ABPA - Australian Bush Poets Association

A little metre problem that I’ve encountered quite often. Words where colloquially, a syllable is dropped.

eg When not using formal language, every is usually pronounced ev’ry. Would this be penalised in competition?

Time is not a problem.
It’s open day and night;
Counters decked in ev ‘ry
mechanical delight.

Thanks ... Wazza

G'day Wazza

'Every' quite often comes up as a word that people are unsure of the syllable count. Most people would consider it to be two syllables in regular speech. I normally consult the Macquarie Concise Dictionary when I want to check on the syllable count of a word. It lists 'every' as being two syllables, with no other pronunciation shown. If a word has more than one accepted pronunciation, it normally lists both. 'History', as an example, is shown as hist - ree or hist - er - ee.

As to how words are judged in competition, it to some extent comes down to a judge's own understanding of the English language and their personal preferences for a particular word. The best thing that I can suggest to do is to choose words that have only one accepted pronunciation as much as possible, it leaves things less open to interpretation that way. But if you feel that a word that has more than one pronunciation is the best fit, some judges may not like seeing the word written as a contraction, eg 'hist'ry' for 'history'. Some of them might look at the over-riding metre of a poem to determine what syllable count the poet was looking to achieve and see the writing as a contraction as unnecessary. Again, it all comes down to personal preferences.

Regards


John Peel

Thanks John. Maybe I'll change the line to shelves stacked with ev-er-y and hope that readers will give the word all of its syllables.
Wazza


Time is not a problem.
It’s open day and night;
shelves stacked with every
mechanical delight.

Yeah it's something I have problems with also Waz. One that someone picked up recently in something I'd written was when I rhymed silence and violence . . of course one has an extra syllable

As John said, maybe just steer clear of using words like "memory" where in spoken usage syllables are commonly dropped - in Strayan English that's about two thirds of our vocab!

I guess it's just another one of those little speed bumps we hit in on the road to impeccable metre.

Cheers, Marty

Well, if memory serves me rightly, Lawson and Patterson never had a problem with using the apostrophe occasionally to force a rhythm, so I guess it's alright for us lesser mortals too.

I am sure it doesn't matter if the rhyming words do not have the same syllables as long as the line is correct in it's rhythm, Marty. Otherwise I reckon its OK to shorten the word.

Regards

Mal.

Hey that's really nit picking Marty. Who gives violence three syllables???
Wazza

Who gives violence three syllables???

MEEE!! ( ) As a sometimes judge, all I can offer Wazza, is that if I EVER get a punctuated contraction on an entry....it 's binned....it gives me hives. I bloodywell HATE it. We are entering a competition for ''Wordsmiths'', are we not? So go find another word. Geeze Louise!

Having now spat the dummy sufficiently..........Regarding colloquially contracted words, where I can see the author has a modicum of applied talent, & where I can see the author's intention, I allow it. Where there's a Godforsaken apostrophe stuck in it, I do not! I view that as inefficient & lazy. And who wants an inefficient & lazy prizewinner?? For all of eternity the war will rage re whether ''fire'' et al has one or two syllables, so I believe that taking that more lenient approach is the best way to 'judge.'

Now, where you will come unstuck with:

Time is not a problem.
It’s open day and night;
shelves stacked with every
mechanical delight...........is.......

I often see a poem that has the meter quite exact but is still a mess. The big problem is often that where the stresses fall is awkward....they should fall upon the syllable/s that we stress in our normal speech. To 'force' the stress upon a normally unstressed syllable results in 'forced rhyme' &/or 'forced meter'.....aaargh! Words like 'upon' for instance. We speak it as up-on....NOT up-on. ''Upon his horse he looked grand..'' Gawd! That line is in perfect Trochee (Trochaic)...strong, weak, strong, weak etc....but it's bloody awful.

So....your verse is Trochaic & Iambic...(I'll dissect it using bold for stressed)

Time is not a prob lem..............(Trochaic)...strong,weak, strong etc
It’s o pen day and night;...........(Iambic)......weak. strong, weak etc
shelves stacked with ev er y.......(Trochaic)
mech an ic al de light................(Iambic)

What's happened to 'every'....it's become 'ev er y. No one EVER pronounces it that way. Anyway, the simple way around all of this seems to me to be...to simply add one word..'are'.

Time is not a problem.
It’s open day and night;
shelves are stacked with every
mechanical delight. (Pefect meter, perfect stress, & 'every' is perfectly pronounced.) Sorted.

Now.......while I'm still scratching my hives....Mal, you can go straight to your room! TWO 'T's in 'Paterson'.........?? Big smack! (scratch scratch)

Goodo. (I musta had a bit of pent up steam..? )

All my love....
Glenny.........................
.

I warn you Wazza Not a lady to be trifled with, be careful with ev'ry thing you post LOL

Bobbo

Hey I just realised did something change ? I now have spell check on the site ???? yahbloody hoooooo

Hi Wazza

You shouldn't be in much doubt now mate - good fun though isn't it.

Cheers Terry

Oh dear..... Poor Wazza. I hadn't had me tea, & Leo lions are not much fun when they haven't had a kill for a few days. I wasn't particularly picking on you mate....and I mighta been suffering a bit of critique withdrawal, given my recent absence from the site. I'm usually more subtle....(''as a train smash'' I've been told...at times)

Seriously though, it was such a good opportunity to try to demonstrate to hard working poets who get soo bewildered when they can plainly see that they've nailed the meter....but it still just doesn't work...what the problem IS. It's WHERE the stress falls. As far as ''every'' goes, it's one of those irritating blighters that I go easy on...like ''history'' etc. I just abhor having the apostrophe contaminating the thing that I can clearly read for myself, & that makes the writer look so ''un-wordsmith.'' But on the other hand...who needs to take 'advice' from a chook who has ended two sentences with a preposition?.

xx Glenny