{"id":2538,"date":"2013-07-13T01:42:17","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:42:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=2538"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:42:17","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:42:17","slug":"66-appendix-iii-remarks-on-a-review-vol-27-letters-on-poetry-and-art","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/03-cwsa\/27-letters-on-poetry-and-art\/66-appendix-iii-remarks-on-a-review-vol-27-letters-on-poetry-and-art","title":{"rendered":"-66_APPENDIX III Remarks on a Review.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\n\n
\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAPPENDIX III
\n<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tRemarks on a Review<\/font>2<\/sup>
\n\t\t\t<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t[A] <\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMarginal Comments <\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

The writer justly contends that Quantitative Verse has, hitherto, been misunderstood by English poets who have used it, because the constituent elements of such verse have not
\nbeen correctly appreciated. These elements are accent, stress, and quantity. Accent is voice-weightage on a syllable; stress
\nis voice-weightage on a one-syllable word (which may or may not be accented by itself) considered
\nhic et nunc <\/i>as a
\ncomponent part of a phrase, clause or sentence; <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nNot in my theory; stress occurs in English words of all lengths,
\nnot only in monosyllables. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

quantity is this voice-weightage in poetry. The best (and the
\nonly true) Quantitative Verse is that in which accent, stress and quantity fall on the same syllable. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThis is not part of my theory, where accent is disregarded for metrical purposes (though it counts in the intonation and
\nrhythm) except when it coincides with stress. On the other hand unstressed long syllables count as long and here stress and
\nquantity do not <\/i>fall on the same syllable. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

English being an accentual language, poets writing in English
\nhave a natural bias towards accentual verse. The result is, that <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t2 In April 1943 a review of Sri Aurobindo’s
\n<\/i>On Quantitative Metre by a certain F. J.<\/i>
\nFriend-Pereira was published by the <\/i>New Review of Calcutta. Sri Aurobindo jotted<\/i>
\ndown some comments in the margins of a copy of the journal, and also began a reply,<\/i>
\nwhich he abandoned after writing a single paragraph. Here, in [A], Sri Aurobindo’s<\/i>
\nmarginal comments are published, along with the relevant passages of the review. (Page<\/i>
\nreferences to <\/i>On Quantitative Metre have been altered to agree with
\n<\/i>THE COMPLETE WORKS OF SRI AUROBINDO edition.) Sri Aurobindo’s incomplete reply follows in [B].<\/i>
\n  
\n<\/font> <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage-749<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n

they tend to regard quantity in verse as secondary, and by misplacing both accent and stress produce (when they venture
\ninto such fields) Quantitative Verse of unbelievable badness. This is written in a slipshod metre whose “tread-mill movement” (p. 346) has been charged against it as an incurable defect. . . . <\/p>\n

All this is, assuredly, excellent in theory. But in practice, certain serious objections arise. If it be true, as the author
\nasserts that it is true, that only certain heroic themes can be treated in English hexameter (the most practised of the
\nnumerous types of Quantitative Verse), <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThis has nowhere been said; epic, pastoral, epistle, satire, familiar speech, poems of reflection have all been admitted, ―only there must be either power or beauty. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

then the utility of the suggested adoption of verse based on quantity will be utility in name alone, since the just claim of
\npoetry at present to give not only airy nothing, but everything, a local habitation and a name, would be effectively quashed. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThis objection would arise if it were proposed to write quantitative verse
\nonly<\/i>; that is not so. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

If it be true, further, that because of the undactylic nature of English, the hexameter needs to be “modulated” by bacchius,
\nby lighter cretic, by the first paeon, by the choriamb or double trochee (similar variations to be used in the other quantitative metres), what remains of the fundamental metric of the original form? <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThe ground given is not the undactylic nature of English, but the natural tendency of English poetry to resort to modulation
\nfor the sake of freedom and variety. I have said that this device should be adopted in transferring classical metres into English,
\nso as to create a natural English quantitative verse ―not a rigid imitation of Greek and Latin models. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The verse so written would, doubtless, be something rich and strange:
\n   <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage-750<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nSo much the better. <\/p>\n

\n  <\/p>\n

but would it be really hexameter, simply because it would (and
\nthen not always) have a dactyl in the 5th, and a spondee (or more likely a trochee) in the 6th? <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nWhy not? All that is necessary is that it should be a six-foot verse with a sound and predominant dactylic basis. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Would sapphics, with the changes advocated as a relief to monotony, remain genuine sapphics? <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nAgain, why not? The modulations are few and do not destroy the characteristic swing of the Sapphic verse. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

And ionics, ionics? It would seem, then, that the learned author’s scheme would amount merely to
\nsome <\/i>sort of quantitative verse; this is native to English, as Langland, Hopkins and others have shown, and shown most successfully. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nIf it is some sort of quantitative verse, rich and strange, and based on the recovery by quantity of its place in metre, that
\nwould be enough. Hopkins, I believe, wrote sprung verse ―it is not entirely quantitative. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

There are a number of other points, of more or less importance, to which attention must, in fairness, be drawn. The
\npunctuation leaves something to be desired: on p. 322, line 13 from the bottom, there should be a colon or a fullstop instead
\nof a comma; on p. 323, line 8 . . . a semi-colon instead of a comma. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nNo, that would disturb the connection and balance. The comma is intended to preserve the close connection of the two statements. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Grammar is also defective, as in the following:
\n   <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage-751<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n

(i) ” . . . they can seldom intervene or only if it <\/i>is done very carefully” (p. 362) where
\nit <\/i>lacks a true antecedent. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n“It” refers to the intervention; there is an unexpressed or implied antecedent. This is a liberty, but one that can be taken. Literary style can <\/i>take such liberties sometimes with schoolmaster’s grammar. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

(ii) “All that is necessary is that artificial quantity . . . must <\/i>be abandoned.” (p. 363)
\nMust <\/i>ought to be should<\/i>. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n“must” ought to remain “must”. It is meant to indicate the nature of the necessity and its imperativeness. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

(iii) “A better statement may lead to a solution that could <\/i>well be viable.” (p. 317)
\nMay <\/i>or might <\/i>instead of could <\/i>would be
\nan improvement. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nNo. “Could” has a different shade of meaning from “may” or
\n“might”. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

(iv) On p. 318, bottom line, “they” lacks an antecedent, unless
\nit be “desire”! <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nYes, there should be in the previous sentence “by many” after
\n“vividly felt”. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

(v) The order of words in “He perpetrates frequently lines
\nthat are wholly trochaic” (p. 355) could scarcely be more un-English. Frequently
\n<\/i>should be the first or, preferably, the
\nsecond word in the sentence. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThe word can be where it is to give a certain effect. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

(vi) What, one wonders, is meant by “no insuperable impossibility”? (p. 363) If a thing is an impossibility, there is no
\nnecessity to say that it is insuperable; if it is not insuperable, then it cannot be an impossibility. What the author meant
\nwas either “no apparently <\/i>insuperable impossibility” or “no insuperable difficulty”.
\n   <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage-752<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n“insuperable impossibility” gives a single idea, something that is impossible and therefore insuperable; it is not meant that there
\nare impossibilities that are not insuperable. <\/p>\n

\n  <\/p>\n

(vii) On p. 352, line 5, “verily evidently” is a misprint for
\n“very evidently”. <\/p>\n

These are, however, flaws of little importance. More serious is the claim, put forward on p. 321 that Spenser, Tennyson and Swinburne were great geniuses. It would be nearer the
\ntruth to say that they were poets whose technical ability was considerable. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nNew and strange opinions! “My opinion” would be preferable to “the truth”. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

And in a treatise on metre, one hardly expects to find the following: <\/p>\n

(i) “The way was long, the wind was cold” is referred to as iambic pentameter<\/i>! (p. 324) <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThe “pentameter” is evidently a slip of the pen; it should be “iambic verse”. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

(ii) We are told (p. 338) that the correct way to read the first line of the Aeneid is to place a stress on
\n\t\t\t<\/span>
\n\t\t\t
\nque<\/i><\/span>. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThat is obviously a misprint, quite as obvious as the “verily evidently”. The stress mark should be omitted. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

(iii) In a detailed scanning of the speech beginning “The lunatic, the lover and the poet” from
\nA Midsummer Night’s<\/i>
\nDream<\/i>, one of the lines is quoted as <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

And as imagination bodies forth. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In all the editions of Shakespeare your reviewer has consulted, this line runs <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

And, as imagination bodies forth.   <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage-753<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n

In the second form, it is clear that And<\/i>, followed by a comma, must be stressed: the line then has 5 stresses; therefore is regular. But its irregularity (without the comma and hence with only 4 stresses) is pointed out by our author. (p. 326) <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nEven with the comma (is it Shakespeare’s?) it is an accentual inflexion that I should put on “and” not a stress.
\n<\/p>\n

<\/i> <\/p>\n

(iv) On p. 333, we find the following accentuations: narr\u00e2<\/font>tive<\/i>;
\n\t\t\tcontempl\u00e2<\/font>tive<\/i>, incarn\u00e2<\/font>te<\/i>, sw\u00ee<\/font>ft<\/i>, abstr\u00e2<\/font>ct<\/i>. These are wrong; except the last, if it is a verb. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThe signs do not indicate accentuations, but natural long quantities. Accentually these “a”s are short because unaccented, but
\nin quantitative reckoning they should recover their native value. The second “a” in “abstract” is a short vowel, but the 4 consonants of the syllable can be taken as giving it quantitative force. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Moreover, when producing examples from prose to show that accent, stress and quantity do fall on the same syllables, and
\nthat therefore English “preserves the natural sound values”, (p. 341), it might appear to some readers that the author is
\nout-Jourdaining Monsieur Jourdain. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nWhy? The idea that English prose is capable of scansion is not
\nat all new or absurd. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Nor is he quite certain whether poetic composition is conscious or unconscious (p. 348 and ff.) <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nPsychologically it is both, or let us say, partly conscious and
\npartly subconscious. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

and he sometimes mars the utility of his criticism by taking
\nrefuge in such phrases as “the rhythmic rendering of significance” (p. 360) and “the native utterance of things seen”
\nwhich “conveys by significant sound its natural atmosphere.” (p. 328)
\n   <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage-754<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nWhy? These are not phrases in which I took refuge, but express a recognised fact, both psychological and practical, of poetic
\ntechnique. Is it denied that either in music or word-music sound can convey significance or reproduce the natural atmosphere of
\na thing seen? This is a constant experience of a sensitive reader of poetry. <\/p>\n

\n  <\/p>\n

The book is intended to show the possibility of writing in a metre that will “read as if it were a born English rhythm,
\nnot a naturalised alien.” (p. 363) The words that give the clue to the result, are, one feels, the words
\nas if<\/i>. Quantitative
\nVerse, except what is written in Sprung Rhythm, will always masquerade in English
\nas if <\/i>it were in everyday garb: it will
\nalways be meretricious. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n“As if” here refers to the fact that the hexameter is in origin an
\nimportation from Greek and Latin, but it must not read as such, it must not sound like a naturalised alien music; it must have
\na native English sound and for that it must follow the native rhythm of the English tongue. If it sounds “meretricious” the
\ncondition has not been satisfied. “As if” does not mean that it must be a false metre pretending to be a native one. The
\nhexameter has not to pretend to be in everyday garb, for it is admittedly a new dress, but it has to fit perfectly the body of
\nthe English language. It may use the Sprung Rhythm which is also not an everyday garb, but a dress novel, reinvented and
\nartistically fashioned. It seems to me that “meretricious” here means simply new and unfamiliar and therefore felt by the conservative mind to be foreign and artificial, just as blank verse first sounds when it is first brought into a language accustomed
\nto rhymes; after a while it becomes quite natural, native, to the manner born ―as has happened in French, in Bengali and other
\ntongues. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Is this book, then, one of which “love’s labour’s lost” must be
\nsaid? By no means. There is in it a great deal of illuminating criticism on Longfellow, Clough and Kingsley. There are some
\nextremely wise remarks on poetry, of which these are samples:   <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage-755<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n

It is evident that a crowding or sparseness of consonants will make a great difference to the total rhythm, it will
\nproduce a greater or less heaviness or lightness; but that is a rhythmic effect quite distinct from any imperative
\ninfluence on the metre. (p. 339) <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A great deal of free verse is nothing but prose cut up into
\nlines to make it look like verse. (p. 348) <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

And one must admire the generous “expense of spirit” that
\nwent to the writing of On Quantitative Metre<\/i>, and acknowledge that Sri Aurobindo’s poems are far more than mere
\nillustrations of a poetic theory. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nIn spite of being written in a false and artificial rhythm? Queer!
\n   <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage-756<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n[B] <\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n


\nIncomplete Reply <\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nA criticism of my book On Quantitative Metre <\/i>in the Calcutta New Review
\n<\/i>(Pitfalls on Parnassus <\/i>by F. J. Friend-Pereira) at
\ntacks, not the principles of quantitative verse put forward by me, ―these it holds excellent in theory, but the practice and even
\nthe possibility of putting them in practice. Unfortunately even the approval of the theory loses its value, as it seems to be based
\non a misconception. For the writer starts by thus describing the three constituent elements of quantitative verse,
\n\t―accent, stress
\nand quantity. “Accent is voice-weightage on a syllable; stress is voice-weightage on a one-syllable word (which may or may not
\nbe accented in itself) considered hic et nunc <\/i>as a component part of a phrase, clause or sentence; quantity is this voice-weightage
\nin poetry.” The reviewer evidently accepts the theory of voice-weightage as determining quantitative sound-value and accepts
\nthese three different weights, accent weight, stress weight, quantity weight. But the exact sense of the description of quantity
\nis not clear to me and that of stress I find bewildering. In my own theory I have admitted two kinds of quantity, stress weight,
\nweight of natural syllable quantity depending on vowel length or consonant weight, while accentual weight is disregarded as I
\naccept it is a metrical length producer only when it coincides with stress and there its action is superfluous, since stress by itself is
\nsufficient for the purpose. Other accentual pitches I disregard for metrical purposes and leave them only a rhythmic importance.
\nPractically, then, in quantitative verse accent disappears as a quantity-determiner and takes a back place in the rhythm; just
\nas does natural syllabic quantity in accentual verse.   <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage-757<\/font><\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

APPENDIX III   Remarks on a Review2   [A]   Marginal Comments   The writer justly contends that Quantitative Verse has, hitherto, been misunderstood by…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2538","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-27-letters-on-poetry-and-art","wpcat-51-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2538","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2538"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2538\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}