Poetic Designs: An Introduction to Meters, Verse Forms, and Figures of Speech

by Stephen Adams

There are numerous introductions to poetry and prosody available, but none at once so comprehensive and so accessible as this. With the increasing emphasis on free verse, the past generation has developed a widespread impression that the study of poetic meter is old fashioned - or even that form doesn't matter on poetry. it is an impression that has not been dispelled by the emphasis of some of the existing texts in the area on forms that are now rare or outmoded. The irony is that simultaneously in the past decade interest in formal matters among many poets and literary scholars has been on the increase; the reality is that prosody is today on the cutting edge of literary studies.

Stephen Adams' text provides a full treatment of traditional topics, from the iambic pentameter through other accentual-syllabic rhythms (trochaic, dactylic and so on) and covering as well other metrical types, stanza structure, the sonnet and other standard forms. Adams also includes a variety of topics not covered in most other introductions to the topic; perhaps most significantly, he provides a full chapter on form in free verse. Moreover, he treats rhyme extensively and includes a comprehensive chapter on literary figures. Poetic Designs is thus much more than an introduction to prosody; it is a concise but comprehensive introduction to the nature of poetry in English. It is a book for the general reader and the aspiring writer as well as for the student, a book intended (in the words of the author) to help "heighten the experience of poetry."

Genres: Poetry, Nonfiction, Reference, Read For School, Writing, Textbooks, Criticism

237 pages, Paperback

First published April 7, 1997

Reviews

[David Mosley · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent introduction to the form and teaching of poetry.

[Emily Strom · Rating 4 out of 5]

You can call me a fan :)

[Mackenzie Lopez · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is awful. I've had to read it for a class and feel like I didn't learn anything from it. It isn't that the information isn't there, it's that Adams never actually explains it. The whole book feels like a pretentious attempt to be smarter than the reader. I understand he knows more on this subject, he doesn't need to be so obnoxious about it. Seriously, this is the worst textbook of my English major college career and will probably burn it and the end of the semester because I don't want this copy going back into circulation. Professors, don't use this. There are much better sources out there that are written like "oh this guy does this and let me use some language that makes me sound so smartical and you don't actually understand, reader. Oh! Also, I'm not going to do any real explaination." This is just the worst. Don't buy it.

[KNA · Rating 2 out of 5]

had a really tough time dissecting this for a class. it didn't make any sense to me and I felt like I didn't learn how to apply the principles of poetry that I read about into writing analyses. it was also super pretentious and difficult to read.

[Robin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading for a paper I want to write, I found this intro to meters and verse forms to be very helpful. There were several mentions of hymns, my topic. Clear, well organized, lots of examples. Brief history of meter that was helpful and a detailed appendix on the terminology of rhyming.

[Carolyn · Rating 1 out of 5]

Poetry was never this serious. This man ruined it for me and sucked the life out of it. Reading this book is a form of self harm. If u like yourself and don’t want to waste ur time stay away. If a professor (def white and old) is forcing u to read this I AM SO SORRY

[Alan Wright · Rating 5 out of 5]

Has got me through many an essay.

[Sophie Bowns · Rating 2 out of 5]

Presumably it might be suitable if you were an A Level English teacher, but to me it felt inaccessible and presumptuous…

[Tynan Brooks]

Very approachable text on the basic make-up of poetry. Would recommend.

[Mobius1 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent primer to poetry. All aspects are explained and shown in famed examples from Homer to Chaucer to Milton to Pound. All aspects of different meters are explained thoroughly and in a way that makes applying them simple. It has an excellent chapter on poetic rhetoric and figures of speech that is invaluable and makes you look at poetry with closer attention. The final chapter on free verse is also a very interesting dissection of the form and explains it as best as anyone can. Adams gives references to many books on the different forms and techniques discussed in footnotes incase anyone wants to read more into any topic. The criticism that Adams assumes certain techniques to have specific meanings is true despite his warning not to attach a specific meaning to any abstract figure or meter. The book expects you to be familiar with rhyming pattern terminology like abab, axax, etc and to know what stressed and unstressed syllables are but a quick Google search will tell you.

Overall a very good book for learning about the technical aspects of poetry, I highly recommend it. Any seemingly negative comments above are really nitpicking since the content is so good. I don't know what the other negative reviews are talking about, they must be illiterate or something.

[Nadosia Grey · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a wonderful reference for poetic analysis. All tropes, schemes, and meters are explained well and have examples displayed in various poems (from Shelley to Eliot to whoever you can think of).

My only gripe about this book is that sometimes it asserts that tropes and schemes are used for a specific purpose. In other words, authorial intentionality slides quietly into the background. I don't think there is a way to prove that all authors who use these poetic techniques do so with some intent. Close, jagged (against the grain) readings will not go well with this methodology. Moreover, one can always use the ironic infinity argument: that authors will use a specific technique not in a traditional sense, but as satire or irony of its historical intention. You can always use this argument as a means of shifting the meaning of poetic techniques, but it's hardly creative and stupid.

[Katie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A decent primer on poetry. A bit dry at times.

[Sandra Miksa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Let's keep this short and simple.

This book was educational and probably the reason I understand most of the poetic designs presented to me at University. This one of the greatest book for poetry noob. Hell, I didn't think I was a poetry noob but my Poetry class and this book proved I was.

Although I only read the passages imposed on me for class (pretty much 3/4 of the book), those passages were detailed and concise, and filled with examples to every term presented.

Overall, a great and important read for poetry students or poetry lovers/writers, etc.