Poetry

==Genres==
In addition to specific forms of poems, poetry is often thought of in terms of different [[genre]]s and subgenres. A poetic genre is generally a tradition or classification of poetry based on the subject matter, style, or other broader literary characteristics.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/intgenre/intgenre.html |title=Introduction to Genre Theory |last=Chandler |first=Daniel |publisher=Aberystwyth University |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150509013303/http://visual-memory.co.uk/daniel/Documents/intgenre/intgenre.html |archive-date=9 May 2015 |access-date=10 December 2011}}</ref> Some commentators view genres as natural forms of literature. Others view the study of genres as the study of how different works relate and refer to other works.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Beyond the screen: transformations of literary structures, interfaces and genres |publisher=Verlag |year=2010 |isbn=978-3-8376-1258-5 |editor-last1=Schafer |editor-first1=Jorgen |pages=16, 391–402 |editor-last2=Gendolla |editor-first2=Peter}}</ref>

===Narrative poetry===
[[File:Chaucer Hoccleve.png|thumb|upright|[[Chaucer]]]]
{{Main|Narrative poetry}}
Narrative poetry is a genre of poetry that tells a [[narrative|story]]. Broadly it subsumes [[epic poetry]], but the term "narrative poetry" is often reserved for smaller works, generally with more appeal to [[human interest]]. Narrative poetry may be the oldest type of poetry. Many scholars of [[Homer]] have concluded that his ''[[Iliad]]'' and ''[[Odyssey]]'' were composed of compilations of shorter narrative poems that related individual episodes. Much narrative poetry—such as Scottish and English [[ballad]]s, and [[Balts|Baltic]] and [[Slavic peoples|Slavic]] heroic poems—is [[performance poetry]] with roots in a preliterate [[oral tradition]]. It has been speculated that some features that distinguish poetry from prose, such as meter, [[alliteration]] and [[kenning]]s, once served as [[memory]] aids for [[bard]]s who recited traditional tales.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Kirk |first=G. S. |title=Homer and the Oral Tradition |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2010 |isbn=978-0-521-13671-6 |edition=reprint |pages=22–45}}</ref>

Notable narrative poets have included [[Ovid]], [[Dante]], [[Juan Ruiz]], [[William Langland]], [[Geoffrey Chaucer|Chaucer]], [[Fernando de Rojas]], [[Luís de Camões]], [[Shakespeare]], [[Alexander Pope]], [[Robert Burns]], [[Adam Mickiewicz]], [[Alexander Pushkin]], [[Letitia Elizabeth Landon]], [[Edgar Allan Poe]], [[Alfred Tennyson]], and [[Anne Carson]].

===Lyric poetry===
[[File:Christine de Pisan - cathedra.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Christine de Pizan]] ''(left)'']]
{{Main|Lyric poetry}}
Lyric poetry is a genre that, unlike [[epic poetry|epic]] and dramatic poetry, does not attempt to tell a story but instead is of a more [[person]]al nature. Poems in this genre tend to be shorter, melodic, and contemplative. Rather than depicting [[Character (arts)|characters]] and actions, it portrays the poet's own [[feeling]]s, [[Qualia|states of mind]], and [[perception]]s.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Blasing |first=Mutlu Konuk |author-link=Mutlu Konuk Blasing |title=Lyric poetry : the pain and the pleasure of words |publisher=Princeton University Press |year=2006 |isbn=978-0-691-12682-1 |pages=1–22}}</ref> Notable poets in this genre include [[Christine de Pizan]], [[John Donne]], [[Charles Baudelaire]], [[Gerard Manley Hopkins]], [[Antonio Machado]], and [[Edna St. Vincent Millay]].

===Epic poetry===
{{Main|Epic poetry}}
[[File:Camões, por Fernão Gomes.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Camões]]]]
Epic poetry is a genre of poetry, and a major form of [[narrative]] literature. This genre is often defined as lengthy poems concerning events of a heroic or important nature to the culture of the time. It recounts, in a continuous narrative, the life and works of a [[hero]]ic or [[mythological]] person or group of persons.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hainsworth |first=J. B. |title=Traditions of heroic and epic poetry |publisher=Modern Humanities Research Association |year=1989 |isbn=978-0-947623-19-7 |pages=171–175}}</ref> Examples of epic poems are [[Homer]]'s ''[[Iliad]]'' and ''[[Odyssey]]'', [[Virgil]]'s [[Aeneid]], the ''[[Nibelungenlied]]'', [[Luís de Camões]]' ''[[Os Lusíadas]]'', the ''[[Cantar de Mio Cid]]'', the ''[[Epic of Gilgamesh]]'', the ''[[Mahabharata]]'', [[Lönnrot]]'s ''[[Kalevala]]'', [[Valmiki]]'s ''[[Ramayana]]'', [[Ferdowsi]]'s ''[[Shahnama]]'', [[Nizami Ganjavi|Nizami]] (or Nezami)'s Khamse (Five Books), and the ''[[Epic of King Gesar]]''. While the composition of epic poetry, and of [[long poem]]s generally, became less common in the west after the early 20th century, some notable epics have continued to be written. ''[[The Cantos]]'' by [[Ezra Pound]], ''[[Helen in Egypt]]'' by [[H.D.]], and ''[[Paterson (poem)|Paterson]]'' by [[William Carlos Williams]] are examples of modern epics. [[Derek Walcott]] won a [[Nobel prize]] in 1992 to a great extent on the basis of his epic, ''[[Omeros]]''.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1992/press.html |title=The Nobel Prize in Literature 1992: Derek Walcott |publisher=Swedish Academy |access-date=10 December 2011}}</ref>

===Satirical poetry===
[[File:Jacob Huysmans - Portrait of John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester 1.jpg|thumb|upright|[[John Wilmot]]]]
Poetry can be a powerful vehicle for [[satire]]. The [[Ancient Rome|Romans]] had a strong tradition of satirical poetry, often written for [[political]] purposes. A notable example is the Roman poet [[Juvenal]]'s [[Satires of Juvenal|satires]].<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Dominik |first1=William J. |title=Roman verse satire: Lucilius to Juvenal |last2=Wehrle |first2=T. |publisher=Bolchazy-Carducci |year=1999 |isbn=978-0-86516-442-0 |pages=1–3}}</ref>

The same is true of the English satirical tradition. [[John Dryden]] (a [[Tories (British political party)|Tory]]), the first [[Poet Laureate]], produced in 1682 ''[[Mac Flecknoe]]'', subtitled "A Satire on the True Blue Protestant Poet, T.S." (a reference to [[Thomas Shadwell]]).<ref>{{Cite book |title=Broadview Anthology of British Literature |publisher=Broadview Press |year=2011 |isbn=978-1-55481-048-2 |editor-last=Black |editor-first=Joseph |volume=1 |page=1056}}</ref> Satirical poets outside England include [[Poland]]'s [[Ignacy Krasicki]], [[Azerbaijan]]'s [[Mirza Alakbar Sabir|Sabir]], [[Portugal]]'s [[Manuel Maria Barbosa du Bocage]], and Korea's [[Kim Kirim]], especially noted for his ''[[Gisangdo]]''.

===Elegy===
{{Main|Elegy}}
[[File:PortraitThomasGrayByJohnGilesEccart1747to1748.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Thomas Gray]]]]
An elegy is a mournful, melancholy or plaintive poem, especially a [[lament]] for the dead or a [[funeral]] song. The term "elegy," which originally denoted a type of poetic meter ([[elegiac]] meter), commonly describes a poem of [[mourning]]. An elegy may also reflect something that seems to the author to be strange or mysterious. The elegy, as a reflection on a death, on a sorrow more generally, or on something mysterious, may be classified as a form of lyric poetry.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Pigman |first=G. W. |url=https://archive.org/details/griefenglishrena0000pigm |title=Grief and English Renaissance elegy |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1985 |isbn=978-0-521-26871-4 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/griefenglishrena0000pigm/page/40 40–47] |url-access=registration}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Kennedy |first=David |title=Elegy |publisher=Routledge |year=2007 |isbn=978-1-134-20906-4 |pages=10–34}}</ref>

Notable practitioners of elegiac poetry have included [[Propertius]], [[Jorge Manrique]], [[Jan Kochanowski]], [[Chidiock Tichborne]], [[Edmund Spenser]], [[Ben Jonson]], [[John Milton]], [[Thomas Gray]], [[Charlotte Smith (writer)|Charlotte Smith]], [[William Cullen Bryant]], [[Percy Bysshe Shelley]], [[Johann Wolfgang von Goethe]], [[Evgeny Baratynsky]], [[Alfred Tennyson]], [[Walt Whitman]], [[Antonio Machado]], [[Juan Ramón Jiménez]], [[William Butler Yeats]], [[Rainer Maria Rilke]], and [[Virginia Woolf]].

===Verse fable===
[[File:Per Krafft - Portrait of Bishop Ignacy Krasicki - MNK II-a-671 - National Museum Kraków.jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|[[Ignacy Krasicki|Krasicki]]]]
{{Main|Fable}}
The fable is an ancient [[literary genre]], often (though not invariably) set in [[Verse (poetry)|verse]]. It is a succinct story that features [[Anthropomorphism|anthropomorphised]] [[animal]]s, [[legendary creature]]s, [[plant]]s, inanimate objects, or forces of nature that illustrate a moral lesson (a "[[moral]]"). Verse fables have used a variety of [[meter (poetry)|meter]] and [[rhyme]] patterns.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Harpham |first1=Geoffrey Galt |last2=Abrams |first2=M. H. |title=A glossary of literary terms |year=2011 |publisher=Wadsworth Cengage Learning |isbn=978-0-495-89802-3 |edition=10th |page=9}}</ref>

Notable verse fabulists have included [[Aesop]], [[Vishnu Sarma]], [[Phaedrus (fabulist)|Phaedrus]], [[Marie de France]], [[Robert Henryson]], [[Biernat of Lublin]], [[Jean de La Fontaine]], [[Ignacy Krasicki]], [[Félix María de Samaniego]], [[Tomás de Iriarte]], [[Ivan Krylov]] and [[Ambrose Bierce]].

===Dramatic poetry===
[[File:Goethe (Stieler 1828).jpg|thumb|upright|[[Goethe]]]]
{{Main|Verse drama and dramatic verse|Theatre of ancient Greece|Sanskrit drama|Chinese Opera|Noh}}
Dramatic poetry is [[drama]] written in [[Verse (poetry)|verse]] to be spoken or sung, and appears in varying, sometimes related forms in many cultures. [[Greek tragedy]] in verse dates to the 6th century B.C., and may have been an influence on the development of Sanskrit drama,<ref>{{Cite book |last=Keith |first=Arthur Berriedale |title=Sanskrit Drama in its origin, development, theory and practice |publisher=Motilal Banarsidass |year=1992 |isbn=978-81-208-0977-2 |pages=57–58}}</ref> just as Indian drama in turn appears to have influenced the development of the ''[[bianwen]]'' verse dramas in China, forerunners of [[Chinese Opera]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Dolby |first=William |url=https://archive.org/details/chinesetheater00coli |title=Chinese Theater: From Its Origins to the Present Day |publisher=University of Hawaii Press |year=1983 |isbn=978-0-8248-1220-1 |editor-last=Mackerras |editor-first=Colin |page=[https://archive.org/details/chinesetheater00coli/page/17 17] |chapter=Early Chinese Plays and Theatre |url-access=registration}}</ref> [[East Asia]]n verse dramas also include Japanese [[Noh]]. Examples of dramatic poetry in [[Persian literature]] include [[Nizami Ganjavi|Nizami]]'s two famous dramatic works, ''[[Layla and Majnun]]'' and ''[[Khosrow and Shirin]]'', [[Ferdowsi]]'s tragedies such as ''[[Sohrab|Rostam and Sohrab]]'', [[Rumi]]'s ''[[Masnavi]]'', [[Asad Gorgani|Gorgani]]'s tragedy of ''[[Vis and Ramin]]'', and [[Vahshi Bafqi|Vahshi]]'s tragedy of ''[[Farhad]]''. American poets of 20th century revive dramatic poetry, including [[Ezra Pound]] in "''Sestina: Altaforte,''"<ref>{{Cite book|last=Giordano|first=Mathew|title=Dramatic Poetics and American Poetic Culture, 1865–1904, Doctoral Dissertation|publisher=Ohio State|year=2004|location=Columbus, Ohio|quote=Dramatic poetry: Pound’s 'Sestina: Altaforte' or Eliot’s 'The Love Song of J. Alfred Proufrock'.}}</ref> [[T. S. Eliot|T.S. Eliot]] with "[[The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock]]".<ref>{{Cite web|last=Eliot|first=T. S.|date=1951|title=Poetry and Drama|url=https://tseliot.com/|access-date=2020-10-09|website=tseliot.com|language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock {{!}} Modern American Poetry|url=https://www.modernamericanpoetry.org/poem/love-song-j-alfred-prufrock|access-date=2020-10-09|website=www.modernamericanpoetry.org}}</ref>

===Speculative poetry===
{{Main|Speculative poetry}}
[[File:Edgar Poe 1848.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Poe]]]]
Speculative poetry, also known as fantastic poetry (of which weird or macabre poetry is a major sub-classification), is a poetic genre which deals thematically with subjects which are "beyond reality", whether via [[extrapolation]] as in [[science fiction]] or via weird and horrific themes as in [[horror fiction]]. Such poetry appears regularly in modern science fiction and horror fiction magazines. [[Edgar Allan Poe]] is sometimes seen as the "father of speculative poetry".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Allen |first=Mike |title=The alchemy of stars |publisher=Science Fiction Poetry Association |year=2005 |isbn=978-0-8095-1162-4 |editor-last=Dutcher |editor-first=Roger |pages=11–17}}</ref> Poe's most remarkable achievement in the genre was his anticipation, by three-quarters of a century, of the [[Big Bang theory]] of the [[universe]]'s origin, in his then much-derided 1848 [[essay]] (which, due to its very speculative nature, he termed a "[[prose poem]]"), ''[[Eureka: A Prose Poem]]''.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Rombeck |first=Terry |date=22 January 2005 |title=Poe's little-known science book reprinted |url=http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2005/jan/22/poes_littleknown_science/ |journal=Lawrence Journal-World & News }}</ref><ref>[[Marilynne Robinson|Robinson, Marilynne]], "On Edgar Allan Poe", ''[[The New York Review of Books]]'', vol. LXII, no. 2 (5 February 2015), pp. 4, 6.</ref>

===Prose poetry===
{{Main|Prose poetry}}
[[File:Étienne Carjat, Portrait of Charles Baudelaire, circa 1862.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Baudelaire]]]]
Prose poetry is a hybrid genre that shows attributes of both prose and poetry. It may be indistinguishable from the [[microfiction|micro-story]] ([[List of acronyms and initialisms: A#AK|a.k.a.]] the "[[short short story]]", "[[flash fiction]]"). While some examples of earlier prose strike modern readers as poetic, prose poetry is commonly regarded as having originated in 19th-century France, where its practitioners included [[Aloysius Bertrand]], [[Charles Baudelaire]], [[Stéphane Mallarmé]], and [[Arthur Rimbaud]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Monte |first=Steven |title=Invisible fences: prose poetry as a genre in French and American literature |publisher=University of Nebraska Press |year=2000 |isbn=978-0-8032-3211-2 |pages=4–9}}</ref> Since the late 1980s especially, prose poetry has gained increasing popularity, with entire journals, such as ''The Prose Poem: An International Journal'',<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://digitalcommons.providence.edu/prosepoem/ |title=''The Prose Poem: An International Journal'' |publisher=Providence College |access-date=10 December 2011}}</ref> ''Contemporary Haibun Online'',<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://contemporaryhaibunonline.com |title=''Contemporary Haibun Online'' |access-date=10 December 2011}}</ref> and ''Haibun Today''<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://haibuntoday.com/pages/about.html|title=Haibun Today: A Haibun & Tanka Prose Journal|website=haibuntoday.com}}</ref> devoted to that genre and its hybrids. [[Latin American poetry|Latin American poets]] of the 20th century who wrote prose poems include [[Octavio Paz]] and [[Alejandra Pizarnik]].

===Light poetry===
{{Main|Light poetry}}
[[File:LewisCarrollSelfPhoto.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Lewis Carroll]]]]
Light poetry, or [[light verse]], is poetry that attempts to be humorous. Poems considered "light" are usually brief, and can be on a frivolous or serious subject, and often feature [[word play]], including [[pun]]s, adventurous rhyme and heavy [[alliteration]]. Although a few free verse poets have excelled at light verse outside the formal verse tradition, light verse in English usually obeys at least some formal conventions. Common forms include the [[limerick (poetry)|limerick]], the [[clerihew]], and the [[double dactyl]].

While light poetry is sometimes condemned as [[doggerel]], or thought of as poetry composed casually, humor often makes a serious point in a subtle or subversive way. Many of the most renowned "serious" poets have also excelled at light verse. Notable writers of light poetry include [[Lewis Carroll]], [[Ogden Nash]], [[X. J. Kennedy]], [[Willard R. Espy]], [[Shel Silverstein]], [[Gavin Ewart]] and [[Wendy Cope]].

===Slam poetry===
{{Main|Poetry slam}}
[[File:Marc Smith - Slam à La Zone de Liege - 19 mars 2009.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Marc Smith (poet)|Smith]]]]
Slam poetry as a genre originated in 1986 in [[Chicago]], [[Illinois]], when [[Marc Kelly Smith]] organized the first slam.<ref name="maryhutchingsreed">{{Cite web |url=http://maryhutchingsreed.com/honoring-marc-kelly-smith-and-international-poetry-slam-movement/ |title=Honoring Marc Kelly Smith and International Poetry Slam Movement |website=Mary Hutchings Reed |access-date=5 May 2019 |ref=maryhutchingsreed}}</ref><ref name="aap">{{Cite web |url=https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/text/brief-guide-slam-poetry |title=A Brief Guide to Slam Poetry |website=Academy of American Poets |access-date=5 May 2019 |ref=aap}}</ref> Slam performers comment emotively, aloud before an audience, on personal, social, or other matters. Slam focuses on the aesthetics of word play, intonation, and voice inflection. Slam poetry is often competitive, at dedicated "[[poetry slam]]" contests.<ref name="powerpoetry">{{Cite web |url=https://www.powerpoetry.org/actions/5-tips-spoken-word |title=5 Tips on Spoken Word |website=Power Poetry |access-date=5 May 2019 |ref=powerpoetry}}</ref>

===Performance poetry===
{{main|Performance poetry}}
Performance poetry, similar to slam in that it occurs before an audience, is a genre of poetry that may fuse a variety of disciplines in a performance of a text, such as [[dance]], [[music]], and other aspects of [[performance art]].<ref>{{cite book | last=Wheeler | first=Lesley |author-link=Lesley Wheeler | title=Voicing American Poetry: Sound and Performance from the 1920s to the Present | publisher=Cornell University Press | year=2008 | isbn=978-0801446689}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |first1=Fernanda |last1=Seavon |title=Instantní Nostalgie |journal=A2 |date=March 2022 |issue=5/2022 |page=11 |url=https://www.advojka.cz/archiv/2022/5/instantni-nostalgie}}</ref>

===Language happenings===
The term ''[[happening]]'' was popularized by the [[avant-garde]] movements in the 1950s and regard spontaneous, site-specific performances.<ref>{{cite book |title=A Critical Introduction to Twentieth-Century American Drama: Volume 3 Beyond Broadway |first=Christopher W. |last=Bigsby |author-link=Christopher Bigsby |year=1985 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0521278966 |page=45 |access-date=September 5, 2012 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_gZPUSNnDXwC&q=Allan+Kaprow+coined+happening&pg=PA45}}</ref> ''Language happenings'', termed from the [[poetics]] collective [[OBJECT:PARADISE]] in 2018, are events which focus less on poetry as a prescriptive [[literary]] genre, but more as a descriptive [[linguistic]] act and performance, often incorporating broader forms of [[performance art]] while poetry is read or created in that moment.<ref name="Radio Prague">{{cite web |last1=Gironès |first1=Cristina |title=Object Paradise, el colectivo artístico que quiere devolver la vida y la voz al barrio de Žižkov |url=https://espanol.radio.cz/object-paradise-el-colectivo-artistico-que-quiere-devolver-la-vida-y-la-voz-al-8742138 |website=Radio Prague International |date=16 February 2022 |access-date=21 March 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |title=obtydeník živé literatury |journal=Tvar |date=July 2022 |issue=7 |url=https://itvar.cz/z-cisla/noc-kdy-jsme-se-poznali |access-date=2 June 2022}}</ref>