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[MARGINALE ON RHYME](1)
The effect derivable from well-managed rhyme is very imperfectly understood. Conventionally “rhyme” implies merely close similarity of sound at the ends of verse,(2) and it is really curious to observe how long mankind have been content with their limitation of the idea. What, in rhyme, first and principally pleases, may be referred to the human sense or appreciation of equality — the common element, as might be easily shown, of all the gratification we derive from music in its most extended sense(3) — very especially in the modifications of metre and rhythm. We see, for example, a crystal, and are immediately interested by the equality between the sides and angles of one of its faces — but on bringing to view a second face, in all respects similar to the first, our pleasure seems to be squared(4) — on bringing to view a third, it appears to be cubed, and so on: I have no doubt, indeed, that the delight experienced, if measurable, would(5) be found to have exact mathematical relations, such, or nearly such, as I suggest — that is to say, as far as a certain point, beyond which there would be a decrease, in similar relations. Now here, as the ultimate result of analysis, we reach the sense of mere equality, or rather the human delight in this sense; and it was an instinct, rather than a clear comprehension of this delight as a principle, which, in the first instance, led the poet to attempt an increase of the effect arising from the mere similarity (that is to say equality) between two sounds — led him, I say, to attempt increasing this effect by making a secondary equalization, in placing the rhymes at equal distances — that is, at the ends of lines of equal length. In this manner, rhyme and the termination of the line grew connected in men's thoughts — grew into a conventionalism — the principle being lost sight of altogether. And it was simply because Pindaric verses had, before this epoch, existed — i.e. verses of unequal length — that rhymes were subsequently found at unequal distances. It was for this reason solely, I say — for none more profound — rhyme had come to be regarded as of right appertaining to the end of verse — and here we complain that the matter has finally rested. [page 85:]
But it is clear that there was much more to be considered. So far, the sense of equality alone, entered the effect; or, if this equality was slightly varied, it was varied only through an accident — the accident of the existence of Pindaric metres. It will be seen that the rhymes were always anticipated. The eye, catching the end of a verse, whether long or short, expected, for the ear, a rhyme. The great element of unexpectedness was not dreamed of — that is to say, of novelty — of originality. “But,” says Lord Bacon, (how justly!) “there is no exquisite beauty without some strangeness in the proportions.”(6) Take away this element of strangeness — of unexpectedness — of novelty — of originality — call [page 86:] it what we will — and all that is ethereal in loveliness is lost at once. We lose — we miss the unknown — the vague — the uncomprehended, because offered before we have time to examine and comprehend. We lose, in short, all that assimilates the beauty of earth with what we dream of the beauty of Heaven.
Perfection of rhyme is attainable only in the combination of the two elements, Equality and Unexpectedness. But as evil cannot exist without good, so unexpectedness must arise from expectedness. We do not contend for mere arbitrariness of rhyme. In the first place, we must have equi-distant or regularly recurring rhymes, to form the basis, expectedness, out of which arises the element, unexpectedness, by the introduction of rhymes, not arbitrarily, but with an eye to the greatest amount of unexpectedness. We should not introduce them, for example, at such points that the entire line is a multiple of the syllables preceding the points. When, for instance, I write —
And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain,(7)
I produce more, to be sure, but not remarkably more than the ordinary effect of rhymes regularly recurring at the ends of lines; for the number of syllables in the whole verse is merely a multiple of the number of syllables preceding the rhyme introduced at the middle, and there is still left, therefore, a certain degree of expectedness. What there is of the element, unexpectedness, is addressed, in fact, to the eye only — for the ear divides the verse into two ordinary lines, thus:
And the silken, sad, uncertain Rustling of each purple curtain.(8)
I obtain, however, the whole effect of unexpectedness, when I write —
Thrilled me, filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before.
N.B. It is very commonly supposed that rhyme, as it now ordinarily exists, is of modern invention — but see the “Clouds” of Aristophanes.(9) Hebrew verse, however, did not include it — the terminations of the lines, where most distinct, never showing any thing of the kind.(10)
[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 85:]
1 ‘Marginalia’, Graham's American Monthly Magazine 28:116, March 1846.
The title Marginale requires an apology, since Wilson Follett et al., Modern American usage, New York: Hill and Wang, 1966, p. 195, state flatly that marginalia has no singular. Neither the adjective marginalis nor the neuter plural substantive marginalia is of classical Latinity. The adjective marginalis is cited to the year 1265 by R. E. Latham, Revised medieval Latin word-list from British and Irish sources, Oxford Univ. Press, 1965. The adjective marginal is cited to the year 1576 in NED; the identically spelt ‘French adjective is of about the same age. The substantive marginalia was used by Coleridge in a letter of 22 April 1832; the earliest published appearance found by NED is Poe's ‘Marginalia’ of 1844; DAE tacet.
We assert that if Poe, who prided himself on his Latin, had had occasion to discuss his paragraphs distributively, he would have called each paragraph a marginale. In reading aloud, give the word four syllables; the third and fourth rhyme with whatever pronunciation you have adopted for rationale.
2 See p. 67, note 57.
3 For music see p. 17, note 75. Poe's sentence, swollen with two decasyllables, clearly belongs to a speech for the negative in a collegiate debate — RESOLVED, that the pleasurable effects derived from Rhyme appertain to Gymnastic and not to Music.
4 See p. 101, note 31.
5 Two inadvertent decasyllables.
6 Bacon, Essays, no. 43, ‘Of beauty’: ‘There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion.’
Poe, ‘Ligeia’, Harrison 2:250: ‘ “There is no exquisite beauty,” says Bacon, Lord Verulam, speaking truly of all the forms and genera of beauty, “without some strangeness in the proportion.”’
[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 86:]
7 Poe, ‘The raven’, Campbell, p. 109, vv. 13-18:
And the silken, sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me — filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating,
“ 'T is some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door —
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; —
This it is and nothing more.”
[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 86, running to the bottom of page 87:]
8 Campbell, p. 249, states that Griswold, Poets & poetry, printed ‘The raven’ in short lines, breaking each of Poe's long lines after [page 87:] the fourth foot; and cites Griswold's defence of this alleged mutilation.
9 An inadvertent decasyllable.
Edward Munk, The metres of the Greeks and Romans, &c., tr. Charles Beck & C. C. Felton, Boston: James Munroe, 18 44, pp. 23-24:
The ancients were not acquainted with the use of rhyme and assonance, as we find them in modern poets. Where rhymed verses or hemistichs are found, the rhyme for the most part is accidental; . . . Such verbal rhymes frequently produce a comic effect: e.g. Aristoph. Nub. 709 sqq.
‘Απολλυμι σειλαιος’ εχ του σχιμποδος
Δαχνουσι μ' εξερποντες οι Κορινθιοι
Και τας πλευρας δαρδαπτουσιν
Και την ψυχην εχπινουσιν
Και τους ορχεις εξελχουσιν
Και τον πρωχτον διουττουσιν
Και μ' απολουσιν [[— 709-715]]
Homoioteleuton amounting to the last written accent, the vowel affected by that accent, and all letters following that vowel, can be found in the Clouds; by the definition just sketched, the rhyme at vv. 991-992 is licentious.
μετα ταυθ οπως νψν εγενεθ υιος ουτοσι
εμοι τε δη και τη γυναυα ταγαθη
περι τουνοματος δη 'ντευθεν ελοιδορουμεθα
η μεν γαρ ιππον προσετιθει προς τουνοηα,
Ξανθιππον η Χαριππον η Καλλιππιδην,
εγω δε του παππου 'τιθεμην φειδωνιδην — 60-65
δυσιλλα φιλιννα Κλειταγορα Δημιητρια
αρρε δε ποια των ονοματων; μυρια. — 684-685
ειπε τι ποιων; τα δικαια λεγων,
αλλ' ανα τρεψω γ' αυτ αντιλ εγων.
ουδε γαρ ειναι πανυ φημι δικην. — 899-901
προς ταυτ', ω μειρακιον, θαρρων εμε τον κρειττω λογον αιρου.
καπιστηθει μισειν και βαλαειων απεχεσθαι
και τοις αισχυ νεσθαι, καν σκωπτη τις σε, φλεγεσθαι'
και των θακων τοις πρεσβυτεροις υπανιστασθαι προσ ιουσιν,
και μη περι τους σαυτου γονεας σκαιουργειν, αλλο τε μηδεν
αιαχρον ποιειν, οτι της Αιδους μελλεις ταγαλμ' αναπλαττειν,
μηδ ' εις ορχηστριδος ειαττειν, ινα μη προς ταυτα κεχηνως,
μηλω βληθεις υπο πορνιδιον, της ευκλειας αποθραυσθης,
μηδ' αντειπειν τω πατρι μηδεν μηδ' 'Ιαπετον καλεσαντα
μνησικακησαι την ηλικιαν, εξ ης ενεοττοτροφηθης. — 990-999
εμοι δ' ομιλων,
χρω τη φυσει, σκιρτα, γελα, νομιξε μηδεν αισχρον.
μοιχος γαρ ην τυχης αλους, ταδ' αντερεις προς αυτον
φς ουδεν ηδικηκας' ειτ' εις τον Δι' επανενεγκειν,
κακεινος ος ηττων ερωτος εστι και γυναικων.
καιτοι συ θνητος ων ξεου πως μειζον δυναιο; — 1077-1082
10 Montgomery, Lectures on general literature, p. 85:, It is certain that Hebrew verse did not include rhyme: the terminations of the lines, when they are most distinct, never manifesting anything of the kind.’
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Notes:
This is “Marginalia 147.”
The Greek quotations in note 9 are from “The Clouds” by Aristophanes. Much of the dialogue is rather rude and bawdy humor, in keeping with the source. The English transations below are taken from a dual language edition of the play, translated by Ian Johnston (Oxford, OH: Faenum Publishing, 2017).
In the first block, lines 709-715, Strepsiades speaks:
I'm dying a miserable death in here!
These Corinthian crawlers keep biting me.
gnawing on my ribs,
slurping up my blood,
yanking off my balls,
tunneling up my arse hole —
they're killing me!
In the next block, lines 60-65, Strepsiades speaks:
After that, when this son was born to us —
I'm talking about me and my good wife —
we argued over what his name should be.
She was keen to add -hippos to his name,
like Xanthippos, Callipedes, or Chaerippos.
Me, I wanted the name Pheidonides,
In the next block, lines 684-685, the first line is spoken by Socrates, and the second by Strepsiades, although not indicated in the quoted Greek:
Which names are masculine?
There are thousands of them — Philoxenos,
(He then proceeds to list several other masculine names.)
In the next block, lines 899-901, the lines alternate between Better Argument and Worse Argument, although not indicated in the quoted Greek:
Worse Argument
And how?
Tell me that.
Better Argument
By arguing what's just.
Worse Argument
That I can overturn in my response,
by arguing there's no such thing as Justice.
In the next block, lines 990-999, all of the lines are spoken by Better Argument:
And so, young man, that's why you should choose me,
the Better Argument. Be resolute.
You'll find out how to hate the market place,
to shun the public baths, to feel ashamed
of shameful things, to fire up your heart
when someone mocks you, to give up your chair
when older men come near, not to insult
your parents, nor act in any other way
which brings disgrace or which could mutilate
your image as an honourable man.
You'll learn not to run off to dancing girls,
in case, while gaping at them, you get hit
with an apple thrown by some little slut,
and your fine reputation's done for,
and not to contradict your father,
or remind him of his age by calling him
Iapetus — not when he spent his years
in raising you from infancy.
In the final block, lines 1077-1082, all of the lines are spoken by Worse Argument:
If, by chance,
you're discovered screwing a man's wife,
just tell the husband you've done nothing wrong.
Blame Zeus — alleging even he's someone
who can't resist his urge for sex and women.
And how can you be stronger than a god?
You're just a mortal man.
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[S:0 - JAG68, 1968] - Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore - Bookshelf - EAP: The Rationale of Verse — a preliminary edition (Greenwood)