Poetry on the AP Exam.

Subject: Poetry on the AP Exam. Mon Jul 14, 2008 10:43 pm

I was given this pamplet my senior year in highschool. AP English was at the same time my most favorite and least favorite of classes.

The most obvious way to distinguish poetry from prose is to search for rhyme and meter. Prose almost never rhymes (unless by accident), and metered prose is a rarity. But this is an inadequate distinction, since a great deal of modern poetry - like prose- lacks both meter and rhyme. Therefore, a more useful way to tell prose and poetry apart is to say that poetry relies more fully on figurative language, although that, too, is an overgeneralization.
Suffice it to say, therefore, that the study of individual poems reveals that metaphorical language, connotation of words, and verbal irony, while not the exclusive domain of the poet, are used frequently in poetry and are crucial in giving readers what may be called the poetic experience.

On the AP Literature exam, you will invariably find both multiple-choice questions and an esay question that will require you to analyze one or more poems. Although it generally agreed that poetry should be read for pleasure, the poems on the exam are not there for your enjoyment. You might enjoy reading them, of course, but your task is to find out as much as you can about the poem- how it sounds, what it means, how its pieces are arranged, how it conveys its meaning. To describe a poem adequately, you must be familiar with the vocabulary of poetry.

It drolls on about the exam somemore here so I'll skip to the vocab..., but I included that last paragraph because I would be delighted if people who commented/posted here would dissect eachother's works.

Lyric: subjective, reflective poetry with regular rhyme scheme and meter that reveals the poet's thoughts and feelings to create a single, unique impression.

Matthew Marnold, "Dover Beach"
William Blake, "The Lamb," "The Tiger"
Emily Dickinson, "Because I Could Not Stop for Death"
Langston Hughes, "Dream Deferred"
Andrew Marvell, "To His Coy Mistress"
Walt Whitman, "Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking"
Narrative: nondramatic, objective verse with regular rhyme scheme and meter that relates a story or narrative.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge, "Kubla Khan"
T. S. Eliot, "Journy of the Magi"
Gerard Manley Hopkins, "The Wreck of the Deutschland"
Alfred, Lord Tennyson, "Ulysses"
Sonnet: a rigid 14-line verse form, with variable structure and rhyme sceheme according to type:
a. Shakespearean (English) -- three quatrains and concluding couplet in iambic pentameter, rhyming abab cdcd efef gg or abba cddc effe gg. The Spenserian sonet is a specialized form with linking rhyme abab bcbc cdcd ee.

b. Italian (Petrarchan) -- an octave and seslet, between which a break in thought occurs. The traditional rhyme scheme is abba abba cde cde (or, in the sestet, and variation of c, d, e).
Ode: elaborate lyric verse that deals seriously with a dignified theme.
Blank Verse: unrhymed lines of iambic pentameter.
Free Verse: unrhymed lines without regular rhythm.
Epic: a long, dignified narrative poem that gives the account of a hero important to his nation or race.
Dramatic Monologue: a lyric poem in which the speaker tells an audience about a dramatic moment in his/her life, and in doing so, reveals his/her character.
Elegy: a poem of lament, meditating on the death of an individual.
Ballad: simple, narrative verse that tells a story to be sung or recited; the folk ballad is anonymously handed down, while the literary ballad has a single author.
Idyll: lyric poem describing the life of the shepherd in pastoral, bucolic, idealistic terms.
Villanelle: a French verse form, strictly calculated to appear simple and sontaneous; five tercets and a final quatrain, rhyming aba aba aba aba aba abaa. Lines 1, 6, 12, 18, and 3, 9, 15, 19 are refrain.
Light Verse: a general category of poetry written to entertain such as lyirc poetry, epigrams, and limericks. It can also have a serious side, as in parody or satire.
*** A FAVORITE - Haiku: Japanese verse in three lines of five, seven, and five syllables, often depicting a delicate image.
Limerick: humorous nonsense-verse in five anapestic lines rhyming aabba, a-lines being trimeter and b-lines dimeter.

That's all out of the pamplet that I'll post for now. Please tell me if this was helpful/informative, or just a waste of time. Smile

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Religion must remain an outlet for people who say to themselves, "I am not the kind of person I want to be." It must never sink into an assemblage of the self-satisfied.

Subject: Re: Poetry on the AP Exam. Wed Jul 16, 2008 12:55 pm

Meter is poetry's rhythm, or its pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables. Meter is measured in units of feet; the five basic kinds of metric feet are indicated below.
_________________

Religion must remain an outlet for people who say to themselves, "I am not the kind of person I want to be." It must never sink into an assemblage of the self-satisfied.