Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-l7hp2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-27T19:20:36.681Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Pindar—The Function and Technique of Poetry

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 January 2009

Extract

All writers are to some extent consciously interested in the technique of their art; many of them far more so than is generally realized. The majority follow the principle Ars maxima celare artem, and do not allow us more than a glimpse into their workshop; many a lyric that delights us by its apparent spontaneity has been hammered out slowly and shaped and altered until its final form contains hardly a trace of the original creation. The late W. B. Yeats in his Autobiography says:

‘Metrical composition is always very difficult to me. Nothing is done upon the first day, not one rhyme is in its place; and when at last the rhymes begin to come, the first rough draft of a six-line stanza takes the whole day. Sometimes a six-line stanza would take several days, and not seem finished even then.’

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1939

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

page 146 note 1 Nem. ii.

page 147 note 1 Ol. x. 91106.Google Scholar

page 147 note 2 Nem. iv. 68.Google Scholar

page 147 note 3 Isth. v. 12.Google Scholar

page 148 note 1 Ol. i. 2836.Google Scholar

page 148 note 2 Ol. i. 53.Google Scholar

page 148 note 3 Nem. vii. 1124.Google Scholar

page 149 note 1 Nem. vii. 68–9.Google Scholar

page 149 note 2 Nem. viii. 32–9.Google Scholar

page 149 note 3 Ol. x. 45.Google Scholar

page 149 note 4 Pyth. iii. 29.Google Scholar

page 149 note 5 Nem. v. 14, 17.Google Scholar

page 149 note 6 Ol. xiii. 47, 48.Google Scholar

page 150 note 1 Xenoph, . Frg. 11.Google Scholar

page 150 note 2 Xenoph, . Frg. 2.Google Scholar

page 152 note 1 Ol. ii. 91–4.Google Scholar

page 152 note 2 Ol. i. 114–15.Google Scholar

page 152 note 3 Ol. ii. 98–9.Google Scholar

page 152 note 4 Isth. v. 46–7.Google Scholar

page 152 note 5 Nem. vi. 26–8.Google Scholar

page 152 note 6 Nem. i. 18.Google Scholar

page 153 note 1 Nem. vii. 70–2.Google Scholar

page 153 note 2 Pyth. i. 42–5.Google Scholar

page 153 note 3 Ol. vi. 82–3.Google Scholar

page 153 note 4 Pyth. i. 86–8.Google Scholar

page 154 note 1 Ol. ix. 100–2.Google Scholar

page 154 note 2 Nem. vi. 911Google Scholar; Nem. xi. 3942.Google Scholar

page 155 note 1 Ol. vi. 105.Google Scholar

page 155 note 2 Ol. ix. 21–9Google Scholar; cp. Ol. xiv. 6.Google Scholar

page 155 note 3 Pyth. iii. 108–15.Google Scholar

page 156 note 1 Pyth. iv. 247–8.Google Scholar

page 156 note 2 Nem. iv. 33–5.Google Scholar

page 156 note 3 Pyth. ix. 76–9.Google Scholar

page 156 note 4 Pyth. x. 54.Google Scholar

page 157 note 1 Nem. viii. 19.Google Scholar

page 157 note 2 Isth. i. 45.Google Scholar

page 157 note 3 Pyth. viii. 2932.Google Scholar

page 157 note 4 Nem. x. 1920.Google Scholar

page 157 note 5 Ol. ii. 108Google Scholar; Ol. xiii. 46.Google Scholar

page 157 note 6 Nem. x. 45–6.Google Scholar

page 158 note 1 Ol. xiii. 2448.Google Scholar

page 158 note 2 Ol. xiii. 93-end.Google Scholar

page 159 note 1 Od. iv. 2.Google Scholar