Verse: An Introduction to Prosody

To read a poem with complete pleasure we must understand how it works rhythmically and how its rhythms are related to those of a whole network of other poems. Verse is a seminal introduction to prosody —the rhythmic organization of poetic language—for any student learning to read or write poetry.  Written in a clear and engaging style by a poet and teacher with more than 30 years of experience teaching the subject, this book explains the fundamental components and technical details necessary to fully understand the meaning of poems.  Along with important historical and theoretical background material, the author discusses basic definitions, methods of scansion, and broader techniques of reading. The chapters cover iambic pentameter and other kinds of metrical verse, rhythm and rhyme, free verse, song, and advanced topics such as poetic meter, linguistic approaches to verse, and the computer scansion of metrical poetry. The  book is also supplemented by  a user–friendly website featuring student exercises and additional resources.  Addressing fundamental topics that so often go untaught in today’s poetry courses, this is an essential text for anyone wishing to fully understand the meaning of poetry.

Charles Hartman is Poet in Residence and Lucy Marsh Haskell ’19 Professor of English at Connecticut College, USA, where he teaches poetry writing, modern and contemporary poetry, and song.  He is the author of seven collections of poems, most recently New & Selected Poems (2008), and critical books on free verse, jazz and poetry, and computer poetry.