Friday, March 27, 2009

Spring cleaning


1. An anapest is the reverse of a dactyl.

Anapest beat: da-da-DUM da-da-DUM da-da-DUM da-da-DUM
Example: The AsSYRian came DOWN like the WOLF on the FOLD... (Lord Byron, 1813)
Example: ’twas the NIGHT before CHRISTmas and ALL through the HOUSE... (Clement Clarke Moore, 1829)

Dactyl beat: DUM-da-da DUM-da-da DUM-da-da DUM-da-da
Example: THIS is the FORest primEVal, the MURmuring PINES and the HEMlocks... (Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1847)

2. An iamb is the reverse of a trochee.

Iamb beat: da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM
Example: i WANdered LONEly AS a CLOUD... (William Wordsworth, 1804)
Example: come LIVE with ME and BE my LOVE (Christopher Marlowe, circa 1585)

Trochee beat: DUM-da DUM-da DUM-da DUM-da
Example: ONCE upON a MIDnight DREAry, WHILE i PONdered, WEAK and WEAry Over MANy a QUAINT and CURious VOLume OF forGOTten LORE... (Edgar Allan Poe, 1845)

3. Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny. (Étienne Serres, 1824)

4. In life, as in the dictionary, perspicacity precedes perspicuity. (rhymeswithplague, 1983)

5. The square of the hypotenuse of a right triangle is equal to the sum of the squares of the other two sides. (Pythagoras, sixth century B.C.)



6. I got you, babe. (Salvatore Bono and Cherilyn Sarkisian, 1965)


...and the beat goes on.

7 comments:

  1. Wonderful DUM-de-de, if you don't mind my saying so. (UK version of DUM-da-da)

    ReplyDelete
  2. If ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny, what evolutionary phase did Sonny Bono represent?

    ReplyDelete
  3. jinksy - Thanks, awfully (UK version of "Awesome, dude").

    Ruth - If ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny (and that's a might big "if"), Sonny Bono represents Piltdown Man.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Plato: 'to be is to do'
    Sartre: 'to do is to be'
    Sinatra: 'do be do be do'

    A very informative post.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Your speed at inspecting the solitary title of my next post and leaving such an hysterically funny comment, shows that you are certainly no dumb anything, Da or De.

    ReplyDelete
  6. This is great.....I may print it off. Thank you for the beat info!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Is it still an anapest
    if written down in Budapest?

    Is a dactyl
    equal to a fractal?

    Do new spring lambs
    write in iambs?

    Can one find a trochee
    in the Okefenokee?

    Will my progeny
    understand ontogeny?

    Is cooking in a Dutch Oven on an elevated burner a high-pot-in-use?

    ::: sorry about that last one. You got me for a rhyme, babe!::

    ReplyDelete

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