Accent (poetry)

In English poetry, accent refers to the stressed syllable of a polysyllabic word, or a monosyllabic word that receives stress because it belongs to an "open class" of words (noun, verb, adjective, adverb) or because of "contrastive" or "rhetorical" stress. In basic analysis of a poem by scansion, accents can be represented by a short vertical line (') preceding the syllable, while the divisions between feet are shown by a slash (/).[1]

Metrical feet and accents
Disyllables
 pyrrhic, dibrach
 iamb
 trochee, choree
 spondee
Trisyllables
  tribrach
  dactyl
  amphibrach
  anapaest, antidactylus
  bacchius
  antibacchius
  cretic, amphimacer
  molossus
See main article for tetrasyllables.

There is generally one accent in each foot, for example:

Be-'hold / her, 'sin-/gle 'in / the 'field
Yon 'sol-/i-'tar-/y 'high-/land 'lass!
'Reap-ing / and 'sing-/ing 'by / her-'self;
'Stop here /or 'gent-/ly 'pass.

See also

References

  1. St. Edward's University: "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2008-07-03. Retrieved 2007-12-28.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) Accessed December 28, 2007.
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