COLLEGE ENGLISH Volume 28 December 1966 Number 3 Chaucerand the Study of Prosody MORRISHALLE AND SAMUELJAY KEYSER INTRODUCTION writing in the iambic pentametertradi- lin- In this article we propose to character- tion. (It is not, of course, the only utilized the We ize the accentual-syllabic meter known guistic given by poet.) as iambic in the form in shallrestrict our attentionto stressplace- pentameter ment and the number of which it was first used by Geoffrey syllables only Chaucer. We view this meter as an insofar as they participate in the con- struction of a line of verse. abstract pattern which the poet has single We shall not in created or adopted, perhaps only in part attempt any systematicway to the verse line to more consciously. The poet uses this pattern as go beyond single a basis of selection so that he may choose complex structures.' out of the infinite number of sentences of Let us first turn our attention to the a natural those which qualify for facts of English stress placement. In language word like of inclusion in the poem. In the verse of celestial,a speaker modern knows that the stress is interest here the pattern consists in the English primary of 1 regulation two linguistically given on the second syllable, thus celestial and the number of in a 1 properties, syllables not celestial. line and the placement in a line of sylla- bles stress There are other facts about English bearing linguistically given which are than that of adjacent stress also relevant for pur- greater syllables. of meter. Thus nouns Thus we begin with the assumption that poses compound is a stress placement relevant linguistic 1While this article deals with which is the primarily fact utilized by English poet iambic pentameter,we have quoted on occa- sion relevantexamples from certain of Chau- Morris Halle is Professor of Linguistics and cer's works written in iambic tetrameter,in on the staff of the Research Laboratory of Elec- particularthe Romauntof the Rose (RR), the ironics at MassachusettsInstitute of Technolo- Book of the Duchess (BD), and the House of gy. His published work is concentrated pri- Fame (HF). marily in the area of phonology, particularly Abbreviationsof titles throughout follow in the Slavic languages. The Chaucer study is those of A Concordance to the Complete a result of his long standing interest in problems Works of Chaucer and to the Romaunt of the of poetic form. Rose compiled by John S. P. Tatlock and Samuel Jay Keyser is Assistant Professor of Arthur G. Kennedy (The Carnegie Institution English at Brandeis University. His major in- of Washington, 1927). All quotationscome from terests are in linguistics, the history of the En- the Concordance from The Complete Works of glish language,and the intersection of linguistics Geoffrey Chaucer, ed. F. N. Robinson (Boston, and literary study. 1933). 187 188 COLLEGE ENGLISH such as blackbirds are clearly stressed Beginning with the observation that a 1 2 2 1 his has at his and not the poet (like audience) disposal blackbirds blackbirds. Indeed, certain we ask how latter stress en- linguisticgivens, may assignment automatically these are utilized for tails the sequence being understood as the linguistic givens 2 1 purposes of prosody. There are, of noun phrase black birds and not the com- course, two possibilities.The first is that pound noun. Similarly, if a complex noun the poet develops a metrical form which like kitchen towel rack is stressed as is completely independent of the linguis- 2 1 3 1 kitchen towel rack it is understood as tic givens of stress so that celestial is as meaning 'a towel rack for the kitchen' 1 1 3 acceptable as celestial. This hypothesis as kitchen towel while if it is stressed entails that the poet may radically depart 2 from the basis of his his rack it is understood as meaning 'a rack linguistic (and for kitchen towels.' And if it is stressed as audience's) language. The second possi- 1 2 3 is that the does not violate the kitchen towel rack it is clear that it is un- bility poet linguistic givens of his language but English.2 rather incorporates them into a metrical Still other facts about English are ob- pattern which, while extra-linguisticin vious to the native speaker. Thus articles that the patternis not a fact of the spoken such as a, and the, as in a new home, the language, is nonetheless perfectly com- old man, prepositions such as of or in patible with the linguistic givens of the in phrases such as of the people, in the spoken language. house, conjunctions such as and and or, An advocate of the first view is Ten pronouns such as him, his, etc., are with- Brink4 who supposed, for example, that out stress, or with very little stress." while the facts of Chaucer's spoken En- glish demanded a stress pattern of the 1 21In American English the normal stress pat- sort nonetheless Chaucer vio- tern in adjective + noun phrases is 2 1, thus cominge, 2 1 2 1 lated this linguistic given by actually black bird, old man, etc. Commentators on the stress for metrical British observe that in such shifting purposes stress, however, to with words like thus syntactic units the stress distribution is level, rhyme springe, 1 1 1 2 black bird as opposed to blackbird.Thus Daniel cominge.5 Outline 9th ed. Jones, of English Phonetics, On this view (Cambridge, 1960), ?959 observes, "Foreign the present lines which learners should note particularlythe case of one have been word qualifying another. Both the words have as a rule strong stress."In the ensuing examples black bird in a sentence such as "I saw a black of adjective + noun phrases, he makes no bird" has the pattern 2 1. This is not to say distinction between the level of stress on either that the noun phrase could not, in such a sen- constituent. This suggests that the subordination tence, receive a 1 2 stress pattern, prompted, of the adjective stress to the noun stress in for example, by a request for clarification: noun phrases is a peculiarity of American En- "What color bird?" But such an emphatic stress glish. In what follows, then, we shall assume pattern departs from the normal distribution of stress subordination in compounds but level stresses in simple declarative statements. In stress in noun phrases and the like. It will be general, we shall assume neutral stress distribu- seen below that this assumption is consistent tion in the lines of verse which follow unless with the metrical practice of Chaucer and other there are strong contextual reasons for suppos- English poets. The assumption of the (Ameri- ing otherwise. can) 2 1 stress pattern in these phrases renders 4See B. Ten Brink, The Language and Metre a number of regular lines metrically deviant. of Chaucer, 2nd ed. rev. F. Kluge, trans. M. Examples of such lines will be found on p. 200. Bentinck Smith (London, 1901), 5279. 3These facts are intended to convey a pic- 5For a discussion of this point see M. Halle ture of English stress under neutral emphasis. and S. J. Keyser, The Evolution of Stress in Thus in American English the noun phrase English (forthcoming). CHAUCER AND THE STUDY OF PROSODY 189 devisedso thata wordboundary falls 'iambicpentameter', a poetic meterwhich afterthe tenth,twentieth, thirtieth has been used by English poets from etceterasyllable is written Geoffrey Chaucerto the present.In what in perfectiambic pentameter. follows we shall adopt this name without and to characterizein Moreover,on this view the meterof a prejudice attempt line suchas Keats's: as precise a fashion as possible what we intend by it. Silentupon a peakin Darien Suppose, then, that by iambic penta- meter one meant a metrical form which which is cannot be metricallyregular, adheredto the following metricalprinci- distinguishedfrom that of the title of the sonnet ples: Principle 1. On first looking into Chapman's The iambic pentameterline consists Homer of five feet to which may be ap- pended one or two extra-metrical which is not. Givena principleof stress unstressedsyllables. shift for metricalpurposes, both lines Principle 2. mustbe viewedas regular.But this clear- The iambic foot consistsof two syl- ly is not the case.Indeed, it is precisely lables. the differencebetween these two lines Principle 3. thata successfultheory of prosodyought Each even syllable is strongly to characterize. stressed. In what followswe shalladopt the sec- Principle4. ond alternative,namely that basically the Each odd syllable is less strongly poet doesnot violatethe linguisticgivens stressed. of his in languagebut, rather,attempts We shall refer to the above principles generalto utilizethem in actualizingthe as the strict of the iambic metrical interpretation pattern. pentameter line. Notice that (1) above is a line in termsof these Fromthis pointof view, a line like: regular princi- ples. (1) Celestial, whether among the Thus the line may be scannedas fol- thrones,or named lows: 1 1 1 1 from Milton'sParadise Book Celestial,wheth'r among the thrones, Lost, XI, 1 line 296 (hereafterPL. XI. 296) mustbe or viewed as with an unstressed named.6 beginning now be syllablefollowed by a stressedsyllable But notice that (2) abovemay becauseit is a offeredas a counter-exampleto the iam- precisely linguistic1 given bic thus: that celestialis stressedas celestial.Simi- pentametertheory, 1 1 1 1 of doleful larly, becauseregion is so stressed,we Regions sorrow, shades, supposethat a line suchas: wherepeace (2) Regionsof sorrow,doleful shades, 6For elision of -e before an r which separates wherepeace (PL. I. 65) unstressedvowels in Milton, see Robert Bridges, Milton's Prosody (Oxford, 1921), pp.