'What is this', and 'How is this done?' are the first two questions to ask of any work of art. The second question immediately illuminates the first, but it often doesn't get asked. Perhaps it sounds too technical. Perhaps it… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
Among those today who believe that modern poetry must do without rhyme or metre, there is an assumption that the alternative to free verse… — James Fenton Copy Share
When we study Shakespeare on the page, for academic purposes, we may require all kinds of help. Generally, we read him in modern spelling… — James Fenton Copy Share
There is no objection to the proposal: in order to learn to be a poet, I shall try to write a sonnet. But the… — James Fenton Copy Share
Poetry carries its history within it, and it is oral in origin. Its transmission was oral. Its transmission today is still in part oral,… — James Fenton Copy Share
A glance at the history of European poetry is enough to inform us that rhyme itself is not indispensable. Latin poetry in the classical… — James Fenton Copy Share
In song the same rule applies as in dramatic verse: the meaning must yield itself, or yield itself sufficiently to arouse the attention and… — James Fenton Copy Share
'Love' is so short of perfect rhymes that convention allows half-rhymes like 'move.' The alternative is a plague of doves, or a kind of… — James Fenton Copy Share
Lyric poetry is, of course, musical in origin. I do know that what happened to poetry in the twentieth century was that it began… — James Fenton Copy Share
At somewhere around 10 syllables, the English poetic line is at its most relaxed and manageable. — James Fenton Copy Share
In rap, as in most popular lyrics, a very low standard is set for rhyme; but this was not always the case with popular… — James Fenton Copy Share
The Italian word 'stanza' means 'a room', and a room is a good way to conceive of a stanza. A room, generally speaking, is… — James Fenton Copy Share
Some people think that English poetry begins with the Anglo-Saxons. I don't, because I can't accept that there is any continuity between the traditions… — James Fenton Copy Share
Nobody really knows whether they are a poet. I knew I was interested from the age of 15. — James Fenton Copy Share
Modernism in other arts brought extreme difficulty. In poetry, the characteristic difficulty imported under the name of modernism was obscurity. But obscurity could just… — James Fenton Copy Share
