quatrain

Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Email
(kwŏt'rān', kwŏ-trān') pronunciation
n.
A stanza or poem of four lines.

[French, from Old French, from quatre, four, from Latin quattuor.]


quatrain, a verse stanza of four lines, rhymed or (less often) unrhymed. The quatrain is the most commonly used stanza in English and most modern European languages. Most ballads and many hymns are composed in quatrains in which the second and fourth lines rhyme (abcb or abab); the ‘heroic quatrain’ of iambic pentameters also rhymes abab. A different rhyme scheme (abba) is used in the In Memoriam stanza and some other forms. The rhyming four‐line groups that make up the first eight or twelve lines of a sonnet are also known as quatrains.

Top

A poem, unit or stanza of four lines of verse, usually with a rhyme scheme of abab or its variant, xbyb. It is the most common stanzaic form.

Random House Word Menu:

categories related to 'quatrain'

Top
Random House Word Menu by Stephen Glazier
For a list of words related to quatrain, see:

A quatrain is a stanza, or a complete poem, consisting of four lines of verse.

Existing in various forms, the quatrain appears in poems from the poetic traditions of various ancient civilizations including Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome, and China; and, continues into the 21st century, where it is seen in works published in many languages. During Europe's Dark Ages, in the Middle East and especially Iran, polymath poets such as Omar Khayyam continued to popularize this form of poetry, also known as Rubaai, well beyond their borders and time. It can be AAAA, AABB, or ABAB.

Contents

Forms

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea,
The plowman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.
  • The Ruba'i form of rhymed quatrain was favored by Omar Khayyám, among others. This work was a major inspiration for Edward FitzGerald's Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, written in Persian. The ruba'i was a particularly widespread verse form: the form rubaiyat reflects the plural. One of FitzGerald's verses[1] may serve to illustrate:
Come, fill the Cup, and in the fire of Spring
Your Winter garment of Repentance fling:
The Bird of Time has but a little way
To flutter--and the Bird is on the Wing.
  • The Midnight Songs poetry form is from Fourth Century China, consisting of regular five-character lines, with each quatrain formed from a pair of rhymed couplets. The subject matter involves the personal thoughts and feelings of a courtesan during the four seasons, into which the quatrains are individually assigned.
  • The Shichigon-zekku form used in Classical Chinese poetry and Japanese poetry. This type of quatrain uses a seven characters length of line. Both rhyme and rhythm are key elements, although the former is not restricted to falling at the end of the phrase.
  • Ballad meter (The examples from "The Unquiet Grave" and "The Wife of Usher's Well" are both examples of ballad meter.)
  • Decasyllabic quatrain used by John Dryden in Annus Mirabilis, William Davenant in Gondibert, and Thomas Gray
  • Various hymns employ specific forms, such as the common meter, long meter, and short meter.
  • The thirty syllable, Celtic verse form Englyn from the Welsh language is another interesting variation of the quatrain, and is also now popular in the English language.

Notes

References

External links


Translations:

Quatrain

Top

Dansk (Danish)
n. - firelinjet strofe

Nederlands (Dutch)
kwatrijn

Français (French)
n. - quatrain

Deutsch (German)
n. - Vierzeiler

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - (προσωδ.) τετράστιχο

Italiano (Italian)
quartina

Português (Portuguese)
n. - quarteto (m), estrofe de quatro versos (f)

Русский (Russian)
четверостишие

Español (Spanish)
n. - cuarteto, estrofa de cuatro versos

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - fyrradig strof, kvadernar

中文(简体)(Chinese (Simplified))
四行诗

中文(繁體)(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 四行詩

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 4행시

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 四行詩, 四行連句

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) الرباعيه, مقطوعه شعريه رباعيه الابيات‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮מרובע - שיר בן ארבע שורות, בד"כ עם חרוזים שמפרידה ביניהם שורה‬


Post a question - any question - to the WikiAnswers community:

Copyrights: