Re: Metrical Stress, Feet, etc.

On Sun, Feb 08, 2004 at 09:18:08PM +0100, Christophe Grandsire wrote:
> In French length does not exist and stress is not phonemic. As a result,
> all syllables are pronounced with the same length, whether unstressed or
> stressed.
Huh.

> And French metrics are based on number of syllables, so simple it
> is! The "king" of verses in French is the "alexandrin", which means each
> verse is twelve syllables *exactly*, no more no less. Stress doesn't take
> part of it at all. Other verse forms are named after the number of
> syllables in the verse (another common verse is the "octosyllabe", i.e.
> eight syllables per verse.
Is this a recent development?  When I studied French, we were taught to
stress carefully, usually the last syllable of each word.  And when I
read old (Old?) French poetry, e.g. Marot and Villon, there definitely
seems to be a rhythmic pattern.  For example, Marot's "Ma Mignonne":

        Ma mignonne,
        Je vous donne
        Le bonjour.
        Le séjour,
        C'est prison;
        Guérison
        Recouvrez,
        Votre Porte
        Et qu'on sorte
        Vitement
        Car Clément
        Le vous mande.
        Va, friande
        De ta bouche,
        Qui se couche
        En danger
        Pour manger
        Confitures;
        Si tu dures
        Trop malade,
        Coleur fade
        Tu prendras,
        Et perdras
        L'embonpoint.
        Dieu te doint
        Santé bonne,
        Ma mignonne

Sure, each line has three syllables (or three feet, I suppose, but despite
what you said about the distinction in French, I have always considered
syllables a phonetic thing, not a written one), but each line is also
stressed on the third of those three syllables.  If you change the
stress, the result may be phonemically the same, but the poem doesn't
flow as well at all.

-Mark