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  • that don't scan

    From Rich D@21:1/5 to All on Sat Jul 24 16:58:28 2021
    "From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    "From the ashes shall a fire be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    Which flows smoother?

    I always said, old J.R.R. was a fine story teller, but
    no ear for the cadences of the English language -

    --
    Rich

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  • From Jeff Urs@21:1/5 to Rich D on Sun Jul 25 01:08:29 2021
    Rich D <rdelaney2001@gmail.com> wrote:
    "From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    "From the ashes shall a fire be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    Which flows smoother?

    Seriously? The first one.
    Stresses on 'ash', 'fire', 'wok', 'light', 'shad', 'spring'.

    --
    Jeff

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  • From Steve Morrison@21:1/5 to Jeff Urs on Tue Jul 27 18:27:40 2021
    On Sun, 25 Jul 2021 01:08:29 +0000, Jeff Urs wrote:

    Rich D <rdelaney2001@gmail.com> wrote:
    "From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    "From the ashes shall a fire be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    Which flows smoother?

    Seriously? The first one.
    Stresses on 'ash', 'fire', 'wok', 'light', 'shad', 'spring'.

    It all depends on whether you pronounce "fire" with one syllable or
    two. Most of us use the two-syllable pronunciation in real life, but
    the scansion works assuming "fire" is a one-syllable word. It's good
    enough for poetry.

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  • From Glenn Holliday@21:1/5 to Steve Morrison on Tue Jul 27 21:36:10 2021
    On 7/27/2021 2:27 PM, Steve Morrison wrote:
    On Sun, 25 Jul 2021 01:08:29 +0000, Jeff Urs wrote:

    Rich D <rdelaney2001@gmail.com> wrote:
    "From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    "From the ashes shall a fire be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    Which flows smoother?

    It all depends on whether you pronounce "fire" with one syllable or
    two. Most of us use the two-syllable pronunciation in real life, but
    the scansion works assuming "fire" is a one-syllable word. It's good
    enough for poetry.

    I heard an actor once comment "John Wayne is the only person I ever
    heard pronounce 'cow' as three syllables."

    <Trying it with "fire">

    That doesn't work. Never mind.


    --
    Glenn Holliday holliday@acm.org

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  • From John W Kennedy@21:1/5 to Rich D on Sun Aug 1 23:01:07 2021
    On 7/24/21 7:58 PM, Rich D wrote:
    "From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    "From the ashes shall a fire be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    Which flows smoother?

    I always said, old J.R.R. was a fine story teller, but
    no ear for the cadences of the English language -

    --
    Rich


    The other responders have observed that Tolkien’s version requires that “fire” be pronounced with a single syllable, but there’s nothing unusual about that. Tennyson, for example, does it more often than not, and so
    does Shakespeare.

    Your version, on the other hand, is hideous, and doesn’t scan at all
    unless you pronounce "ashes" as one syllable and “fire” as two. Don’t quit your day job.

    --
    John W. Kennedy
    "The blind rulers of Logres
    Nourished the land on a fallacy of rational virtue."
    -- Charles Williams. "Taliessin through Logres: Prelude"

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  • From Julian Bradfield@21:1/5 to Steve Morrison on Mon Aug 2 10:33:05 2021
    On 2021-07-27, Steve Morrison <rimagen@toast.net> wrote:
    Rich D <rdelaney2001@gmail.com> wrote:
    "From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    "From the ashes shall a fire be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    Which flows smoother?
    It all depends on whether you pronounce "fire" with one syllable or
    two. Most of us use the two-syllable pronunciation in real life, but
    the scansion works assuming "fire" is a one-syllable word. It's good
    enough for poetry.

    When Tolkien read his poetry, he was rhotic, and pronounced "fire" as approximately [faɪr], with the r being a tap or short trill.

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  • From Rich D@21:1/5 to Steve Morrison on Mon Aug 2 16:35:18 2021
    On July 27, Steve Morrison wrote:
    "From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    "From the ashes shall a fire be woken,
    A light from the shadows shall spring..."

    Which flows smoother?

    Seriously? The first one.
    Stresses on 'ash', 'fire', 'wok', 'light', 'shad', 'spring'.

    It all depends on whether you pronounce "fire" with one syllable or
    two. Most of us use the two-syllable pronunciation in real life, but
    the scansion works assuming "fire" is a one-syllable word.

    Good point, and subtle.

    if 'fire' is stretched out, the book version becomes clumsy. But pronounced sharply, a single syllable, it works.


    --
    Rich

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