The Literary World

Metre is the rhythmic pattern of a poetic line that measures the rhythm of the line of a verse in poetry. The word metre derives from the Greek word ‘metron’ which means ‘measure’.

Traditionally, metre refers to the regular, reoccurrence of feet. According to the Hungarian- American linguist John Lotz (b. 1913), In some language there are texts in which the phonetic material within certain syntactic frames, such as sentence, phrase, word, is numerically regulated.

Various principles, based on the natural rhythm of language, that have been devised to organized poetic lines into rhythmic units. These have produced distinct kinds of versification among which the most common are syllable- stress metre or accentual- syllabic, strong- stress, syllabic and quantitative metre.

Types of meters

1. Syllable- stress metres
   • Iambic metres
   • Troche metres
   • Anapest metres
   • Dactyle metres
2. Strong- stress metres
3. Syllabic metres
4. Quantitative metres

While the Mertrics is the study of metre. A non- metric text is called prose. According to Seymour Chatman (b.1928), Metre might defined as a systematic convention whereby certain aspects of phonology are organized for aesthetic purposes. In order to find out where the accent falls, we scan a line.’ ‘Like any convention’ Chatman goes on, ‘it is susceptible of individual variation which could be called stylistic, taking “style” in the common meaning of “idiosyncratic” (distinctive) way of doing something.

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