Gotta write a classic, Gonna do it an attic: Rhyme

It's a popular misconception that poetry has to rhyme - that is rhyme in the most obvious sense that the ends of lines have to have repeated sounds, known logically enough as 'end rhyme'. Which is not to say that poetry shouldn't rhyme, just that, in the sense of the old saw 'I'm a poet/And I didn't know it', it is not what makes poetry poetry.

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Q. Really

A. Indeed. There is even one school of thought which follows the tenet that if it rhymes it's doggerel, not poetry. However, that's up for grabs.

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Q. But isn't rhyme of one form or another intrinsic to poetry

A. Not really. At least not 'end rhyme'. Rhythm is probably more important, though rhythm is often created by using words which have similar patterns, whether they be within the line or at the end. Having said that, many traditional poetic forms do utilise set rhyme patterns. The sonnet, which has a rhyme scheme of ABAB CDCD EFEF GG, is an example of this.

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Rhyme is a relative late-comer to European poetry. It is found only occasionally in Classical Greek and Latin poetry though more frequently in medieval religious Latin verse. Shakespeare interspersed rhymed couplets into the blank - unrhyming - verse of his plays, but Milton disapproved, while Samuel Johnson was much in favour.

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Q. Well, that's as clear as mud. What, then, does rhyme actually mean

A. A rhyme - or, less commonly, rime - is any pattern of repeated sounds. As you well know.

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Q. And are there different types to be found in poetry

A. There are, though purists may only recognise three kinds as 'true rhymes'.

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Q. Which are

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Masculine - or perfect - rhyme, in which the two words end with the same vowel-consonant combination: near/clear, loud/proud, for example. The too-regular effect of masculine rhyme is sometimes softened by using 'trailing' - or semirhyme - in which one of the two words 'trails' another unstressed syllable behind it, as in youth/truthful

Feminine - or double - rhyme, in which two syllables rhyme: creature/feature, profession/discretion

Trisyllabic rhyme, in which three syllables rhyme: patinate/latinate

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Q. What about the rest

A.

Partial - or near or off - rhyme, which is when two syllables almost rhyme: fault/ought. Another form of near rhyme is assonance - not that common in English poetry, however - in which only the vowel sounds are identical: home/alone

Eye rhyme is a rhyme that does not exist in sound at all, but only in sight: tough/cough

Half rhyme - or pararhyme - is where the final consonants match, though the preceding vowels don't: cat/cut, grand/grind. Feminine pararhyme has two forms, one in which both vowel sounds differ, and one in which only one does: ran in/run on, blindness/blandness

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Q. These rhymes aren't all end rhymes, though, are they

A. No. Internal rhyme is another kind where the first or last word of one line rhymes with a word inside the next line.

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By Simon Smith