Tintern Abbey (poem) - Style and Structure

Style and Structure

The poem is written in tightly-structured blank verse and comprises verse-paragraphs rather than stanzas. It is unrhymed and mostly in iambic pentameter. Categorising the poem is difficult, as it contains elements of all of the ode, the dramatic monologue and the conversation poem. In the second edition of Lyrical Ballads, Wordsworth noted:

I have not ventured to call this Poem an Ode but it was written with a hope that in the transitions, and the impassioned music of the versification would be found the principle requisites of that species of composition.

At its beginning, it may well be dubbed an Eighteenth-Century "landscape-poem", but it is commonly agreed that the best designation would be the conversation poem.

Read more about this topic:  Tintern Abbey (poem)

Famous quotes containing the words style and/or structure:

    No change in musical style will survive unless it is accompanied by a change in clothing style. Rock is to dress up to.
    Frank Zappa (1940–1994)

    One theme links together these new proposals for family policy—the idea that the family is exceedingly durable. Changes in structure and function and individual roles are not to be confused with the collapse of the family. Families remain more important in the lives of children than other institutions. Family ties are stronger and more vital than many of us imagine in the perennial atmosphere of crisis surrounding the subject.
    Joseph Featherstone (20th century)