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ALEXANDRINE VERSE

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Originally appearing in Volume V01, Page 576 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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ALEXANDRINE See also:

VERSE , a name given to the leading measure in See also:French See also:poetry. It is the heroic French verse, used in epic narrative, in tragedy and in the higher See also:comedy. There is some doubt as to the origin of the name; but most probably it is derived from a collection of romances, collected in the 12th See also:century, of which See also:Alexander of Macedon was the See also:hero, and in which he was represented, somewhat like the See also:British See also:Arthur, as the See also:pride and See also:crown of See also:chivalry. Before the publication of this See also:work most of the See also:trouvere romances appeared in octosyllabic verse. There is also a theory that the See also:form was invented by a poet named Alexander. The new work, which was henceforth to set the See also:fashion to French literature, was written in lines of twelve syllables; but with a freedom of pause which was after-wards greatly curtailed. The new fashion, however, was not adopted all at once. The See also:metre See also:fell into disuse until the reign of See also:Francis I., when it was revived by See also:Jean See also:Antoine de Baif, one of the seven poets known as the See also:Pleiades. See also:Jodelle mingled episodical Alexandrines with the vers communs of his tragedies and so introduced them into See also:drama. It w4s See also:Ronsard, however, who made the verse popular, and gave it See also:vogue in See also:France. From his See also:time it became the recognized vehicle for all See also:great poetry, and the regulation of its pauses became more and more strict. The following is an example of the verse as used by See also:Racine Ou Buis-je ? qu'ai-je fait ?

II que dois-je faire encore ? Quel transport me saisit ? II quel chagrin me devore ? Two inexorable See also:

laws came to be established with regard to the pauses. The first is, that each See also:line should be divided into two equal parts, the See also:sixth syllable always ending with a word. In the earlier use of this metre, on the contrary, it frequently happened that the sixth and seventh syllables belonged to the same word. The other is that, except under the most stringent conditions, there should be none of what the French critics See also:call enjambement, that is, the overlapping of the sense from one line on to the next. Ronsard completely ignored this See also:rule, which was after his time settled by the authority of See also:Malherbe. The latest school of French See also:prosody has given great See also:attention to the breaking up of the Alexandrine, which no longer possesses the rigidity of authoritative form which it held until about 188o, but is often used with a See also:licence no less than when Ronsard wrote. See also:Michael See also:Drayton, who was twenty-two years of See also:age when Ronsard died, seemed to think that the Alexandrine might be as pleasing to See also:English as it was to French ears, and in this metre he wrote a See also:long poem in twenty-four books called the Polyolbion. The metre, however, failed to catch the English See also:ear. The See also:principal English measure is a line of ten syllables, and the Alexandrine is used only occasionally to give it variety and See also:weight.

In See also:

ordinary English heroic verse it is but rarely introduced; but in the favourite narrative metre, known as the Spenserian, it comes in regularly as the concluding line of each See also:stanza. In English usage, moreover, it is to be observed that there is no fixed rule as to the position of the pause, though it is true that most commonly the pause occurs at the end of the sixth syllable. See also:Spenser is very See also:free in shifting the pause about; and though the later poets who have used this stanza are not so free, yet, with the exception of See also:Shenstone and of See also:Byron, they do not See also:scruple to obliterate all pause between the sixth and seventh syllables. Thus See also:Thomson (See also:Castle of Indolence, i. 42): And See also:music See also:lent new gladness to the See also:morning See also:air. The danger in the use of the Alexandrine is that, in attempting to give dignity to his line, the poet may only produce heaviness, incurring the sneer of See also:Pope A needless Alexandrine ends the See also:song, That, like a wounded snake, drags its slow length along. The Alexandrine was the dominant metre in Dutch poetry from the 16th to the See also:middle of the lgth century, and about the time of its introduction to See also:Holland it was accepted in See also:Germany by the school of Opitz. In the course of the 17th century, after being used without See also:rhyme by See also:Seckendorf and others, it formed a transitional station on the route to See also:German See also:blank verse, and has since then been rarely employed, except occasionally in rhymed comedy.

End of Article: ALEXANDRINE VERSE

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