2.40 Verse — how to read Knittelvers and Blankvers — Epoché
What you will be able to do Hear and mark the rhythm of German verse: stressed and unstressed syllables, Hebung and Senkung , decided by the ordinary stress of each word. Recognise the two great verse forms of German drama: the rhymed Knittelvers of four stresses (Goethe's Faust ) and the unrhymed Blankvers of five (Lessing, Schiller). Name the rhyme schemes and line endings: Paarreim , Kreuzreim , umarmender Reim ; männliche and weibliche Kadenz . Read verse aloud naturally, with the sentence running over the line end where the meaning requires it. Sentences from this lesson, before the explanation. Read the German aloud; all of them come back below. German English Ich habe eine Grube gegraben. [1] I dug a pit. Ich grub eine Grube. [2] I dug a pit. Gibt es die Medizin auch in Tropfen? [3] Does the medicine come in droplet form? Das ist ein Tropfen auf den heißen Stein. [4] It's a drop in the bucket. Wir säen die Saat. [5] We're sowing seeds. Ich neige nicht zur Eifersucht. [6] I'm not the jealous type. Wie die Saat, so die Ernte. [7] You reap what you sow. Letztes Jahr gab es eine schlechte Ernte. [8] Last year, there was a bad harvest. Prerequisites : 2.39 — you need word stress from 0.1 Sounds , the verse of 7.20 Reading , 7.28 Reading , 7.29 Reading and 7.33 Reading , and the poems of 7.34 Reading . German verse, like English verse, is built on stress. A line has a fixed number of stressed syllables, and the unstressed syllables between them form a more or less regular pattern. Because both languages are Germanic, English speakers already have the right instinct: say the line with normal word stress, and the rhythm appears by itself. What you need are the names of the main forms and a few rules about how German poets count. This lesson uses lines you have already read in this phase, and proverbs whose rhythm every German knows. The patterns Concept German name What it is Example, with the pattern (X stressed, x unstressed) stressed and unstressed syllable Hebung , Senkung the units of German metre Lügen haben kurze Beine : X x X x X x X x iamb Jambus unstressed + stressed Der See kann sich : x X x X trochee Trochäus stressed + unstressed Steter Tropfen höhlt den Stein : X x X x X x X four-stress rhymed verse Knittelvers four stresses, free unstressed syllables, rhymed (often in pairs) Habe nun, ach! Philosophie blank verse Blankvers five stresses, iambic, unrhymed Der See kann sich, der Landvogt nicht erbarmen rhyme schemes Paarreim , Kreuzreim , umarmender Reim rhymes aabb, abab, abba Wort / fort (a pair); schätzen / übersetzen line endings männliche , weibliche Kadenz line ends on a stressed / unstressed syllable Wort (masculine); schätzen (feminine) enjambment Enjambement the sentence runs over the line end Von diesen drei / Religionen kann doch eine nur / Die wahre sein. The Knittelvers is the oldest native verse form of German drama, used in the sixteenth century by the Nuremberg poet Hans Sachs, who counted syllables: eight or nine to the line, rhymed in pairs. Goethe and his contemporaries counted stresses instead: four to the line, rhymed, with a free number of unstressed syllables between them, so that the verse sounds lively and close to speech. Goethe used it for the opening monologue of Faust : Habe nun, ach! Philosophie, / Juristerei und Medizin, / Und leider auch Theologie / Durchaus studirt, mit heißem Bemühn. Here the rhymes cross ( Philosophie / Theologie , Medizin / Bemühn ); Goethe also rhymes in pairs, as in the lines from the study scene below. In the study scenes you read in 7.28 Reading , Goethe uses freer rhymed lines of four, five or six stresses. The Blankvers came from English drama. Lessing's Nathan der Weise (1779) made it the standard line of German classical drama, and Schiller used it in most of his later plays, including Wilhelm Tell (the prologue play Wallensteins Lager is in Knittelvers ). It is the line of Shakespeare: five iambs, no rhyme. German Blankvers often ends with an extra unstressed syllable, a feminine ending: der Landvogt nicht erbarmen ends x X x, with the stress on -bar- . In real sentences Proverbs : the rhythm of everyday German. Mark the stresses as you read. German English Morgenstund hat Gold im Mund. [9] The early bird catches the worm. Lügen haben kurze Beine. [10] Lies have short legs. Steter Tropfen höhlt den Stein. [11] Constant dripping wears away a stone. Wer andern eine Grube gräbt, fällt selbst hinein. [12] Those who dig a grave for others will themselves fall therein. Was du säst, das erntest du. [13] You reap what you sow. Was ihr säet, das erntet ihr. [14] You reap what you sow. Was sein muss, das muss sein. [15] What must be, must be. Lines from the readings. From the study scene in 7.28 Reading : four rhymed lines, Wort and fort rhyming in a pair, schätzen and übersetzen in another. Geschrieben steht: „im Anfang war das Wort!“ / Hier stock’ ich schon! Wer hilft mir weiter fort? / Ich kann das Wort so hoch unmöglich schätzen, / Ich muß es anders übersetzen, From Nathan der Weise in 7.33 Reading : Blankvers with the sentence running over two line ends. Der Christ ist zwischen uns. – Von diesen drei / Religionen kann doch eine nur / Die wahre sein. How English does it The same system. English and German verse both count stresses and arrange them in the same feet: iambs, trochees, dactyls. An English speaker who can hear the rhythm of Shall I compare thee to a summer's day can hear the rhythm of Der See kann sich, der Landvogt nicht erbarmen . The German Blankvers is in fact the English blank verse, borrowed in the eighteenth century from Shakespeare, whom German writers then admired more than any other poet. Word stress decides. In German the stress falls on the stem, usually the first syllable, never on the prefixes be-, ge-, er-, ver-, zer- or on native endings such as -e, -en, -er, -lich . Foreign endings are different: -ie, -ei, -ieren carry the stress, as in Philosophie, Juristerei, studieren . Poets place their w