(boing!) Cnoocy Mosque O'Witz ([info]cnoocy) wrote in [info]rikchiktalkhome,
@ 2007-04-15 17:29:00
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Iambic Pentameter
I was thinking about verse today and came up with a scheme for a Rikchik verse form similar to iambic pentameter. Rather than alternating stress, it alternates 0-collector words. So I translated an immortal line of English i.p. into horrible doggerel in Rikchik:

What do y'all think? Is it too apt to be full of useless words?

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[info]rikchik
2007-04-16 12:07 am UTC (link)
It is a bit wordy, but I think in an original piece you could make those words do some work. (For non-rikchik-readers: the translation is more or less "(The) me-LOVED one HUMAN's happy EYES, (and the) big SUN, (are) not ALIKE.") "One" isn't too bad, if you're specifying (as you might need to to a rikchik reader) that you only love one person. "Happy" and "Big" are interesting choices - I might choose more antonymic adjectives to presage the upcoming conflict, or use the same adjective to improve the similarity to the overblown verse it's parodying.

I think the form is valid, though. (I'd lay it out with height=2 to show the feet better, I think.)

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[info]cnoocy
2007-04-16 12:50 am UTC (link)
I was trying to use the most overblown adjectives for each thing being described. But the same adjective would make a lot of sense, wouldn't it?

Using height=2 would make it hard to read a whole sonnet or something! (Though for that you'd really want height=10).

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[info]rikchik
2007-04-16 01:43 am UTC (link)
Using height=2 would make it hard to read a whole sonnet or something! (Though for that you'd really want height=10).
My thought exactly.

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[info]cnoocy
2007-04-17 12:18 am UTC (link)
Interestingly, there seem to be 14 possible structures for a line of this (assuming it's a single sentence).
Have you looked at the math for possible sentences of given lengths?

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[info]rikchik
2007-04-17 01:14 am UTC (link)
Er, no. (And are you taking pronomials into account?

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[info]cnoocy
2007-04-17 01:31 am UTC (link)
I'm not taking pronomials into account. That would add a lot of complexity. The sequence seems to be the Catalan numbers. I would add a constraint to the Rikchik sonnet form to use all 14, but enjambment is too interesting not to allow.

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