as we should expect. It must not be assumed that the iambic and trochaic Forms 2-5 in any way 'correspond' with each other in terms of rhythmical (or even metrical) realities. The use of the same 6 definitions in both cases is purely a matter of convenience for purposes of analysis. On this point, vide infra, pp. 203 ff. 8 Nos 158, 296, 617, 640, 732. • In No. 732 there is parity (10 each light 1st and 3rd feet). 10 Cf. Iz istorii i ritmiki xoreja. The 5-foot trochee is discussed on pp. 55-60. The figures quoted are from the table on p. 66.

192

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TROCHAIC METRES

The differences between these two sets of findings are considerable, and are not so easily explained. The material, certainly, is very limited in both cases - but this very fact tends to suggest that it must be more or less identical in each instance.11 Moreover, the biggest discrepancies are not - as would be understandable - in the 2nd and 3rd feet (where examples are so few as almost to encourage chance results) but in the 1st and 4th feet, where examples are, as it were, at their maximum.12 For the 5-foot trochee, there exist - in theory, at least - the same 9 possible forms as for the 5-foot iamb.13 Converting my own figures into terms of these forms, we get: 1

2

3

4

5

6

1 7

8

9

Lines

Total

16

21

4

10

36

5

18

0

10

120

%

13.6

17.5

3.3

8.2

30.0

4.2

15.0

8.2

(100)

—

Compared with the 4-foot trochaic line, the most striking feature is the big drop in the incidence of the full-stress (here, 5-stress) line (13.6% as against 27.3%, or almost exactly half). The light 1st foot alone and light penultimate foot alone (Forms 2 and 5 respectively) drop slightly 11 The 5 poems examined here are in fact the only 'pure' 5-foot trochees in the whole of the standard edition of Blok. The only poem specifically mentioned by Astaxova (p. 55) is Na pole Kulikovom, which presumably refers to the second canto (No. 732, also included in my study). It is, of course, possible that Astaxova also included the odd lines of the 3rd canto (No. 733) in her study, this being in 5 x 3 trochaic metre. If so, the results are apt to be very misleading; it is dangerous to compare interrupted lines taken in isolation with continuous lines forming a sequence in a complete poem. 18 True, Astaxova's results in respect of 5 poets show extremely wide variations anyway, and this is almost certainly due in part to the extreme paucity of material. In this connection, one cannot fail to be struck by the figures she cites in respect of Anna Axmatova: 36.5 12.5 12.5 55.0 = 116.5 These are so close to my own figures for Blok: 36.7 11.7 12.5 53.4 = 114.3 that one is almost tempted to suspect an inadvertent transposal of results somewhere. Of course, the 5 poems themselves display not inconsiderable variations, so that results based on, say, only 4 (or 3) of them might differ appreciably from mine. Taranovski's table (XIV) reveals no striking parallelism to my figures for Blok, though, citing Astaxova's, he notes a certain resemblance with Fet and Majkov, and, for Axmatova, with Polonskij (RDR, p. 368). 13 Cf. Ch. IV, pp. 165/6. Unbegaun does not give any table for the 5-foot trochee but, for the sake of consistency, I again adhere to the same numeration as for the iamb. Astaxova (pp. 56/7) lists 11 forms; of these, the first 7 coincide with mine, her No. 8 = my No. 9 and her No. 10 = my No. 8. The remaining 2 forms (her No. 9 and No. 11 [ = my No. 10]) are of no practical significance. For illustrations from Blok's verse, vide infra, pp. 197/8.

193

LIGHT FEET

(17.5% against 19.8%; 30.0% against 35.4%); this is only to be expected in view of the increased number of alternative patterns. On the other hand, the totals of light 1st feet and of light penultimate feet (i.e. including lines in which they occur in combination) are almost identical with those obtaining in the 4-foot line, viz.: 5-foot trochee

4-foot trochee

36.7% 53.2%

37.3% 52.9%

Total light 1st feet Total light penultimate feet

c) Make-up of light syllables in arsis. For the 4-foot trochee, the make-up of the light syllables in arsis in the 1st and 3rd feet of the line is as follows: 1st Foot

Group Group Group Group

68 92 75 84

A. B. C. D.

-

Total

—

42 37 53 45

110 129 128 129

—

177

496

-

X

— —

319 3rd Foot

A

Total

X

Group Group Group Group

60 81 62 57

97 92 89 74

31 14 20 27

188 187 171 158

260

352

92

704

A. B. C. D.

Putting these together, we get: 1st Foot 3rd Foot

319 (64%) 260(37%)

352 (50%)

177 (36%) 92(13%)

TOTAL

579

352

269

1,200

%

48.3

29.3

22.4

100

—

496 704

Compared with the 4-foot iamb, we find the - form up by some 5 % and

194

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TROCHAIC METRES

the ^ form up by nearly 3 %, with a corresponding drop of 8 % in the incidence of the - form. This is almost entirely explained by the much higher proportion, in the trochee, of light 1st feet to total light feet reinforced by the complete absence of the light 2nd foot.14 On the other hand, the distribution of the three types of light syllable in the penultimate foot follows fairly closely that of the 4-foot - and notably the 5-foot iambic line, viz.: Light syllables in penultimate foot (%)

4-foot trochee 5-foot iamb 4-foot iamb

X

4

-

37.0 36.1 33.0

50.0 48.3 48.7

13.0 15.6 18.3

For the lines containing 2 light feet in combination - which here means the 1st and 3rd foot - we have the same 6 possible combinations as for the corresponding iambic line. The distribution of these is: Light 1st and 3rd foot combined a (xx) b(x")

c(x')

d ( v x) e C ~ )

Group

Total

A B C D

61 64 48 60

12 18 12 17

24 24 12 16

3 6 5 11

7 8 10 7

11 4 6 6

4 4 3 3

TOTAL

233

59

76

25

32

27

14

f(v")

The first three types still dominate the picture, but no longer to the extent noted in the iambic line - due, once more, to the emergence of the syllable in the light 1st foot. Even so, types a and b remain by far the largest single categories of 2-stress line, together forming 135 of the total of 233. Examples of each type of line encountered in Blob's 4-ft trochaic verse Form 1 (4-stress line): B i flem> XOJIOAHLIH, BT. aein> oceHHifi (83) 14

In the trochee, light 1st feet form 41.5 % of all the light feet occurring (496 out of 1200). In the iamb, by contrast, the proportion is only 20.6% (170 out of 828) (cf. Ch. IV, pp. 167/8, supra).

195

LIGHT FEET Form 2 (light 1st foot) : With *: With Form 4 (light 3rd foot): With x: With With Form 5 (light 1st and 3rd a) x x : b) x ~ : c) d) ~ x : e) f)

YcBimbiH CKÓpÓHbiH ^yxi>. A nojifl bo Mrjii BejiHKoft

(83) (82)

CbiHi 6e3AÓHHOH rjiyÖHHbi HÓHblO CyMpaHHÓH HflHKOHMyacflbi, xjiàflHbi ö tcmhh. foot): 3äropHTca - nponafléra, YcbimiéHHOMy ayinóìi. BcnòMHHàfl, Hè cropiò. Ìì pacKHHyjrb nÓKpbiBàjio. 0 3 t poflHMaró nepTÓra 3a TyMaHOMi», 3a jiicàMH

(82) (82) (82) (96) (83) (83) (148) (82) (96)

In the 5-foot trochee, the picture of distribution between the three types of light syllable in arsis is very different from any previously encountered in our study of the main binary metres. Again, however, the extreme paucity of material, and the consequent danger of purely chance results, must be borne in mind. The distribution in the 120 lines examined is: X 1st foot 2nd foot 3rd foot 4th foot

17 4 8 17

'

9 3 36

27 1 4 11

Total 44 14 15 64

TOTAL

46

48

43

137

/o

33.6

35.0

31.4

100

Here we find all three types of light syllable roughly evenly distributed in the final outcome. This is largely explained by the unusual (and probably chance) predominance of the - form in the 1st foot - the one form of the three, incidentally, which hitherto has never played more than a secondary role in any foot.15 In general, it seems impossible to pick out any specific trend or pattern from these figures - there is not even approximate equiv16

The incidence of the — form in the 1st foot varies very sharply among the 5 poems themselves. Thus, while Nos 158 and 296 have only 1 example each (2 out of 32 lines = 1:16), Nos 617, 640, and 732 have 11, 6, and 8 respectively (25 out of 88 lines = 1:3$).

196

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TROCHAIC METRES

alence in the two 'halves' of the line, as we found in the 5-foot iamb - and it is doubtful if they are of much representative significance. For the lines containing 2 light feet in combination, three main forms occur, as we have already seen, viz.: Form 6. Light 1st and 3rd foot (5 cases) Form 7. Light 1st and 4th foot (18 cases) Form 9. Light 2nd and 4th foot (10 cases) For the first two of these, there are again 6 theoretically possible combinations. The distribution of these is: Total Form 6 (1 and 3) Form 7 (1 and 4)

5 18

a (xx) b ( x - )

c (x v ) d C x ) e ( " )

f(" v )

1 4

1 1

1 2

2 1

0 1

0 9

For Form 9, there are 3 further possibilities (i.e. each with - in the 2nd foot, as in the iamb). The distribution here is:

Form 9 (2 and 4)

a

b

XX

X*

c xv

d "x

e

Total 10

0

1

2

0

1

f 0

h

j

g *x

»• *

»y

1

5

0

In addition, there is one line with light syllables in the arsis of the 1st, 3rd, and 4th foot combined (—-), namely: 3 a My|HHTejn>|HMH TBOH, | 3a Jiy|icaBbm,

(640)

The unusual feature of this line - apart from the existence of three light feet as such - is the 3rd foot, where, ceteris paribus, the word in thesis would bear more stress (^-stress) than the - intensa in arsis; this situation is made more 'dangerous' by the presence, in the arsis of the following (4th) foot, of a further syllable which is itself lighter than the word meou. To talk, however, as some prosodists do, in such cases, of 'iambic substitution' in the third foot is totally unrealistic.16 Once again, the mental beat, assisted by the otherwise 'regular' 5-foot trochaic context, sees the line through safely enough. In isolation, however, this line would almost certainly be taken by most readers as 3-foot anapaestic hypercatalectic, viz.: 3 a MyHH|TejibHbiii TB6H, | 3a jiyKd|BWH, " On the question of alleged 'iambic substitution' in trochaic verse, vide infra, pp. 198/9.

197

LIGHT FEET

T o this extent, this line f o r m s the counterpart t o the unusual 5 - f o o t iambic line n o t e d in the previous chapter, which, taken in isolation, appeared dactylic in character. 1 7 Examples

of each type of line encountered

in Blok's 5-foot

trochaic

verse

Form 1 (5-stress line) : Ci> n j i é i b y n ä j i H THXCKHXI. A B Ì KOCM. . .

(617)

Form 2 (light 1st f o o t ) : With

HéHocTynHbiH, rópflMH, HHCTHH, 3JIÓH.

(640)

With -:

H ä npocTÓH H CK^HHWH n y r b 3eMHÓìi.

(640)

Form 3 (light 2 n d f o o t ) : With-:

B b pi»3KOMT>, HÈNOFLKYNHOMI, C B Ì T Ì AHH!

With -: With - :

E ó j i t è , n i M b cyzjbHMb, M H Ì 3HaKÓMO, fläace

(640) (640)

3ä njieiÓMi. TBOHMT>, noflpyra,

(757) 1 8

Form 4 (light 3rd f o o t ) : With - :

T ù He CMÓaceoib 3 ä n p o K H H y T b pyKb.

(296)

With-:

MHÓrHMi »céHmHHàMb cyaméHHbiH n^Tb...

(640)

With-:

À H e TÓJibKO H£ HMÌIO n p à B a ,

(640)

Form 5 (light 4th f o o t ) : With - :

^ à j i b BecHH 3arjiHHerb, Bècejià.

(158)

With-:

Hàci> npaflén» - BI> XOJIOÄHBIFI MHTÓJIH

(158)

With-:

CràHeTi. Bbicb npo3pàiHa fi CBTXNA.

(158)

Form 6 (light 1st a n d 3rd f o o t ) : a)

xx

:

HénpepbiBHbiH, 3äyHbiBHbiH 3Byicb.

(296)

:

Hè3a0BéHHaa, npocTÓ Memi!

(640)

b) c)

x

d)

v x

" :

e) f)

vv

:

N o example in lines examined. H pyKÓK) 3àKpbreàeTi> r p y f l b . . .

:

N o example.

:

H è BepHyTbca, Hé B3rji»HyTb Ha3aflT>.

(617)

(732)

Form 7 (light 1st a n d 4th f o o t ) :

"

a)

xx

b)

x

C)

xv

d)

vx

:

" :

OflHHÓKifi, Bb cépaue

flòropÓTb.

(158)

YBHflàTb GjiaacéHHbié Kpaa . . .

(640)

:

NÖRJIAFLH, KAKB n p é x y i e , NÄ MCHH.

(640)

:

f i , Kb 3 e M J l t CKJIOHHBUIHCb rÒJIOBÓK),

(732)

e)

:

ì l Torflà - He3HàeMÓK) 6ÓJibio

(617)

f)

"" :

H é yÜTH, He BCTàTb H H è B 3 f l o x H y T b . . .

(617)

Cf. Ch. IV, pp. 185/6, supra (example from No. 538). 18 No example of such a line was found in the pure 5-foot trochees examined. No. 757 is basically in 5 x 4 metre (cf. Ch. XI, p. 405). The seventh line (given here) illustrates a pattern which may, of course, perfectly well appear in pure 5-foot trochaics also.

198

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TROCHAIC METRES

Form 9 (light 2nd and 4th foot) - No examples of types a), d), f), or j). BHXpb JIH Ct MHOrOUBiTHMMH KpHJiaMH, b) (617) v c) * : Kto-TO, oxzrknHBinHCb OTT. c r i m i , (296) Pa3Bt h 6 oti> cTaparo orHa? e) (640) 1 ToHicie n o i o r b Kojioicojia. (617) » g) h) yM6pift JiacKaiomaa Mrjia. (617) 2. OTHER "SUBSTITUTION" I N TROCHAIC VERSE

a) 'Spondaic substitution?. In comparing the 4-foot trochee with its iambic counterpart, we found that - while the percentage of 4-stress lines was about the same in each case - the incidence of lines having 2 light feet in combination (and hence the total number of 'light' syllables in arsis) was considerably higher in the trochee. In fact, the whole trend in the Russian 4-foot trochee is towards lightness. It is therefore not surprising to note the virtual absence from this metre of any 'heavy' feet - both in a general way and in the case of Blok in particular. In the 1,331 lines examined, I did not find a single foot, coming before a true trochaic foot, that could remotely be considered a 'spondee'. 20 b) 'Iambic substitution'. Some Russian prosodists have claimed that the trochaic foot may, under certain circumstances, be replaced by an iambic one. Sengeli claims that such substitution (which he admits solely 'as an exception') can take place only where the stress of the iambic foot is formed by a monosyllable which in turn is linked in thought with the following word. 21 Such 'substitution' would presumably include Blok's line: 1

* Possibly a case of combined substitution in the middle of the line ( X | KOJIOK6|jia). On this point, vide infra, p. 202. 20 Sengeli (Prakt. Stix., p. 47) claims that 'spondaic substitution' is permissible, provided a) the second word of the spondee be subordinated in sense and 'joined to' the following word, and b) the following foot be a trochee and not a 'pyrrhic'. As an example, he gives: BOA MHUM | 6bicrpo | Harny | Jioflicy. Such cases, in so far as they occur at all, are largely confined to the first foot of the line. In any case, 'spondaic substitution' in trochaic verse remains extremely rare in any position in the line. The 'spondee followed by a pyrrhic' is a phenomenon in its own right, and may dissolve into combined substitution. On this point, vide infra, pp. 200ff. 21 Prakt. Stix., p. 47. Sengeli's example is: T h X O | CBeTHT|CH A)>H | COJIHU,a.

OTHER "SUBSTITUTION" IN TROCHAIC VERSE CicâHceTb | K â a c f l o l ^ : Eydb

| Bécejn».

199 (372)

On paper, the 3rd foot may appear 'iambic' to the extent that, ceteris paribus, the stress on the second syllable (half to full stress) is greater than that on the first (post-stress intensa). Explain this how one may, it is yet perfectly obvious that the trochaic rhythm is never even remotely disturbed, as it must needs be - beyond repair - if ever a genuine 'iamb' were suddenly to be inserted in the middle of a trochaic line.22 The analogy drawn by protagonists of such 'iambic substitution' is, of course, that which they claim to be 'trochaic substitution' in iambic verse. The latter, however, as has already been shown in the previous two chapters, is in reality combined substitution, and it is to this phenomenon, in so far as it occurs in trochaic verse, that we must now turn our attention. c) Combined {monosyllabic + trisyllabic) substitution. The problem next arises: Does combined substitution take place in trochaic, as well as in iambic, verse? And, if it does, under what conditions? Let us look closely at the following two lines: H3flaJlH - ylOKOMOTHBa

(372)

H JierfeTb, umoôbi

(640)

noTowrb ynacTb.

How are these to be scanned? Clearly, if we wish to conserve the full natural pronunciation, without making any concessions to rhythm or mental beat, we have no option but to introduce, in each instance, a compensatory pause, followed, inevitably, by a trisyllabic foot, viz.: il3.ua IJIH - X | JIÔKÔMÔ |THBa f l Jie|TtTb x

| I T Ô 6 W no|TÔM"B

y|nâcTb. (x)

Such scansion is the equivalent and counterpart of the combined substitution sometimes introduced into the iambic line, the difference being 22 In so far as this line needs 'explaining', it would seem, in practice, to involve something much nearer a 'pyrrhic' than an iamb in the 3rd foot - owing to the counterbalance of the trochaic 'mental beat*; this is in turn reinforced (as Sengeli rightly pointed out in general) by the close syntactical connection between the last two words in the line. In reading, Eydb is probably longer than -My, but hardly bears more stress. The same probably applies to the 3rd foot of the line quoted on p. 196 above (q.v., from No. 640), though there the sense does not 'run on' as here (meoii, 3a). Genuine iambic substitution in the first foot of the line is found in popular verse and imitations thereof, notably in the poetry of Kolcov. On this point, cf. Russian Versification, p. 34 and p. 39, also RDR, pp. 13-15.

200

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TROCHAIC METRES

that, owing to the falling rhythm, the compensatory pause falls within the thesis of the foot having the last 'regular' stress in arsis, while the ensuing foot becomes dactylic instead, as in iambic verse, of anapaestic. This is easily seen if we artificially 'convert' the two lines in question into iambic ones. We then get, say: H H3|,ziajiH | - x Jio|K6MSTH|Ba 3amn>Mb | j i e T t n . , | x h t 6 | 6 h iiStomt. |

yndcrc».

The difference between the two cases, however, is more than a mere question of foot division. In nature, the two phenomena may be identical; in degree, they certainly are not. With an iambic line like, say: IloBepr|HyTb hhio> | x ndjpeflb eAH|nf>iMi>

(62)

we feel virtually forced to introduce combined substitution, if we are not to commit violence on sensible pronunciation; in the trochee, we may do so, but the absolute necessity does not seem to be there - we instinctively feel this and, indeed, it is doubtful if many Russians would, in fact, scan with combined substitution in such cases, it being possible to pass the 'offending' feet off as light (trochaic) ones without erring too much against natural pronunciation. What is the explanation? In my view, there are two. The first, subjective, is the fact that it takes a lot more to upset - or induce us to upset - the 'rocking', almost sing-song, 'dancing' (choreic!) rhythm of the trochaic line, which contrasts strongly with the quieter, smoother iambic cadence, so near to that of normal speech. The second, objective, lies in the different relationship between the feet involved in each instance. If we leave our iambic line with its normal binary foot division: IIoBepr|HyTb h 6 u i | nepedb | eflH|HMMb we have no option but, somehow or other, to pronounce the second syllable of nepedb with more emphasis than the first (due to the fact that the second syllable is in the arsis of the same foot). And this, of course, is to commit violence upon natural pronunciation values. In our trochaic line, however, we get something rather different: 0 jie\mrbmb umo\6bi nd\i6mb

y|n£cTb.

Here we have a second foot heavier than usual ('spondaic' in type), followed by a 'pyrrhic' - but both feet 'saved' by the fact that in each the syllable in arsis is heavier than (or, in isolation, at least equal to) the syllable in thesis; consequently, the mental beat is sufficient to see them

O T H E R " S U B S T I T U T I O N " IN T R O C H A I C VERSE

201

through without excessive deformation of prose pronunciation and without necessarily 'deforming' the trochaic structure (by introducing combined substitution). Other examples which, in an iambic context, would almost certainly demand combined substitution but in their actual trochaic environment could - and in most cases probably would - pass without it include: a) Those involving intensy: KpicHbift I M I E M I . ocmpoKOH&iHbiH

(342)

H6 MeHH S/ia20CJi0BJMJia

(360)

3flpdBCTByH, AcUit, oceoGox/ieHHaa

(384)

b) Involving the prefix ne-. The difference here between the effect noted in iambic verse and that found in trochaic is especially marked; in the latter, it is very doubtful if He- produces combined substitution at all, e.g.: HxTj KOCTpfelflaJieKO3pHMbI, ChapHH MpaKT. OKpeCTHblH. Hxi MeiTbi HeyrojiHMM, HenOMtpHM, HeH3BtCTHH ...

(142)

c) Even in a line like: Bo3JIK)6hTI>,

«03HeHaBHfffcTb

(190)

despite the fact that, in the first word, B03- coincides with the ictus, the 'analogy' in the second word is not sufficient to bring about combined substitution, and the intensa falls on the second syllable, viz.: B63JIK)6HTB,

B03«eHaBHfltTb

d) Involving the word nepedo: U,tjiHH ,neHb nepedo mhoio,

(171)

Here again, the contrast with iambic verse - say: X II6|pefl6 mh6h | ciajjio Ha | crojit.

(567)

is very marked, and the existence (or introduction) of combined substitution in the trochaic line is doubtful. Some may read : U,tjibiH |flem>x | n6p6fl5 | mhoio,

202

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TROCHAIC METRES

but the great majority of Russian readers will more likely scan: LJtjibifi |

fleHb

n6|p6flo |

mhoio,

We find the same contrast with one and the same word (this time involving an intensa again) between a trochaic line such as: rioflHSJiacb Bi KOtfOKOJia,

(393)

(or example g) from No. 617 quoted on p. 198, supra) and the 'corresponding' iambic context noted in the previous chapter: Ha rojjioci.

tboh

| x Kojjioicojia

(408)23

To sum up, it would seem that combined substitution may take place in trochaic verse but that the conditions bringing it about have, to say the least, to be very much more pressing than in the iambic line. Indeed, in the trochee, almost every case is open to purely individual interpretation, and it is doubtful if the average Russian would introduce combined substitution in many of the 'possible' examples quoted above, more likely preferring the 'spondee-plus-pyrrhic' scansion which leaves the trochaic base more or less intact. In any event, the incidence, even of such possible cases, is extremely small. In the 1,331 lines examined, such examples comprise an absolute maximum of 12 to 14. This would represent an incidence of around 1 % - which those who reject the combined substitution reading altogether may consider, alternatively, as the incidence of 'spondee-plus-pyrrhic'. Compared with the general incidence of combined substitution in iambic verse, this figure is, of course, extremely small. On the other hand, almost all the cases encountered in iambic verse occur in the opening foot of the line - a phenomenon which is obviously impossible in the case of the trochee. The incidence of midline combined substitution noted in 1,000 iambic lines was from 8 to 11 cases,24 and this figure compares almost exactly with the 1 % incidence noted for the trochee. Viewed in this light, then, the incidence may be said to be about the same in both cases. The nature of the phenomenon is, as we have already seen, also the same in both cases (despite the different foot division). The degree, however, is utterly different. This difference would seem to be explained, partly by the more ebullient nature of the trochaic, as compared with the iambic, rhythm, and partly by the " For another example of (possible) combined substitution in trochaic verse, cf. Ch. VII, pp. 233/4, and note 4, infra (example from Dvenadcat'). 24

Cf. Ch. IV, pp. 183/4, supra.

203

OTHER "SUBSTITUTION" IN TROCHAIC VERSE

different relative values in stress within each foot obtaining in the iambic line on the one hand and the trochaic on the other.25

3. C O M P A R I S O N O F T R O C H A I C A N D I A M B I C L I N E

It remains to mention one characteristic feature of the 4-foot trochaic line - its frequent tendency to resolve itself into two equal halves, i.e. virtually into a pair of 2-foot trochees. This is not so much a question of caesura between the two hemistichs as one of parallelism in word structure and division, e.g.: B b fleHb XOJIOflHblH, BI> fleHb oceHHiii

(83)

Bt nacb 3aKaTHbiH, Bt nacb xpycrajibHbiit

(344*)

Here, we find the first word(s) of the line - monosyllabic - repeated at the beginning of the 3rd foot, and followed in each instance by a trisyllabic ('amphibrachic') adjective. Similar instances abound, especially where Blok resorts to 'popular' types of verse or song, e.g. :26 a) b) c)

Jlynb 3ejiem>ra, Jiymb JiaMnaflKH, Cmm> Bb xpycrajibHoii, cmrrb Bb KpoBanci O 3aMopcKoii, o uapeBHt,

(745)

Or: a)

*lepe3b 6ypio, nepe3b Bbiory

b)

B e t MM 6JIH3KH, B e t Mbl 6paTbH -

(344a)

25

This, incidentally, constitutes a strong argument against the theory, advocated, inter alia, by Unbegaun, that " . . . the real unit of Russian syllabic-accentual verse is the line, and the foot is but a conventional, though a very convenient, concept". (Russian Versification, p. 13; also p. 11 and p. 41). If we regard only the iambic and trochaic lines as such, we find no objective explanation of why combined substitution takes place so much more readily in the one than the other. The decisive factor here is, once more, the arsis-thesis relationship within each foot (cf. Ch. Ill, p. 123, incl. note 26). ae This feature is, of course, not confined to Blok. Compare, for instance, analogous examples from Puskin: a) A a p b HanpacHbift, a a p b cjiynaHHoii, (26 Maja 1828)

b)

IIocKaKajiH, nojieTtjin,

(Kazak)

and notably in Besy:

a) b) c)

MiaTca TYHH, BMOTCH TYNN; Bbiora 3JIHTCH, Bbiora njiaierb;

Ee3KOHe*un>i, 6e3o6pa3Hbi,

etc. (I/p. 379, p. 70, p. 418)

204

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TROCHAIC METRES

Sometimes, it is the 2nd and 4th feet which parallel each other, producing internal rhyme, e.g.: a) b)

Kaifb npomajracb, CTpacTHO Kjiajincb Bet npn3Ham>a, o6imaHbfl,

(680)

Or, in slightly different forms: a)

3aiuieTaeMi>, pacnjieTaeMi>

b)

Mbi MOOTajiH, KOJiflOBajm,

(338)

Occasionally, we find the two types combined. The parallelism is then almost complete, e.g.: (approximate rhyme)

3 a ryMaHOMt, 3a JitcaMH

(full r h y m e )

IIofli> n a p n a M H , noffb

(96)

(745)

jiynaMH

This is essentially a feature of the trochaic (4-foot) line, and has no strict iambic counterpart. Added to the numerous and considerable differences already noted in the general make-up of the two types of line especially, but by no means only, with regard to the distribution of light feet - it provides a convincing mass of evidence to show that each line is an entity in its own right. True, both lines are, of course, in duple-time metre, and both show approximately the same incidence of 4-stress lines (26-27 %). Beyond this, however, all other basis of comparison falls to the ground - indeed, even the binary metre common to both means little when we realise that the 'theoretical norm' of alternating stressed and unstressed syllables applies to only about one-quarter of the lines in each metre, and that the remaining three-quarters follow markedly differing stress patterns as between one metre and the other, viz.: (BLOK)

Form 1

2

3

4

5

6

4-ft iambic line (%) 4-ft trochaic line (%)

26.2 27.3

8.7 19.8

10.1

46.0 35.4

8.3 17.5

0.7

—

—

These figures, based on a study of 1,000 iambic and 1,331 trochaic lines respectively, speak for themselves. Yet if, like some theorists, we were to regard the iambic line as nothing more than a basically trochaic line with 'monosyllabic anacrusis', viz.: (trochaic) (iambic)

COMPARISON OF TROCHAIC AND IAMBIC LINE

205

we might reasonably expect the distribution of stress to be more or less identical in each type of line, inasmuch as the relative position of all feet concerned, arsis as well as thesis, would, according to the 'anacrusis theory', remain identical in both cases. The two sets of figures just given form the best commentary on the totally unrealistic nature of such 'pantrochaic' scansion.27

" For the 'pan-trochaic' method applied to English verse, cf. esp. M. A. Bayfield, The Measures of the Poets (C.U.P., 1919). - Even in English verse, where the difference is harder to demonstrate statistically than in Russian, the falsity of such scansion is recognised by most prosodists - even by those, like T. S. Omond, who regard 'duplerising' and 'duple-falling' as "subdivisions of the same metre". As Omond admits, iambic verse is "immensely more common" in English (as it is in Russian), and he pertinently asks: "Why should the less common form be made normal?" (A Study of Metre, p. 62, my italics). For examples of parallelism in the English 4-foot trochee, cf., inter alia, Ch. II, pp. 87-89, supra (Burns, Blake, Tennyson).

C H A P T E R VI

R H Y T H M I C VARIATIONS I N T R I P L E - T I M E M E T R E S

Rhythmic variations occurring in triple-time measures may conveniently be divided into general variations, common to all ternary metres, and specific features, associated with one particular form of triple-time verse (dactylic, anapaestic, amphibrachic).

1. G E N E R A L

FEATURES

a) "Dual" words. To the dual words - monosyllables - already noted in duple-time verse are now added a number of disyllabic words of the same grammatical or syntactical type, viz. principally pronouns, demonstrative and possessive adjectives, prepositions, conjunctions, certain adverbs (e.g. mo/ibKo, eute, yMce, c/ioeno), and - with Blok, at any rate - various forms of the verb 6BIMB (6UAO, 6ydeuib, etc.). In conditions of normal speech and, of course, in duple-time verse, such words divide up into two groups, namely: a) Those having the (grammatical) stress on the first syllable: (uatua, eatuu, etc. smorm, etc. nmo6bi, UAU, nepedt, monbKO, 6ydmo). b) Those having the stress on the second syllable: (ona, OHU, etc. Menn, me6n, etc. ezo, ee, etc. MOH, meon, etc. yotce, eufe). In triple-time verse, however, the metrical ictus is so much more pronounced than in duple-time that it tends to carry all before it, and it is doubtful if, in practice, there is any great rhythmic distinction between words from the two groups when they appear in thesis; between, say: and:

CoJibBeMrb! O, Cojn>Beiinb! O,

COJIHCHHMH IlyTb! FLAII MH% B3floxHyn>, ocBtaciiTb MOW rpyflb!

flaw FLAÖ

OTfloxHyrb Ha ycTynt CKajibi!

pacKOJioTb 3mo aepicajio MTJIBI!

(397)

GENERAL FEATURES

207

Where these words occur in arsis, the metrical ictus of course coincides with the grammatical stress of the word in question: *IeH ocjitnirrejibHbiH ruiamt Ha JieTy IlyTb OTKpwBderb bi> meow BwcoTy? ... ximo6bi JioxMciTiie t p o j i j i h ,

(397)

BH3%a,

Frequently, we find the same, or virtually the same, word occurring in both thesis and arsis in close proximity: % Bipio: t o Bon. Menn cHiroMb 3aHeci>, To Bbiora Menk uijiOB&na!

(622)

Cb Cb

(380)

t o 6 o i o c M O T p i m a Ha smy 3apio t o 6 o h b i . jmy nepHyio 6e3flHy c m o t p i o .

Pa6oTafi, pa6oTaH, pa6oTaii: Tm 6ydeuib cb ypoflCKHMi rop6oivfb... floflT«

npa3flHHicb - apyrHMb 6ydemi>

cjkLako,

(506)

Meanwhile, the monosyllables retain their dual role as before: H Mbi npo6y»yiinHCb ana HOBOH Haaeacflbi, Mbi 3Hina: HesyjaHHaa Paflocrb 6jiH3Ka!... Mbi 6 £ i j i h , - h o Mbi OTOuuiH,

(344a) (370)

Sometimes we find the same two words with reverse distribution of metrical stress: Tbi MHib o6tmdeuib 3apH>? Mto

mil Mum cecTpd, h HeBtcra,

(370) h aonb.

(380)

In this respect, there seems to be little if any distinction in the degree of stress as between monosyllables and disyllables of the same grammatical type (again, in sharp contrast to duple-time conditions): Thus, in the line Te6h MWb Bee acajibne h acajibne...

(492)

the disyllable is stressed, the monosyllable not. But the monosyllable may appear in arsis side by side with the disyllable in thesis: Hto h ezo BCTpiqy omrrb ... (523)

208

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TRIPLE-TIME METRES

M6>KeTT> 6MTb, pHflOMl CO

MHBU OKU

BCTpiTHTb ...

(281)

The case of the phrase Mootcemb 6umb (or: 6umb MOMcemb) is also interesting. In most cases, the ictus coincides with the first syllable of MOMcemb, as in the line just quoted (dactylic), or in the following example (amphibrachic): Ebimb MOMcemb, ce6a

caMoro

...

(523)

In the line below, however, we have a rare instance of the reverse procedure (anapaestic): TaMT. - 6e3CMepTHOK) BOJieft TOMHMa, Mootcemb 6bimb, npH3bmdjia CaMd...

(298)

The fact that each of the last three examples occurs in a different type of ternary metre should not be interpreted as indicating anything specifically related to each. The only point of these examples, as of all the preceding ones, is to demonstrate the truly dual function of the words in question and the dominating role of the metrical ictus in triple-time verse generally. b) "Light" feet. The corollary of this dominating role of the mental beat in triple time is the virtual disappearance of lightly stressed syllables in arsis (except in the first foot of dactylic lines, q.v. infra). In contrast to genuinely dual words like n, om>, etc., all of which occur time out of number in both thesis and arsis, it is extremely rare to find very light-stressed words like u, o(6b), HO coinciding with a triple-time arsis; indeed, in the 4,000 odd lines of Blok's triple-time verse, I was able to trace but one instance of this kind, and that in a poem which, while basically in triple-time, is altogether extremely free - almost colloquial - in nature: KypcHCTKa npucnajia PyKonHCb c i Tyiefi 3narpa(j)OBi> (H3b Hadcona H cuMeoAucmoeb).

(553)

Yet in duple time, as we have seen, it is not in the least unusual for a word like V to coincide with the metrical ictus. The same contrast applies, naturally enough, to the problem of secondary stress in long words, or what we have so far termed, for convenience' sake, intensy. Intensy in this sense - so abundant in dupletime verse - occur extremely seldom in triple time. There are, of course,

GENERAL FEATURES

209

numerous examples of 5-syllable words, but these are almost invariably of the >-> ^ - >-> ^ type, i.e. the grammatical stress coincides with the ictus and the remaining four syllables remain in thesis. Similarly, 4-syllable words are of the ^ - ^ ^ or ^ ^ - ^ types, rather than - ^ ^ ¿ o r ^ ^ - . In just over 4,000 lines of triple-time verse by Blok, I found only 8 cases in which a single word extends through two metrical stresses, i.e. where, in addition to the main (grammatical) stress, one other accessory stress (pobocnoe udarenie; 'intense?) coincides with a metrical ictus. Of these 8, six occur at the beginning of dactylic lines, thus forming a special type of (extra-) light first foot, which, as we shall see shortly, is a distinctive feature of dactylic verse. The seventh example likewise occurs in a dactylic line, but in the second half of the line. The remaining example occurs in line 179 of the long poem, Nocnaja Fialka (No. 329), in an anapaestic context: BblJIO BHflHO, HTO OHl>, He CTaptfl, He MIHH»cb, H .nyMaH #y\iy oflHy, Ilporpycrairb 3/iicb stKa, TaKi> HTO HJieHti odepeeembjiu, ...

(329)

Of the 7 dactylic instances, the "purest" example occurs in verse 2 of No. 714: O, 3THflaJIbHiflpyKH! Bi> T y c K J i o e STO ACHTBE

dwpoednbe

CBoe Aaxce BT, pa3Jiyici!

BHOCHUIL TW,

(714)

Another appears in No. 619 - the only poem in Blok's three Books written in imitation of classical elegiacs:1 flaHce npHpo,na caMa, Ha MOH 3arji5wtBuiHCb co3aam>a, npuHyMcdena Memi 3Bdn> (||) MacrepOMi paBHbiMT. ce6t. (619) No. 553 is in mixed triple-time metre. Line 52 (tripodic dactyl catalectic) is as follows: HiTT», OHHeuibca nopoii, B3BOJIHOBaHl>, BCTpeBOaCeHl. BdcnOMUHtZHieMh CMyTHbIMT>, IlpeflHyBCTBieMT» TaHHbiMb ... 1

(553)

Cf. also Ch. Ill, p. 154, note 88, supra. For other (early) classical imitations by Blok, cf., inter alia, Pol. Sob. Stix./1946, Vol. II: p. 47 (No. 844, Poema) 1898; p. 247 (No. 1255, Translation from Horace) 1898; pp. 355/7 (OrfeJiEvridika) 1895; pp. 362/4 (Iz Marona) 1896.

210

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TRIPLE-TIME METRES

Line 27 (tripodic dactyl acatalectic) offers a further example: Bi> KUHeMamdzpacpTb BenepoMi. 3HaTHbiii 6apoHi> n t j i o B a j i c a n o f l t . naJibMoii

Ci> 6ap£mmeH H H 3 K a r o 3Bam>$i,

(553)

It might be argued that this is a less striking example, to the extent that KUHeMamozpa is virtually a compound word. 2 The same applies to at least the first of the three remaining examples, which occur in succession in the last two lines of N o . 711: . . . EAaz0CA0\eeHH0, x | Heu3Z/ia\duMO, Heeo3epa\muMo ... npo|cTH!

(711)®

Here we find the same compound and "semi-compound" words which, at the beginning of iambic lines, may bring about combined substitution (vide supra, Chap. Ill), e.g. : X Bji4|r6cji6BJia|io Bed, | HTO 6MJIO X He|ycT&K>|mHMi> c j i y | x o M i »

jiobhti

(630)

...

(75)

' It is not, however, a compound in the extreme sense of hyphenated words which are barely distinguishable from two separate words, each in its own (grammatical and metrical) right. There are, of course, a number of instances of such words covering two triple-time metrical stresses, e.g.: . . . OKpyacibia Tw 6jiri>dHo-Aa3dpeebiu CBOflf»! (323, line 18) .. .Ckbo3i> AUA6eo-3e/iiHbix cyMepKH . . . (329, line 58) (also No. 329, line 85 and No. 665, line 11). Nor is the hyphen in itself decisive - cf., for instance, No. 339, line 14 and line 24: ... 3oAomopymyto thuii>. ... 3oAomopyHHax rpycTb. The same applies to some of the cases quoted by Unbegaun (Russian Versification, p. 51; examples from Nekrasov and XodaseviS - words compounded with noAy-). The degree of stress may vary in each case, but none of these examples constitutes a genuine intensa in the same way as, say: dvapoedube

or odbpeeeHtbAu Four of the first five lines of this poem (No. 711) are amphibrachic in structure, and it is, of course, possible to scan the entire poem as such, allowing for anacrusis variation in the other lines, i.e. disyllabic anacrusis in lines 2 and 6 and (monosyllabic) compensatory pause in the anacrusis of lines 7 and 8: 8

*Ito Sbijio I jdo6hmo | - Bee mhmo, | x mhmo ...

Bne peflii - He|H3BtcTHOCTb | nyTH . . . X Ejiciro IcJioBeHHO, | x HSfi3jrjiaflHMO, X HeB03|BpaTHM0 | . . . npocrii! (711) Cf. Ch. XV, p. 437, where the poem is included with the mixed triple-time metres.

GENERAL FEATURES

211

There is nothing surprising in this, for the effect of such substitution is, in fact, to set up a triple-time lilt - which only tends to confirm the fact that the substitution that takes place in such cases is not "trochaic" at all, i.e. not: — w j _\> — j w — j — j but combined monosyllabic plus trisyllabic: Reference to duple-time verse recalls one other interesting feature which clearly brings out the contrast between the metrical role of intensy in duple and triple time respectively. While, as we have just seen, genuine intensy, or accessory stresses, are virtually non-existent in triple-time verse, Blok's poems, as already mentioned, abound in 5-syllable words having the stress on the middle syllable (and in 4-syllable words of the type ^ - ^ ^ or ^ ^ In triple time, such words fit into the metrical scheme with no difficulty whatever. In duple time, however, the use of such words perforce entails the appearance of intensy on the first and fifth syllables (in 4-syllable words, on the last or first syllable, as the case may be). It is interesting to compare the position of one and the same (or nearly the same) word in a) triple-time and b) duple-time contexts, e.g.: (703) a) Heeo3M6MCHoe ciacTbe ... (237) Hee03M0MCHbie chm 3a njienaMH ... (736) H Heeo3MdMCHoe BO3M6hcho . . . b) 3ojiomucmbiM npjyjH Ha Ji6y. . . . (314) a) (209) b) 3dAomiicmoK> a o j o h o h . . . (298) a) OnapoeaHHbiu ynHiHtiMt kphkomi. . . . (438) b) H dnapoeoHHyio flajit. ... (304) Hyqo, a cnjno, a ycTajii nenpodydHo ... a) (735) 3a t h i h h h o k ) nenpo6ydHou ... b) While on the subject of similar words occurring in different measures, it is interesting to note the occurrence, on occasion, of the self-same phrase or word-group in different triple-time contexts. Thus, in dactylic verse: Bomb om: 6e3crp£cTeHT> h ahki>.

(402)

and again: Bomb om - bo3hhki>. H c t xojioflHHMi. BHHMiurieMi... 4

(637)

The incidence of such 5-syllable words in Blok's triple-time verse is roughly 9%, i.e. 1 such word per 11 lines.

212

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TRIPLE-TIME METRES

but here in a "heavy" opening to an anapaestic line (q.v. infra): Bbmb oub - p«fli> rpo6oBtixT> cryneHeii.

(314)

Similarly, in an amphibrachic line: O, ecnu KpbiJiaMH B3MaxHeim> ...

(177)

but here in a dactylic one: 6, ec/iti6b He 6 h j i o bi> o k h e x i . . .

(423)

Finally, it is interesting to note that all eight examples of triple-time intensy noted in Blok's verse occur before the main stress of the word to which they belong - one more indication of his instinctive 'feel' for satisfactory rhythm. It has already been suggested that the - intensy are rather more prominent than the £ type, both in ordinary speech and in duple time,8 and this applies to triple time with increased force. An interesting comparison of the two types in close proximity is given in the following lines from Marina Cvetaeva: y * o h 6bi c t o 6 6 k > - nojiaflHJi! 3 a HenpHHyameHHbiH i i o k j i o h

Pa35K&JIOBaHHbIH - HHKOJldeM, IIOXdjIOBaHHblH 6bl - IleTpOM.

(Petr i Puskin)• 6

Cf. Ch. Ill, pp. 153/4, including note 8, supra. * Cited by Unbegaun (Russian Versification, p. 51), who, however, draws no distinction between the two types of interna as such. In contrast to duple time, where he talks only of omission of stress in such cases, Unbegaun admits that, in triple time, "the metrical stress other than the usual stress" (i.e. the interna) "is necessarily weakened, but is still perceptible" (my italics). Likewise 2irmunskij, who recognises that the (lighter) syllable, "enclosed by two unstressed ones on each side, inevitably receives some weight". {VVM., p. 53). Unbegaun is almost certainly right in assuming that "the accumulation of these examples in a single stanza suggests that this is a deliberate device." At the same time, Russian ternary verse would certainly seem to have undergone considerable 'liberation' in this respect since Blok's day. Pasternak's triple-time metres, for instance, abound in instances of intensy coinciding with the metrical ictus and - while most of these appear to be of the * type - examples of the - type (and even of the X type) are not hard to find. Thus, among the poems from Doktor ¿ivago: From No. 10, Bab'e Leto (anapaestic):

Jlec 3a6pacbieaem, KaK HacMeuiHHK, ...

(line 5, p. 541)

From No. 18, Roidestvenskaja Zvezda (amphibrachic): Bee 6ydyufee r a j u i e p e a h My3eeB, . . . and the following three (consecutive) lines from the same poem: . . . TonT&racb noroHinmcH u o b u c b o a h , PyriuiHCb c o ecadmKaMU neuiexoflbi, y e&doAdAemou b o ^ o i i o h h o h k o j i o a h

(line

3 9 , p. 5 5 5 )

... (lines 74-76, p. 556).

GENERAL FEATURES

213

The second line, containing an - intensa, is far less 'disturbing* than the third and fourth lines, each of which contain a - type.7 c) "Heavy" feet. Almost as rare as the extra-light arsis - at any rate among the better poets - is the heavy thesis in triple-time measures - apart from the first foot of the anapaest, which, as we shall later see, forms a common and totally admissible exception in this respect.8 "Lesser poets," writes Unbegaun, "incline to this lapse in ternary metres, which readily allow a disyllabic word to be placed between two stresses."9 This does not mean, of course, that the "greater" poets never resort to this device - it is questionable whether such abject obedience to the 'letter of the law' would even be desirable. It does mean, however, that they use it with circumspection. We find examples in PuSkin and Lermontov and, more particularly, in Nekrasov and Fet, both of whom made wide use of triple-time metre.10 In English triple-time verse, the device seems to be more widespread, but is scarcely less unsatisfactory as a general rule. Numerous instances occur with Byron, e.g.: Then the Eagle, whose gaze in that moment was blasted, Had still so&red with eyes fixed X on victory's sun!11 (Napoleon's Farewell, lines 15/16) Let us drink! - who would not? since, through life's varied round,... (Fill the Goblet Again, line 3) As the blessing I beg ere it flow, And the l£st thought that soothes me below. (Jephtha's Daughter, lines 11/12) 7

The last two lines, out of context, might easily be mistaken for 4-foot iambs with light 2nd and 3rd feet in each case, viz.: Pa3acd |JioBaH |HbiS - HH|icojideM, Iloxcd |JioBaH |hmh 6m | - IleTpoM. Belyj was the first to call attention to the close relationship between the two types of line, noting the reverse phenomenon in the line: KaKi> fleMOHM rjiyxoHtMbie (Be/iyT-b 6ect,ny m&ki» co6oh). In point of fact, these lines of Tjutiev's are 4-foot iambs, but the first on its own reads as a 3-foot amphibrach (cf. Simvolizm, pp. 256-258). 8 Vide infra, p. 221 et seq. " Russian Versification, pp. 116/7 (examples from Polonskij, Nikitin, and VI. Solov'ev). 10 For examples from Nekrasov and Fet, cf., inter alia, VVM., pp. 55/6. 11 A better reading is probably: Had still soared X with eyes fixed on victory's sun! - but even this leaves 'fixed' (and 'still') in thesis.

214

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TRIPLE-TIME METRES

while Browning's line: I report, as a man may of God's work - all's love, yet all's law. {Saul, XVII, line 5) is justly cited by Egerton Smith as illustrating "the peculiarly disastrous effect in this metre of heavy syllables in the thesis of an anapaest".12 Before analysing Blok's verse in this respect, the question of definitions arises once again: what is to be understood by a "heavy syllable" and where is the border-line to be drawn? For the present, at any rate, let us confine ourselves to those cases in which normally full-stressed words - notably nouns, main verbs, adjectives - occur in the thesis of tripletime feet, ignoring the special case of the opening foot of the anapaest. An analysis of Blok's triple-time verse reveals the following incidence of such heavy syllables in thesis -. Metre

No. of poems

No. of lines

No. of heavy syllables in thesis

Dactylic Anapaestic Amphibrachic Mixed

41 104 35 10

691 2291 763 267

0 14 2 1 (dactylic)

190

4012

17

17 instances in over 4,000 lines! This represents an incidence of roughly 0.425 %, or 1 instance per 235 lines, or again, 1 case per average of 11 poems - figures which, not for the first time, pay eloquent tribute to Blok's uncanny rhythmical intuition. In view of their extreme rarity, it is worth examining these cases a little more closely, from grammatical, metrical, and syntactical points of view: a) Grammatical. Of the 17 cases mentioned, 5 concern monosyllables and 12 disyllables. Of the former, 2 are verbs and 3 are nouns. Of the latter, 3 are verbs, 2 nouns, and 7 are adjectives-,these last thus form the largest single group, the total being made up of 7 adjectives (all disyllabic), 5 verbs, and 5 nouns. b) Metrical. In all cases but four, the additional heavy syllable is 12

P.E.M., p. 140. The poem is full of examples scarcely less awkward, e.g., three lines higher: 'I, a work of God's hind for that purpose, received in my brain, ...' where even the word 'God's' appears in thesis!

GENERAL FEATURES

215

separated from the arsis of the same foot by a light syllable (anapaest: i «-. A; dactyl: - ^ Of the four exceptions, two occur in amphibrachic lines (No. 352 and No. 552, vide infra), where such separation is impossible, while the other two occur in anapaestic contexts (No. 665, vide infra). All four of these feet are "bacchic" in structure (y - -) :13 [cf. c) i and ii below (t)]. c) Syntactical context (which also includes, inevitably, other metrical considerations). The simplest method seems to be to list the 17 cases in their various groups: i. In the middle of a sentence ('normal') Amphibrach, t C n o B a cjiauje 3BYKOBI> MouapTa. (352)w Anapaest. * ro/iocb TBOH - OHT> 3 B O H H £ H nrbcem CTapoii cocHbi! (377) CJIOBHO 3M*£H, MHDTCKIU, CMTMH H nbun.HI.IH,

H, KT. KOMy tueAb cb OTKPBITOII ayrndio Tor^a, F IIoracH, COMKHU 6HH TBOH! t CnajieHa, MOH crenb, mpaea CBaJieHa, YnoHTejibHO BCTaTb Bb patmiu *racb,

(535)

(644) (665) (665) (679)

Dactyl (poem in m i x e d T - T )

CojiHije, KaKb MtflHbiH uiAeMb BOHHa,

ii. After a pause (full stop, dash, etc.) Amphibrach. | - I a i FLEHBRN TBOH? - Cnecb B B Ka6aKb. Anapaest. 51 rjiaacy HA Te6a. KaMcduu AEMOHB BO M H 4 Be3T. KOHIia - 8380db 3a B3BOflOMT> H mTblKb 3a IUTHKOMb

(316)

(552) (557) (750)

iii. After rhyming caesura. In view of the caesura, these instances 13 The term "bacchic" is here used in the sense normally current in Russian prosody; cf., inter alia, VVM., p. 57, and TomaSevskij (Russkoe stixosloienie, p. 147). This is also the definition of "bacchic" in: Karl Rupprecht, Einfuhrung in die griechische Metrik (Verlag Max Hueber, Munich, 1924), p. 33. In English prosody, on the other hand, some confusion seems to exist. Whereas the S.O.E.D. agrees with this definition of "bacchius" — ) and "anti-bacchius" ( — (3rd revised ed., 1955, p. 75 and p. 134), Saintsbury gives exactly the opposite definitions, viz. the bacchic as — ^ and the anti-bacchic as ^ - - (H.M.E.P., p. 282, Table of Feet, and Glossary, p. 270 and p. 272). This latter definition is also that given by Egerton Smith (P.E.M., pp. 304/305, Glossarial Index of Terms). Omond prefers the 'Russian' and S.O.E.D. definitions, but points out that the "two names are reversed by some authors" {A Study of Metre, p. 19). Some Russian investigators use the terms bakxij I — ) and bakxij II ( — c f . , inter alia, Sengeli, Traktat, p. 136. 14 This line - printed in italics in the original - is not really Blok's at all, but comes from the libretto of Tchaikovsky's "Queen of Spades" (Pikovaja Dama). Cf., inter alia, Pol. Sob. Stix.jl946, Vol. I, p. 634 (notes).

216

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TRIPLE-TIME METRES

- all anapaestic - are almost equivalent to heavy first feet; certainly, they present no rhythmical difficulties: O, BjiaflMHHua flHeii! || ajiou jieHToii TBoeii * CAbllUUlUb 3BOHKiH TOIIOpi? 11 Budutub paflOCTHblH B30pi>, H He ciecTb H e 3anjiecTb

cenmAbixb p o e t , Dtcejimbixb k6ct»

(323) (377)

(655)

Also the following (not included in the 17 examples, since the accent is rather less than full): * Pd38lb Tb'l He 2CHBa? || Pa36!b TbI He CBiTJld? iv. With heavy first foot (anapaestic)

(268)

also

* CmapbiuflOMbzjiRHemb Bt cepflue Moe,

(744)

(To this group also belong all examples marked * above and No. 706, infra).

v. "Top-heavy" feet. In the remaining example, the stress on the heavy syllable in thesis is - or would be, ceteris paribus - heavier than that of the syllable in arsis; though in practice, of course, the force of the 'mental beat' again comes to the rescue: * MyMCb ymejrb. Cefimb TaKofi 6e3o6pa3HbiH ...

(706)

This is the only example of a top-heavy foot occurring in the middle of an anapaestic line, though several cases occur in heavy first feet of such lines (q.v. infra, p. 224).15 So far, we have confined ourselves - deliberately - to an examination of "heavy syllables" in the fullest sense of the term, i.e. those in which the stress on one of the syllables in thesis is - or normally would be - full ( x ). As in duple time, however, the problem is ultimately only one of degree more particularly, of the relative value between (heavy) thesis and arsis. Thus, where the arsis is only medium-stressed (as in the last example above), a similar half-stress in thesis is sufficient to produce much the same general effect - albeit slightly less pronounced, e.g.: CaMi. He cboh | mojibKo 6biJtb | h, 6e3b naMHTH, 16

(665)

The same applies to the 'heavy' amphibrachic foot in line 3 of No. 552 cited earlier [p. 215, c) ii].

GENERAL FEATURES

217

This is the more usual, 'cretic', type ( - ^ -). In amphibrachic lines especially, one finds the 'anti-bacchic' type (— : TaMt 6fiuio | CBHfldHbe. |

6ujo>/>fi3|roBopi...

(283)

T p e B o r y | CBOIO He | CMHpio n : \ 8ua ece | CHJN>Hte.

(547)

as well as the 'bacchic' type

TdMb

—):

There are, of course, various other possible combinations, and numerous other classical terms are used by some metrists to define these.16 There exist, also, literally infinite and quite undefinable shades of differing emphasis, depending - here as in duple time - on a number of factors, of which grammatical function, syntactical context, type of vowels and consonants involved, and word division are only a few. These are the intangibles which defy analysis, and are always there to remind the prosodist who does not entirely lose himself in statistics that verse is ultimately a living instrument, and versification neither an exact science nor a lesson in anatomy. A few of these combinations, in so far as they are definable, will be examined under the heavy first feet of the anapaests (pp. 221fif.,infra), where they occur with greater frequency and so in more representative form. For the present, it remains only to note that not one of Blok's 17 lines containing heavy feet could fairly be called in the least awkward or halting; and this, surely, is the yardstick by which they should ultimately be judged. The 'rule' may be that heavy syllables in thesis are 'wrong', but what is a metrical 'rule'? As Saintsbury refreshingly wrote: they "are not imperative or compulsory precepts, but observed inductions from the practice of (English) poets. He that can break them with success, let him". 17 Where Blok breaks this 'rule', he certainly does so with success. In point of fact, it is more often the line containing too many heavy (or even half-heavy) syllables in thesis that causes the most trouble. This 16 Cf., inter alia, VVM., p. 57. Zirmunskij, in understandable protest against this glut of imported terms, himself proposes the "short and simple" terminology which would take account of weight "on the first or the second of the unstressed syllables within the line or on the corresponding syllable prior to the [first?] stress". This is all very well, but it fails to take account of differences between rising and falling rhythm, or, indeed, between the three forms of triple-time metre generally. For instance, an additional stress on, say, the second syllable in thesis creates a very different impression in a dactylic line, where it is separated from its arsis by an unstressed syllable ( - ^ from what it does in an anapaestic one, where it immediately precedes the arsis and so forms a 'bacchic' type of foot (y 6 - ) . 17 H.M.E.P., p. 30.

218

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TRIPLE-TIME METRES

is largely what is 'wrong' with the lines already quoted from Byron's Fill the Goblet Again and from Browning's Saul, or, in Russian, with the extremely unhappy line of Fet's quoted in this connection long ago by Nedobrovo: Bee

copBdTb

xonemb

BtTepi,

ece

CMbiTb

xouemb

JiHBem> py«n>»MH . . , 1 8

Of Blok's lines, the worst offender in this respect is probably the one already cited above in another connection: CaMb He cboh MOABKO 6£un> H, 6e3b naMHTH,

(665)

If a poet produces nothing worse than this in over 4,000 lines of tripletime verse, he is, by any standards, doing pretty well. Quod erat demonstrandum. d) Enclitics. Mention, in the previous section [c) above] of normally heavy words appearing in thesis takes no account, of course, of the specific phenomenon of enclitics, of which there are not a few in Blok's triple-time verse. As in duple time, the nouns deprived of their stress constitute some of the lightest syllables that exist. In contrast to duple-time conditions, however, they never coincide with a metrical ictus, but only appear in thesis; the reasons for this should be obvious - firstly, none of the nouns in question is of more than two syllables; secondly, even if one were, triple-time rhythm, as we have already seen, does not tolerate so light a stress except under very exceptional conditions. The vast majority of the nouns in question are disyllabic: M h í »ce nó cépdtfy 6tjian jióxcb...

(183)

TámHTCfl nó nd/iib nyTHHKb rop6áTbiH.

(299)

OkHB JlÓXCHblH HÓ Hé6ñ> HépHOMt,

(607)

Kto-to hú nAétü pyKH nojióacurb,

(693)

HtTi>, He BbíÓTca TaMb nó efbmpy nyóbi,

(746)

No. 740 offers us three examples (two of them identical) within the space of two lines: Kifflyjiacb Ú3b cménü

n é p H a a MTJiá . . .

3á Mópé H é p H o e , 3á Mópé EÍjioe 18

Ritm, metr i ix vzaimootnosenie, p. 19. (Also: VVM., p. 56.)

(740)

219

G E N E R A L FEATURES

An enclitic of a (grammatically) different type is the phrase ne 6WAO, in which the m - normally bearing the lightest of stresses - takes over the full force of enclitic transfer and must be rated fully stressed. We meet this several times, e.g.: In anapaestic verse: Bi> Haci>, Kor^a yace He

6bino

ciurb,

(519)

and again (twice in one line): H t r t , HaMt

ne 6UAO

rpycrao, HaMi> ne

acajib,

6buio

(750)

In dactylic verse: Bed npe6biBcUio. ^BH»cem.a, CTpaaaHba —> Hi 6buo. Jloniaflb xpanijia HaBtKi..

(302)

and again, in the first verse of No. 341, where we also find 6biAO enclitic) coinciding with the ictus (line 1): T5BKKO HaMT. SblAO DO/IB BblOraMH 3aMy xojioflHyio cnaTb ... 3eMJHo npoMep3Jiyio njiyraMH Hi 6blAO MOHH nOflHHTb!

(not

in an

(341)

The same enclitic also appears in No. 423, line 8, already cited above in a different context (p. 212, supra). Less frequently, we find enclitics affecting monosyllabic nouns, e.g.: 3 b o h k o BI> o T B i i T b 3 a c M t a j i c a — >

MajibHHKi.

h na ndjtb

cnpfiiTHyjii».

(759)

and in No. 530, where we have ne 6biAb, i.e. the masculine form ("rhyming", incidentally, with ueSol) - and again 6hvn> in arsis: Hmcorzia He 3a6yay ( o h i 6bUb, h u h 3 t o t t > Beiept): noacdpoMT. 3apn

He

6biM,

(530)

One other case should be mentioned here, inasmuch as it affords an instance of a normally fully stressed word deprived of much of its emphasis - though it is not, of course, an enclitic in the real sense of the term. In the last (fifth) verse of No. 665, we find the word ema in the thesis of a dactylic ending, i.e. deprived, in theory, of all stress: CnajieHa m o h crenb, TpaBa

ceaAena,

H h OrHH, H H 3Bk3AbI, H H nyTH...

H Koro utjioBajn. - He MOA euna, Tbi, KOMy o6imajic», - npocrn...

(665)

220

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TRIPLE-TIME METRES 2. S P E C I F I C F E A T U R E S

a) Dactylic Metres. As already mentioned, the characteristic rhythmic variation of dactylic measures is the light first ictus and, hence, the light first foot. Here, as elsewhere, statistics can never be exact, in the absence of full agreement as to what in fact constitutes a 'light' syllable. A rough check, however, reveals, among the 691 lines of Blok's dactylic verse, 113 lines in which the first syllable bears something less than a normal full stress representing an incidence of about 16%. Of these 113 openings, 84 (roughly 12% of the whole) are medium stressed (-: mostly dual words), 27 or so (4 % of the whole) are very light stressed (-) while 2 are cases of accessory stress in long words ( = intensy, q.v. p. 209, supra, Nos. 619 and 714). This means that roughly one line in every six begins with a syllable that is less than fully stressed, but only about one in twentyfour with a very light stress (29 lines out of 691). The total material is, of course, somewhat limited, but it seems that, by and large, most poems reflect this incidence individually to a greater or lesser degree. There are, however, notable exceptions. Thus, No. 66 (12 lines) and No. 356 (16 lines) exhibit no light syllables of any kind (with the possible exception of the word moAbKo at the beginning of the third line of the latter). By contrast, No. 714 - by far the most 'irregular' in this respect - abounds with light syllables, including one intensa, e.g. especially verses 2 and 5: O , 3TH flajiHia pyKH! Bi> TycKJioe s t o 5KHTbe O n a p o B a H b e CBoe Bhochuib tm, a a a c e bi>

pa3jiyict!

. . . K t o 6 m h h 3Bajn> - He x o n y Ha cyeTJiHByio H t a c H O c n .

fl npoMtHHTb 6e3HaaeacHOCTb M, 3aMbiKaacb, M o m y .

(714)

Other poems with a fair number of light syllables include Nos. 133,291, and 637. Outside the first foot, 'light' syllables are confined to medium-stressed words (-) and are, of course, no longer specifically confined to dactylic verse. Here, the material is even more limited, but the tendency seems to be for the lighter syllables to appear predominantly in the penultimate foot, i.e. the second foot in 3-foot lines and the third foot in 4-foot lines,

SPECIFIC FEATURES

221

though light syllables in the second foot occasionally occur in the latter, either alone: JIacKH mom HeyMijiw h rpy6bi,

(402)

or combined with a light first foot: Mbi 3a to6ok> - He3pHMbie chbi -

(291)

or with a light third foot: - Ht»CHOCTb mo/o ana t&6h yicpamaTb...

(434)

Before leaving the dactyls, one striking deviation from the metrical norm remains to be mentioned. This is the eleventh line of No. 740, which otherwise consists of 4-foot dactyls throughout, the odd lines being acatalectic (D endings), the even lines brachycatalectic (M endings). Verse 3 (lines 9-12), however, is as follows: JIoflKH, m rpaflbi no piicaMi py6njia Tbi, Ho flo U,apbrpaACKHXi> cBOTbiHb He Aoirnia... C0K0A0eb, Ae6edeu bi> crein. pacnycrana t h KnHyjiacb H3T> crena nepHaa MTJia...

(740)

From this it will be seen that line 11 in effect begins with 2 'anapaestic' words. One method of scansion is, of course, to adhere to the metrical structure as far as possible, minimising the grammatical stress on the 3rd and 6th syllables and compensating for this with a rather heavier (or longer) pronunciation of the 1st and, notably, 4th syllables, i.e. roughly: C6k5jiobi>, |

| Bb crem. pacnyc|rajia t h -

The second possibility is to carry straight on from line 10 without a pause, introducing a disyllabic anacrusis and a further compensatory pause (also disyllabic) after Ae6edeu, viz.: C6k6|jiobt>, Jie6e|flen XX | bi> CTem> pacnyc|Tiuia t h The latter may look more plausible on paper. In practice, however, it seems likely that most readers adopt - consciously or otherwise something approaching the former solution. b) Anapaestic metres. In the anapaests, as we have already seen, the specific deviation is the heavy first thesis and so the heavy first foot. Here, our material is

222

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TRIPLE-TIME METRES

abundant - Blok's anapaestic verse runs into nearly 2,300 lines. Of these, roughly 330 (14.5%) include full-stressed words (-) in the first thesis, while a slightly larger percentage (15-16%) have medium-stressed words (-). Inevitably, borderline cases exist (e.g. auxiliary verbs like nycmb; adverbs like moAbKo), but these are too few in number to affect the issue substantially. In my view, the occurrence of medium-stressed words in the first thesis is not sufficient reason to justify labelling such feet as 'heavy'. Very often, such words may be personal pronouns on which very little stress falls at all - indeed, when immediately followed by the verb they govern, they play no essential part in the syntax whatever, e.g.: Mu

He CTajiH n c i c a T b h r a f l a T t :

Tbi noKOHiubCH bt> Stjiovfb rpo6y.

(417)

(314)

and it is absurd to ascribe even as much as a medium stress to them. Even heavier instances of medium stress are far outweighed by the full stress on the third syllable (arsis), the contrast being further enhanced by the mental beat, e.g.: P03M - CTpailieHT. MHt UBtTfc 3THXI. p031>,

3mo 3mo

ptmaa

hohb tbohxi> koct>?

- My3biica TafiHbDCb h3m1>hi>?

3mo - cepitue bt> njitHy y KapMem>?

(723)

The incidence of'genuine' heavy first feet in Blok's anapaestic verse, then, is in the region of 14/15%, or 1 instance per 7 lines or so - which is about the same incidence as that of all light syllables (i.e. half-light plus very light) in the first foot of dactyls. Even if we include the 'half-heavy' syllables as well (which I would consider highly exaggerated), we still have an incidence of not more than 30 % or so - at a generous estimate, let us say, in one-third of cases. It is therefore surprising to find Unbegaun quoting Sengeli for the statement that the heavy first foot (or non-metrical stress, as he calls it) "applies to half the anapaestic lines in the poetry of Bal'mont and Blok".19 19

Russian Versification, p. 52 (my italics). Sengeli (Traktat, p. 66) maintains that, of 415 anapaestic lines in Blok's First Book, no less than 224 open with what he calls 'amphimacers' ( - ^ - = cretics). It is clear from other contexts that both Unbegaun and Sengeli taken a very liberal view of what constitutes a 'stress' in such cases - a problem that has dogged researches of this kind from the time of Belyj onwards, ¿irmunskij (VVM., p. 56) points out that "probably the majority" of cases cited by Belyj's followers consist of words having at most a medium stress, e.g. dual words like MOH, MEUN, ee, nauieu - none of which, obviously, can be compared with the case of, say, nouns, main verbs, and adjectives standing in their own right. (His remarks, of course, are not confined to the opening foot.)

SPECIFIC FEATURES

223

Naturally enough, even the (genuine) heavy feet « -) vary in their intensity and in the impression ofprominence they produce, the syntactical context again playing a large part.20 Sometimes it is syntactical pause which lends special emphasis: Cnu - TBOH OTFLBIX-B HHKTO He n p e p B e T t .

(314)

Hibmb, HaMi. He 6biJio rpycrao, HSMT> He 6MJIO *¿un>,

(750)

A particularly emphatic effect is produced by vocatives - exclamations in the first thesis: Kaoiua,

noii!

(703)

Ha! JIOBH!

(703)

Cd/ibeeiteb! IltcHH 3ejieHofi BecHbi!

(377)

E6otce, Boace, HcnojraeHH&m BJidcTH H CHJib,

(30)

In the last example above, we get the self-same word repeated in 'thesis' (>i and again in 'arsis' ( - | Other instances of this are: Miuiuu,

MHJIMH, TE6A o6HHMy.

ffaAbiue, adjibine . . . H Bkrept. pBaHyjica,

(210)

(746)

and, with a medium-stressed word: OB HdMti, KI> H&Mb - jierKOKpbUiaa MJidaocTb,

(328)

Sometimes the middle syllable of the first foot (2nd thesis) is also slightly heavier than usual (^ ^ -): Cnu mil, HibMCH&fi cnyTHHiia AH6H, nineu^b

medu cb Kpicejii

n o j n e r b Ha KOBepi....

(314) (535)

(Likewise the line from No. 750, quoted above in the first group). Sometimes it is heavier than the first thesis - usually, where the first word is a disyllable of 'iambic' type ( y ^ - ) : YdKe T6nHyjii> Horofl. 80

(703)

No attempt is made here to determine how much of the prominence is due to accentual (stress) and how much to quantitative (time) factors. Cf. Egerton Smith's warning (P.E.M., p. 76), already referred to in Ch. Ill, p. 146, note 73. By the same token, the diagrammatical representations of various types of anapaestic foot are not intended to be anything more than highly approximate.

224

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TRIPLE-TIME METRES

Ona »eaten. m c h h ,

(651)

n e p H a a peBHOCTb

TeouflibciHcjiaGtia pyKH,

(651)

Sometimes the first two syllables (first and second thesis) are roughly equally stressed - though never, of course, fully i -): Bomb - ecrbMb

T4JIOMT> n p i r a c a T b i K W b 4>A6PHHHOH

TaMb, zdtb NJIACKA, rat

Tpy6oii

(416) (328)

BOJIH TBOH.

Occasionally, we find all three opening syllables approximately mediumstressed ^ -). The classic example is: Bomb om - pndb rpo6oBbixi> cryneHeii.

(314)

but there are others: Axb, KOKb

MHtb HAFLOTJIO OHO!

TaMb, zdn, uMb

...

3 a n o B t f l a j i a BJiara,

(706) (328)

In the last example, the first syllable is probably heavier than the third though it is hard to say exactly. This situation arises in quite indisputable form, however, in those opening feet in which we have a fully stressed first syllable followed by a lighter (medium-) stressed third syllable (the second syllable usually being quite unstressed). We then arrive at the phenomenon of the "top-heavy" foot ^ -), one example of which (not in an opening foot) was quoted earlier (p. 216, supra). A few examples among several are: r p d M n e , uibMb B t M o e f i H H m e f i M e v r i .

(727, 4)

Hyeuib mil,

HO He M o a c e n i b n o H H T b ,

(545)

>Kdy me6h,

M o e r d xcemixd,

(306)

Cnumb ond, yjibi6&acb, Kaxi flira, -

(727, 6)

The last example is particularly interesting inasmuch as Blok could presumably equally well have written the first two words the other way round {Ona cnumb). Yet such is the dominating force of the triple-time ictus that he felt no reason to do so and was able, quite successfully, to keep the more poetic rendering. It should be stressed, however, that it is the 'mental beat' that makes this possible and nothing else. There can be no doubt whatever that each of the four opening feet just quoted, taken out

SPECIFIC FEATURES

225

of their metrical context, would be read as dactyls having a slightly heavy second thesis, i.e., diagrammatically (- ^ Yet other possibilities exist - for example, medium stresses on both first and third syllables ^ -): Eydy h

BI> C 0 J I 0 B B H H 0 M I

Ilepedb 3TOH

caay

...

Bpaaytyiomeft BCTpiieH

(727, 3) (497)

or on second and third syllables: (^ ^ -): H

MeMCb

H&Cb

- HHKOrO.

Mbl BflBOeMl.

(314)

This latter form is the nearest we get to "heavy" second and third syllables in an opening anapaestic foot, i.e. where the syllable next to the arsis is practically as heavy, ceteris paribus, as the arsis itself. This never occurs - in Blok's anapaestic verse, that is - with two fully stressed words, i.e. there is no single instance of an opening foot having the diagrammatic structure (^ ^ -) or, say, (^ ^ -).22 One other type of heavy or medium-heavy first foot remains to be mentioned - that in which the first two syllables are formed by the first half of a compound word, hyphenated or otherwise. Here, as elsewhere, the degree of stress on the first syllable varies from heavier cases, such as: ComifeQorvi,

CMTHCB,

HanparyTt CBOH JiyKH,

(488)

¥e/?K03eMHbiMb jieTH nycTbipeMt...

(746)

CHTbO/CHO-dijIbVl pyKH MOH.

(706)

t o rather lighter o n e s like: 81 The most 'outrageous' example of a top-heavy opening foot appears in the fourth line of No. 76 - excusable only in terms of the freedom which traditionally accompanies popular, song-like verse: Hbmi, nojiHbiH 6jia)KeHCTBa, I l e p e A i Eoxu.HM'b HepToroMi» 3Kfly npeicpacHaro AHrejia

C B 6JIAZOETBCMHBIMB MCHOMI».

The foot in question is based on a tetrasyllabic word having the grammatical accent on the first syllable (SjtdeoencmHbiMt,) ! The diagrammatical scheme is thus something like this: (¿^A). 22 For two instances of this "bacchic" type outside the opening foot, however, vide supra, p. 215 (examples from No. 665, line 4 and line 17). Adjacent full stresses in the opening foot otherwise occur only in a few amphibrachic lines (q.v., infra, p. 227).

226

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TRIPLE-TIME METRES

MwoaoHpycHbiH KÓpnyci. 3aB0.ua,

(746)

and (if this be reckoned a 'genuine' compound at all) : IJemporpàp,cKoe

Hé6o MyT&uocb floacfléMt,

(750)

Like the other heavy first feet, the pattern here is almost invariably one of ^ -) or (^ ^ i.e. the hypermetrical stress occurs in the first thesis. In the line : CeMIfllBtTHOH ayrofl THXIIHHa...

(693)

however, we again find something approaching the (^ ^ -) form, i.e. where the second syllable, though lighter than the third (arsis), is yet heavier than the first. As with the light dactylic opening foot, so, here, the percentages given earlier seem to be roughly reflected in the majority of individual poems. Some, however, exhibit few or no full-heavy opening feet whatever, and very few medium-heavy ones. Such include : Book I - Nos 55, 81, 90, 109, 204, 221, 237, 238, 246, 249, 252, 253, 293, 298, and 309. Book II - Nos 321, 324, 325, 499, 521. Book III - Nos 557, 607, 642, 651, 665, 679, 693, 712, 715. This material is probably too small to exclude chance factors entirely; it is, however, interesting to note the predominance of early poems 18 of the above were written up to and including July 1905 (No. 325). After this, Book II musters only 2 more examples, but the number grows again with the later poems (Book III).23 Conversely, poems with a higher-than-average incidence of heavy (full-stress) first feet include: Book 1 - No. 306. Book II - Nos 332, 377. Book IU - Nos 535, 667, 674, 746. c) Amphibrachic metres. The amphibrachic line has no specific deviation in the sense that the dactylic or anapaestic ones have - at any rate, nothing that compares in frequency with the 'light' dactylic or 'heavy' anapaestic opening foot. M

The low incidence of poems from Book II could be partly (though certainly not entirely) explained by the lower absolute number of anapaestic poems contained in that volume, viz. 27, as against 39 in Book I and 38 in Book III (cf. p. 409, infra).

227

SPECIFIC FEATURES

There are, however, occasional - very occasional - examples in Blok's amphibrachic verse of 'heavy' first feet of the "anti-bacchic" type ( ¿ M , e.g.: Cm&Hb, cepdtfe, B3flbixaiomiH CXHMHHKT>,

(504)

In the sixth (last) verse of No. 531, we find a combination of three 'heavy' first feet of varying degree : T a M b cTejieTCH bt> n j i a c K t H n j i d n e r b , IlblAb

BbeTCfl H CTOHCTB 3 y p H a . . .

Tlycmb CKaneTi. »ceHHXt - He

MeneHCKaa nyjia BtpHa.

flocKanerb!

(531)

This is, however, in no way characteristic - indeed, as far as Blok is concerned, it is definitely atypical, and other examples are very few and far between.24 Equally rare is the "top-heavy" type of anti-bacchic foot (¿> e.g.: Bdpyzb

- dm

y j i w S H y j i c a HaxcLribHO, -

(523)

o r (less easy t o define): Hmmb, cb 3TOH CBtnoH a o r o p i o !

(370)

a n d possibly: TaMb 6biJio CBHflaHte. TaMb 6biAb pa3roBopi>...

(283)

The same applies to the reverse ("bacchic") type of opening foot (^ the only example of which (No. 352, line 8, quoted on p. 215 above) is not really of Blok's making at all.25 The same effect, though much less marked, is produced by medium stresses in the second and third syllables, e.g.: 24 For the general incidence of this type of foot in Russian verse, cf. Russian Versification, pp. 48-55, where, however, very conflicting accounts are given. Thus, on p. 49 there is talk of "occasional examples in which the first syllable may take an emphatic stress"; on p. 52, it is stated that "ternary metres frequently stress the initial syllables of the amphibrachic and, more especially, of the anapaestic line"; at the bottom of the same page (pp. 52/53), it is admitted that "a hypermetrical stress on the first foot of an amphibrachic line is less common." (My italics throughout). The value of these remarks is further reduced by the extremely doubtful nature of the only two examples quoted in illustration of a hypermetrical "emphatic stress" - OH in one case and sw in the other (?). It seems doubtful if the phenomenon is any more common with other poets (vide supra, p. 222, note 19). 26 Cf. footnote 14 on p. 215, supra.

228

RHYTHMIC VARIATIONS IN TRIPLE-TIME METRES HTO mil MHtb cecTpa, H HeBtcTa, H fl6.

(380)

MeHH HHKOrO...

(523)

H

HTbntb

6jlUJb

In such cases, the two stresses are roughly equal, though neither of them is more than, at most, medium in strength. Moreover, it is perfectly clear - here, as throughout the numerous examples of triple-time feet given in this chapter - that the force of the metrical ictus and its corollary, the 'mental beat', see us safely through all hazards. All, that is, encountered in Blok's verse. However, it should not be thought that this is necessarily always the case. Only a poet possessed of unfailing rhythmical intuition can produce such variety in ternary metre without once overstepping the limits - intangible, undefinable, but no less real - laid down by the needs of easy, effective, unstilted, musical declamation. It was of such a poet that Saintsbury was doubtless thinking when he wrote, of his prosodical 'rules': "He that can break them with success, let him."26

"

H.M.E.P., p. 30 (cf. p. 217, supra).

CHAPTER VII

ANISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

Such substitution as we have examined up to now - in so far as it deserves the name of 'substitution' at all - has, in point of fact, been confined to the many possible variations in stress, or emphasis, which may occur as deviations from the theoretical metrical norm, without, however, entailing any alteration in the number of syllables per line implicit in the metrical scheme. True, we found that the phenomenon in iambic verse commonly (but erroneously) known as 'trochaic substitution' was in fact something rather more complex than this - namely, the combined substitution of one monosyllabic and one trisyllabic foot for two normal (iambic) ones; but even this did not affect the isosyllabic structure of the line as a whole. yinisosyllabic substitution - in practice, largely, the introduction of trisyllabic feet into duple-time and of disyllabic feet into triple-time measures - is something virtually uncountenanced in Russian literary poetry from the time of Lomonosov until, at least, the time of Blok.1 Isolated instances occur, but these are so isolated as virtually to 'prove' the otherwise ubiquitous rule of syllabic uniformity - in direct contrast to English verse, which, from an early stage of its development, freely admits, in particular, of trisyllabic (mostly anapaestic or tribrachic) feet in iambic verse and of 'iambic substitution' in anapaestic verse. In the syllabo-tonic poems of Blok, cases of anisosyllabic substitution are still rare enough to make it worth while examining them individually in more detail: 1

Cf., inter alia, A. Belyj, writing in 1910 of 'pauses' ( = disyllabic substitution) in triple-time verse: "To-day, the use of pauses no longer surprises anyone; yet, even five or six years ago, the use of pauses was considered by Russian critics as an inadmissible innovation, as [proof of one's] inability to write verse." (Simvolizm, p. 557). Belyj's reference is, in fact, to the doVniki of the Symbolists, which he chose to regard as basically anapaestic or amphibrachic in nature, with 'pauses' in the disyllabic 'feet'. Whatever one's view of this interpretation (vide infra, Ch. VIII, passim), Belyj's remark is of interest in the present context.

230

ANISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

1. BASICALLY DUPLE-TIME VERSE a) Iambic

verse.

a) Trisyllabic substitution. No. 653 offers one example in the fifth line of the second verse: ... IlycTb 6yayn>

T Ì »ce p i n t i l i p o BOJIbHOe 5KHTbe, TBOH BblCOKW njlÓHH,

Be3yMie Moe!

(653)

No. 566, quite exceptionally, includes six instances of 'anapaestic substitution', in lines 12, 15, 16, 22, 24, and 26, e.g.: Line 12

Bee 6ydemb ve/wie cTpàinHbiìi

Line

H

15

B4KT>

nocjiiflHiù, ^»càcHtii

CBÌTT>,

BC£XT>,

YBaduMb u BÈI H a.

Line 22

Tw 6yfleiiib cójmye Ha H66O 3BäTb CojiHue He BCTaHeTb. H KpHKb, K o r f l à mbi Havaéwb

KpHiäTb,

KaKb KaMeHb, KaHeTb ...

(566)

ß) Monosyllabic substitution. Verses 2 and 3 of the same poem (No. 566) each contain one example of the reverse process, viz. 'monosyllabic substitution' - in practice, a type of compensatory pause. In verse 3, the pause, as is usual in such cases, replaces the thesis : Line 5

JIKH H KOBapcTBy A CMépTb - I x

Mipw

HtTb, flä|jieKä.

(566)

In verse 2, by contrast, we find the extremely rare phenomenon of a compensatory pause in place of the arsis : Line 10

Tenepb TM MHJIOH pyicy acMeuib, Hrpàeuib ci» Hè|io, x | myr«, H njianenib TW, 3aMÌTHBb jioacb,

(566)

When we consider that this same poem contains several striking examples of combined substitution, such as : Line 4

x X0|jiÖAb ö MpäKb | rpa/jyjmHXb flHén!

Line 10

x

Line 23

JIÄH X

|

H

KÖBäpjcTBy Mt|pbi HtTb,

CÓJijHué HÖ BCTÄ|HETI>.

BASICALLY DUPLE-TIME VERSE

231

and, notably, the last verse: X E#m>TC>Kbfl6BOJIb|HbI»CH3|HBK) CBOeH, X T H me Boflbi, | X HII|»CE TpaBbi! O, ecjra6i> 3Hajm, FLTTH, B H , X Xo|ji6fli ft MpdKb | rp«fly|mHxi> flHeft!

(566)

it becomes clear that this poem offers one of the most striking and interesting examples of effective anisosyllabic substitution in the whole of Russian syllabo-tonic verse.2 Indeed, this very effectiveness surely demonstrates beyond all doubt that - in the hands of a poet who knows (or 'feels') what he is doing - Russian syllabo-tonic verse is perfectly capable of admitting anisosyllabic substitution as a general part of its structure hardly less, say, than English verse of the same kind. Such a conclusion, of course, lay in the offing from the moment the true nature of so-called 'trochaic' substitution was exposed; the fact that combined substitution preserves the usual number of syllables per line is, in fact, purely incidental; the salient fact is that it introduces, inter alia, a trisyllabic foot into an otherwise iambic scheme. The feasibility of this is merely confirmed (but hardly added to) by the examples of pure trisyllabic substitution (i.e. unaccompanied by 'compensatory' monosyllabic substitution) illustrated here. Another example of compensatory pause in thesis occurs in line 16 of No. 697, as follows (lines 13-16): H BHHcy: Bb cBfrri KpacHOMb H 3 6 a Bb 6ypb»Hi> Bpocjia, HeBiflOMO HecnacTHbiMb

EujibeMb | x no|pocjid ...

(697)

Finally, we find examples of the same phenomenon in the coda of No. 759. Since, however, this is in 'mixed' duple time, it is impossible to define with any show of certainty which lines are 'iambic' in character and which are 'trochaic'.3 For instance, the coda begins as follows: 1 At any rate, up to the time this poem was written (1910-1914). The examples of monosyllabic substitution cited above could, of course, be interpreted as cases of trisyllabic substitution, if the lines be assumed to be shorter by one foot in each instance, e.g.:

Hrpa|euib cb H£|IO, RNYTH, A cMepTb | - flajiexa.

Taken in the context of the whole, such an interpretation seems mistaken. In either event, the existence of amsosyllabism is obvious. 3 Sengeli (Prakt. Stix., p. 70) maintains that, in duple-time verse, all lines must be either iambic or trochaic (sic!). Once again, however, this statement is probably designed to warn the beginner against potentially dangerous pitfalls.

232

ANISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

CrapHKB, T e p n n TflxcKifi Heayn., H TBI, MOH flpyrb, Tepnn H CIIH, C n a , CIIH, H e 3 a 6 y f l e m b Hincorfla

CTapaKa, . . .

(759)

Line 5 may be scanned either as a continuation of the iambic metre of the first four lines: X Cnn, | x cim, or as introducing the trochaic metre of lines 6 and 7: CIIH, X | c n n , ( x )

H6 3a|6yflenn> | HHKor|fli (x) CTapH|Kd, (x) Similarly with the final five lines, which are: B e e , I T O 6BIJIO, H T O MaHHJIO, H T O UBTJIO,

HTO npouuio, Bee, Bee.

(759)

We may scan either in iambic measure: X Bee, | X Bee. or in trochaic: Bee, x | ace. (x) In either case, the compensatory pauses within the metrical line remain as examples of monosyllabic substitution, viz.: Cnn, x cnn, and: Bee, x see. For the rest, whichever scansion be adopted, the actual time values remain the same throughout, irrespective of whether the coda as a whole be considered basically iambic or 'mixed'. It is simply a question of whether the actual (real) time pauses be reckoned as completing the

BASICALLY DUPLE-TIME VERSE

233

end of one (trochaic) line or as beginning the next (iambic) one. The metrical scheme may be interpreted in two ways; the actual rhythm remains identical in both cases. b) Trochaic verse. From what has just been said, it should be obvious that trisyllabic and/or monosyllabic substitution in trochaic verse is not essentially different from the same phenomenon in iambic verse - though the rhythmical effect may well be different, just as the trochaic cadence differs from the iambic one (cf. Chap. V, pp. 203 ff.). The only instance of a trisyllabic foot in an otherwise purely trochaic poem of Blok's occurs in No. 456, the second verse of which reads: HS BHMTI» HH MDIRB, HH n, na|flH'. • • • (X)

(Part IV, line 5)

6ii, Bbib |ra, x | oii, Bbio|rd! ( x )

(Part X, line 2)

and frequently in Part V (lines 5, 11, 17, and 23 respectively): 3xi>, x àxi>, X Sxt, X àx*, x

3X1», x nomi» HIH! (X) 3X1», X n66jiy ffla! (X) 3X1», X ÓCBÌ|XCH, (X) 3Xt, X còrpi |mn! (x)

Part III of the same poem - basically in trochaic 4 x 4 measure - opens with a slightly unusual line: Kaici» nonuiH naiuu pe6«Ta Bi> KpacHOH rBap/un cjiyacHTb Bi. KpacHoii rBapfliH cjxyacHTb ByiiHy rojioBy CJKHKHTI»! How should the first line here be scanned? In practice, it seems probable that some extra emphasis is placed on the second syllable of MIUU and some withdrawn from the first syllable, thus retaining the basically trochaic scheme, viz.:

234

ANISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION KàKt noiium

HauiH

pe6sTa

...

This is, however, not absolutely essential; it is possible to retain the normal prose pronunciation of naiuu by introducing ''combined substitution' in trochaic verse, the scansion then being: KaKb no|uuiH x | Hamfi pe|6»Ta ... In other words, we have here the same phenomenon of a monosyllabic foot followed by a trisyllabic one that we have already observed in iambic verse - the difference being that the feet here are in the same falling rhythm as the rest of the poem, the trisyllabic one thus being a dactyl instead, as in iambic verse, of an anapaest. 4

2. B A S I C A L L Y T R I P L E - T I M E V E R S E

a) Anapaestic verse. a) Disyllabic substitution. No. 571 is basically anapaestic in structure, but shows one or two irregularities in the form of compensatory pause, e.g. in line 4: I l o HOHELMTJ | 3a6biB&|ib x AHH.

and again in the last line of all (which consists of one iamb!): CjIHIIIKOMb 60JIbH0 MeHTaTb O Gbuiofi K p a c o T i

H He MOHb: Xoneuib BCTaTb X H HOHb.

(571)

No. 286 is in mixed metres. The two basically anapaestic segments (lines 5-12 and 21-28 inclusive) contain examples of disyllabic substitution, e.g. line 8: 4

If the line were in an otherwise iambic context, the scansion would be: X K a K b | nouiM | x Ha|uiii pe6s|Ta . . . i.e. the same as in other examples of combined substitution in iambic verse. An alternative scansion - nearer to the 'popular' manner of recitation (naiuu) is to regard the second foot as a type of spondee and the third as a pyrrhic: K & K t no|niJiH H a | m i i p e | 6 a T a . . . Since (or provided that) the first syllable in each foot retains more emphasis than the second syllable in the same foot, the trochaic cadence is maintained, the relative degree of stress (emphasis) within each foot being what counts in such cases - cf. Ch. V, pp. 199ff„ supra.

BASICALLY TRIPLE-TIME VERSE

235

K t O - T O 3BOHKHMl>, B3bIB&K>mHMb MOJIOTOMb Bo3flBHrajn> x c t o j i i i m ajiTapa.

There are also three instances in the last four lines H3i> H

orHH x

Ayma tboh

BceJieHCKoii MeHrfe

HenOMtpHOH Yra/iaTb

(25-28):

CKOBaHa

npeflaHd.

MeiTOH

X

B3BOJIHOBaHa -

x Eh HMeHa.

(286)

(An alternative, but less natural, scansion for the last line is that which places the compensatory pause in place of the arsis of the second foot, v i z . : YrafldTb

| fia A |

HMeHa.)

No. 324 may fairly be considered anapaestic in basic structure, despite a few lines with monosyllabic ( ' a m p h i b r a c h i c ' ) anacrusis. There are also a few cases of disyllabic substitution within the metrical line, e.g. in line 7 (twice): H o CKB03b TpaBbI H 3Jia.KH H 6tjibiH x n y x b x CMeaceHHbixb I I p o 6 t r d e T i > 3ejieHaa Hcicpa,

ptcHiiub

-

and in line 19 (the last): IloacHJibie - CMtioTC», A

y aiBymeKb

-

hcho

bhxhm

3 a njienaMH x S i j i b i a Kpbijiba.

No. 3 2 9 ( N o c n a j a instance, has:

Fialka)

H

He

contains several examples.5 Line

ct£jio

x BHflHO

(324) 53,

for

CTpoemii.

Three further examples occur between lines 77 and 84 (namely, in lines 78, 79, and 82), as follows: B b

nacb 3a6BeHbH o 3Jii h

B b n a c b pa3ryjia H pa3BpiTHO X O

flo6pi,

x poacTBeHHbixb flJIHHHblXb

aypHOMb cocTOSHbH

nyBCTBb

6eciflb

HcejiyflKa

H O HOBOMT. COBtTt MHHHCTpOBb, B i n a c b n p e 3 p t H b a x Kb jiyniimMb H3b Hacb, K t o , n a f l e m i i C B O H X b He CKpbiBaa, B e 3 b c T b i f l a npoaaeTT. CBoe Tkrio . . . s

The following examples refer only to that part of the poem which is more or less anapeastic in structure, as judged by the constant disyllabic anacrusis, viz. from the 5th verse (line 45) onwards (cf. Ch. XII, p. 420, infra).

ANISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION

236

Line 111 includes two compensatory pauses in one line: 51 He 3Haio, 6bijia JIH OHa Mojio,na Hjn. crapa, H KaKÔro x UBÎTI X BÔJIOCW H jcaici» NEPTM H rna3a.

6MJIH,

(329)

b) Amph.ibrach.ic verse. There are no examples of anisosyllabic substitution in any of Blok's amphibrachic poems as such. Line 7 of No. 324, however, quoted above for two examples of compensatory pause within one and the same line,6 has a monosyllabic anacrusis and is, to this extent, 'amphibrachic' in nature, though hardly in context. c) Dactylic verse. a) Disyllabic substitution. No. 434 (Persten'-Stradan'e) - otherwise in regular dactylic metre - has three instances of disyllabic substitution (compensatory pause) in the last verse, viz.: - ^TÔ a Mory? CBoen âjioft x KpÔBbio - HTACHOCTI. MOIO ¿IJIH Te6» yKpainân.... - BipHOCTbK) ÎKéHCKOH, X B4IHOH JUOÔÔBbK) - népcTeHB-CTpaMHbe Teôt x CKOBâTb.

(434)

The only other instance of disyllabic substitution occurring in basically dactylic verse is the substitution of 'trochees' for dactyls in lines 3 and 7 of No. 619. Such substitution, however, is hardly on a par with other examples of anisosyllabic substitution in (modern) triple-time verse, since the poem in question is written in imitation of classical elegiacs, and each 'trochee' is intended to correspond to the classical spondee ( - - ) which, within certain defined limits, could, of course, be freely substituted for the dactyl in such measures. In point of fact, the two feet in question, flyiny yMtni. x Baoxnymb

WCKYCHMMH

najibuaMH -

BI

KpacKH,

and: B"b Mp&MOpHOMT*

3TOM1.

rpO6y MefW ynOKOHJTb JlaBpeHTiii

are only 'trochees' by the standards of modern stress prosody. In practice, the unstressed syllable will, in reading, inevitably be drawn out to cover the time taken up by the two light syllables of the dactylic foot; to this •

Vide supra, p. 235.

BASICALLY TRIPLE-TIME VERSE

237

extent, the two feet in question may, by classical (quantitative) standards, fairly be called 'spondees'. In this connection, it is worth recalling Egerton Smith's view that "the term spondee is not so inapplicable to English verse as some accentualists would think, for it represents much the same thing as in classical verse, viz. a foot of two long or heavy syllables, one of which is distinguished by receiving the metrical ictus. In neither system, therefore, are the two syllables equal in every respect."7 Egerton Smith further mentions "an increasing tendency to believe that stress, being of course quite independent of the t 6 v o i or fixed pitch-accents, must have been used to mark the ictus even in Greek verse".8 The parallel with Russian verse is not quite exact in this particular instance, since the two syllables in question (i.e. the second in each 'trochee') are not heavy. They do, however, tend to become long in declamation, and must, indeed, in such a context, be judged on a quantitative basis as much as an 'accentual' one. d) Mixed triple-time

metres.

a) Disyllabic substitution. Most of these instances are referred to in the chapter dealing with the mixed triple-time poems as a whole (q.v. infra, Chap. XV). Thus, No. 344® affords an isolated example in line 9, reminiscent of the use of the same word (OKuam) to cover two (metrical) syllables by Lermontov:9 C b Heft 3KH3HB x b5jh>h&, O b Heft cMepTb He CTpauraa,

...

(344°)

No. 711 provides instances of genuine 'trochaic substitution' - namely, the substitution of trochaic for otherwise basically amphibrachic feet; the phenomenon remains, of course, merely another form of compensatory pause:

' P.E.M., p. 62, note 1. (See also Ch. III, note 71, p. 145, supra.) * P.E.M., p. 62, note 1. This confusion of the 'trochee-spondee' used in classical imitations with the phenomenon of disyllabic substitution in modern triple-time verse led Belyj to postulate his theory of the pause as applied to the doVniki of Blok and other Symbolists (Simvolizm, p. 557). The theme was developed, with the same false analogy, by S. Bobrov (Novoe o stixosloienii PuSkina, p. 8 et seq.). Sengeli, while noting that the 'trochee' in the dactylic hexameter is something very different from the trochee in trochaic verse, yet considers the former a "pausal movement" (Traktat, p. 68, footnote). On the nature of the trochee, cf. Ch. V, passim ; on the nature of the doVniki, Ch. VIII, infra. ' Cf. Ch. XV, pp. 436/7, and note 4.

238

ANISOSYLLABIC SUBSTITUTION H T O 6BIJIO | JIJOÔHMO, | - B e e MHMO, | X MHMÔ

BnepeAH - HeH3BÎcTHOcrb rryTii . . .

X BjiârôcjioBeHHo, | x HeH3|rjiaflHMO, X H Ê B Ô 3 B p a T H M O | ... npocra!

(711)1»

The anapaestic part of No. 329 has already been examined for examples of compensatory pause (pp. 235/6, supra). In the first four verses, which are in mixed triple-time, we find three further instances, e.g. in line 3: H , OAHCLKO, X NDMSITHO MHT . . .

and in lines 38 and 39: ...

HtMi. yrpaTa x JiyniuHxi. ^py3eft?) IlpoxoacHxt

X CT&JIO

Bee MeHbme.

(329)

No. 353 also affords three examples. Line 8 has: H

CTEKDETT.

X KJIIOKBeHHblH

COKI>.

and lines 25 and 26: Ha TOJiOBt Moeii - KapTOHHbiH x nuieMi.! A b i pyici -flepeBHHHbiiix Meni.!

(353)

No. 553 provides five such examples - one each in lines 33 to 35: Benepa Kptmco ycHyjii. H npocHyjicH BI> apyrofi X CTpaHi. H h xojioflt x yTpa, HH CJIOBO X flpyra, . . . OHI> CT>

and one each in lines 39 and 41: H H CTHXH NYUIKHHBFLHAA,

HH jidii x c66£iiH, HH rpoxoTi

TEJIIACHBIII,

H H H T O , X HHHTO . . .

(553)

In addition, we find a number of examples of disyllabic substitution in No. 316 (4 cases), 319 (11 cases), and 320 (3 cases). (3) Tetrasyllable substitution. Some of the poems just mentioned also provide examples of that very rare phenomenon in basically syllabo-tonic verse - the appearance of three unstressed syllables between two stressed ones, thus constituting a tetrasyllabic foot in place of the usual trisyllabic one.11 19

For the amphibrachic scansion of No. 711, cf. Ch. VI, p. 210 and note 3. This phenomenon is commoner, of course, though still comparatively rare, in the tonic poems, where it is usually referred to by the 'index' of x = 3. Cf. Ch. VIII, pp. 271-273, infra. 11

239

BASICALLY T R I P L E - T I M E VERSE

No. 316 affords one example, in line 6: Ha 3eMJit eme acecTKofi Ilpo6nBaeTCH nepBaa TpdBKa. H BI> K^yMceefi 6