11-02-2015, 05:57 PM
The below is from the Wiki article on Scansion.
It largely echos what tectak said, and what I was going to try to say; but I like how it says it:
"To understand any form of scansion, it is necessary to appreciate the difference between meter and rhythm.
The rhythm of language is infinitely varied; all aspects of language contribute to it: loudness, pitch, duration, pause,
syntax, repeated elements, length of phrases, frequency of polysyllabic words... As C.S. Lewis observes, "if the
scansion of a line meant all the phonetic facts, no two lines would scan the same way".
Meter is another matter. It is an ordering of language by means of an extremely limited subset of its characteristics.
In English (and in many modern languages) the language is ordered by syllabic stress. All other aspects of language
are present, indeed they are vital to the rhythm of the verse; but they are not ordered by the meter.
However, marking stress is not the same as marking meter. A perfectly regular line of iambic pentameter may have
anywhere from 2 to 9 stresses, but it is still felt to exhibit 5 pulses or beats. This can most easily be understood
through the principle of relative stress: an unstressed syllable between 2 even slightly weaker syllables may be
perceived as a beat; and the reverse is true of a stressed syllable between 2 even slightly stronger syllables. These
phenomena are called "promotion" and "demotion". Thus a syllable, regardless of its level of stress, that realizes a
beat is ictic; and a syllable, regardless of its level of stress, that does not is nonictic. Ictus refers to the position
within a line that is experienced as a beat, or to the syllable that fills it."
It largely echos what tectak said, and what I was going to try to say; but I like how it says it:
"To understand any form of scansion, it is necessary to appreciate the difference between meter and rhythm.
The rhythm of language is infinitely varied; all aspects of language contribute to it: loudness, pitch, duration, pause,
syntax, repeated elements, length of phrases, frequency of polysyllabic words... As C.S. Lewis observes, "if the
scansion of a line meant all the phonetic facts, no two lines would scan the same way".
Meter is another matter. It is an ordering of language by means of an extremely limited subset of its characteristics.
In English (and in many modern languages) the language is ordered by syllabic stress. All other aspects of language
are present, indeed they are vital to the rhythm of the verse; but they are not ordered by the meter.
However, marking stress is not the same as marking meter. A perfectly regular line of iambic pentameter may have
anywhere from 2 to 9 stresses, but it is still felt to exhibit 5 pulses or beats. This can most easily be understood
through the principle of relative stress: an unstressed syllable between 2 even slightly weaker syllables may be
perceived as a beat; and the reverse is true of a stressed syllable between 2 even slightly stronger syllables. These
phenomena are called "promotion" and "demotion". Thus a syllable, regardless of its level of stress, that realizes a
beat is ictic; and a syllable, regardless of its level of stress, that does not is nonictic. Ictus refers to the position
within a line that is experienced as a beat, or to the syllable that fills it."
a brightly colored fungus that grows in bark inclusions