How to Scan Poetry With the Three-Step Method (Supplemental Video for A Poet's Craft by Annie Finch)

Want to know more about scansion? Check out my book HOW TO SCAN A POEM

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I made this video for 2 students to accompany my book A Poet's Craft. I'm amazed how many have watched it. Thanks for inspiring me to write How to Scan a Poem.

NOTES
Scansion maps a poem's rhythms so we hear them more deeply, in body as well as mind.

The Four Symbols You Will Need for Scanning (these words are my inventions. Please feel free to use them as long as you give me credit for them wherever possible.).

/ Wand. Marks stronger (louder, longer, or higher pitched) syllables

u Cup. Marks weaker (softer, shorter, or lower pitched) syllables

\ Half-Wand. Marks syllables that are only partially accented. Should be used very rarely; save it for cases where you are really stuck over how to mark a syllable.

| Edge (finally found my simple name for a Foot-Boundary!) Separates repeating instances of the same rhythmic pattern. Each repeat is called a "foot."


Step by Step Guide

Step 1. Mark the accents: listen to where you hear an accent and mark it with one wand over the syllable. Use a half-wand if truly needed. Remember, your ear, not your brain, is the ultimate authority.

Step 2. The remaining syllables are unstressed. Mark them with one cup over each syllable.

Step 3. Look for repeating patterns. Mark the edges between repetitions with a vertical line. If the repetition starts mid-word, put the line right through the middle of the word. Sometimes there can be two ways to hear a line's rhythm; the line "I learn the way to scan cups, wands, and boundaries" could be scanned as u/|u/|u/|u/|u/|u/|or as/uu|/uu|/uu/|/uu. Given a choice, always choose the meter that is in the same pattern as the other lines in poem.
English normally has a strong accent every two or three syllables. So it has four basic foot-patterns:

uu/ Anapest, pronounced ANN-a-pest, from Greek for "strike up" (rising triple)

u/ Iamb, pronounced I-am (rising double)

/u Trochee, pronounced TROW-key, from Greek for "running" (falling double)

/uu Dactyl, pronounced DACK-till, from Greek for "finger" (falling triple)

In most metrical poems, each line has the same number (usually four or five, once in a while three or six) of the same kind of feet. Four-foot lines are tetrameters, and five-foot lines are pentameters.

Scansion Hints
There's usually at least one accent per foot. If you know from the other lines that a poem is in pentameter, your scansion of each line should have at least five accents. In a dactylic tetrameter poem, every line has four feet, mostly dactyls with maybe a few trochees.

When in doubt, read the poem aloud again in a relaxed way. The stressed syllables may “pop out” at you; listen for the meter's swing. Or dance it.
If other lines in the poem have a certain number of feet, your scansion of this line probably should have at least that number of accents (for example, in iambic pentameter, each line generally has at least five accents). Maybe you are missing a light accent that is actually supposed to be promoted (made stronger) by the meter. If a line has more accents than other lines in the poem, remember that though every syllable in speech is somewhat accented, you only need to mark the strong accents.
Use the 3 steps in order. Check to make sure you marked wands first. Many scansion problems come from forcing a pattern instead of listening to the actual rhythm.
Get others to say the poem aloud with you. Combined voices usually decide quite clearly where the accents should fall.
If you are still confused about whether a syllable is accented, consider using the half-accent, marked by the reverse wand (\), a symbol that has resolved many metrical arguments.

Remember the ultimate aim of scansion: pleasure!

New book: How to Scan a Poem

PRINT
https://bookshop.org/a/1041/978173730...

EBOOK
https://www.etsy.com/listing/14748990...

For videos on meter & scansion 'Subscribe" to stay in the loop1

Enjoy the rhythms! Yours in poetry,

Annie