It has long been known that all that is not poetry can be called prose. But the converse is also true: all that is not prose is poetry. You can find poems for every taste: long or short, sad or funny, good or bad (although this statement is very subjective), about love, about war, about loss. But now we will talk about short and cheerful Celtic ditties, if you can call them that.
Definition
Limerick is a poetic form that appeared in the mid-nineteenth century in Ireland and named after the city of Limerick. There is another legend that called the Limerick a repeating verse or chorus in the songs of Irish militia soldiers. It is a five-poem with an absurd, satirical or indecent content. Such comic poetry was originally a product of folk art and helped brighten up the life of English and Irish hard workers. The history of Limerick leads a researcher from the British Isles to the European continent, to France. It was there that the soldiers, yearning for their homeland, sang their songs and this was remembered by the impressionable French.
History
In addition to the official version, there are many more guesses that do not get worse from the fact that they acquire a slight fleur of mistrust among historians. So, some storytellers argue that the Limerics (Irish ditties) existed even in the days of the Ancient World, as evidenced by the plays of Aristophanes. The
British Museum has records of similar poems dating from the fourteenth century. They are found in the works of the great Shakespeare, but mainly in those moments that describe folk art.
The most commonly used version is that Limerick is a creation of Langford Reed, who not only collected ditties, published them, but also wrote at his leisure. The same theory claims that this form of poetry should not be recited, like ordinary poems, but should be sung. And it is imperative to keep a refrain at the end of each verse: “Will you return to Limerick?”
Structure
Limerick as a form of English folk poetry has rather rigid forms. This quality is not inherent in ordinary folk poetry. The size,
method of rhyming, the number of lines in one stanza are strictly regulated. If at least one point is not complied with, then it is no longer limerick, but something else.
The verse consists of five lines, where the first is rhymed with the second and the last, and the third with the fourth. As with any short story, the first step is to get to know the character: the author indicates his or her name and calls the hero’s hometown. The next three lines should tell about a curious case from the life of this person, and the fifth shows the reaction of society to this event. In canonical limerica, the first and last lines should end equally.
Some technical nuances
How to write limerics? To do this, you need to know what rhymed sizes are and how they can be used in a specific form. But for starters, we’ll take a look at the formalities. So:
- The monosyllabic size, or brachycolon, is characterized by the fact that in each foot (a group of syllables with a single stress) there is a word containing only one single syllable.
- Two complex dimensions:
- Chorea - the stress is on the first syllable in the foot. Odd syllables (first, third, fifth) will usually be stressed in a line.
- Yamb - emphasis is placed on the last syllable in the foot, and paired syllables (second, fourth, sixth) are considered stressed. - Three complex sizes:
- Anapest - foot consists of two unstressed syllables and one stressed. An example is the work of A.A. Blok.
- Amphibrachium - a three-compound foot contains an stressed syllable in the middle. Often found in the works of Nekrasov.
- Dactyl is an ancient rhyming method, the foot consists of the first long (shock) and two short (unstressed) syllables. He was preferred by M. Yu. Lermontov.
Limerick size
Now, knowing the basic dimensions used in poetry, we can say that the limerick is a three-footed verse. But not all of his lines are the same in rhythm.
For the first and second lines, as well as the fifth, you can take anapest, then for the third and fourth lines you need to use amphibrach. And vice versa. This helps to obtain a characteristic melodiousness and melody, ease of memorization. It is extremely difficult to get the limerick to be written according to all the canons. It is not even clear why such a complex meter and a bunch of conventions when composing were popular in Britain. But apparently, the mentality, harsh climate and a large amount of free time in the winter months made me think more interesting for myself.
Famous authors
The celebrity among the writers of the Limerick is undoubtedly
Edward Lear. He collected folklore in all corners of England and Ireland, published several books with limerics, and they were a stunning success. The very first collection has survived three reprints; it has been translated into most languages of the world. The same poems that Lear himself composed carry a deep hidden meaning, accessible to a narrow circle of readers familiar with the author’s biography.
At various times, the Limericks wrote Lewis Carroll, Wendy Cope, and outside the United Kingdom in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, this form began to spread in the network space.
Transfer
The expressive means of Limerick, with which he attracts a listener, are understood only by a native speaker. To translate it, preserving the structure, size and meaning, as well as irony, is an almost impossible task. Often authors use puns and jargon that have no equivalents. Therefore, the translator needs to use all his skills to recreate the original canonical limeric or, knowing the meaning contained in it, write a new one, as they say, out of nothing. The main task is to preserve the shape and size, because without this the verse will simply turn into nonsense, and even poorly organized.
Limerick is a truly British way to express yourself, put your thoughts in a playful way so that no one realizes how serious they are. It is difficult for foreigners to understand this trick, and in order to understand it perfectly, you need to be born an Englishman or soak through the life, traditions and culture of the English. That is, to live on Foggy Albion for forty years, no less.
In modern Russian literature, there are also good examples of composing limerics. This, for example, is the hero of Boris Akunin - Nicholas Fandorin, who was Russified German by origin, but an Englishman in the way of thinking, education and culture. He composed short verses reflecting his attitude to a particular event in his life. The writer was able to achieve a stunning identity of sound, shape and size.