Comments | kellyrfineman: Kennings

kellyrfineman

Kennings

Apr 21, 2016 08:46

One of the devices integrated in Anglo-Saxon poetry is the kenning, defined in my Oxford English Reference Dictionary as "a compound expression in Old English and Old Norse poetry, e.g., oar-steed = ship. [ME = 'teaching' etc. f. KEN]." The word "kenning" comes from Old Icelandic (the language of the Vikings, pretty much) and originally meant ( Read more... )

montague, national poetry month, anglo saxon verse, tolkien, kenning, poetry

Comments 2

I think the picture of Pooh is right on... ext_709338 April 21 2016, 19:27:15 UTC

"D'ye ken" is what, indeed, I'm TRYING to do! I like these; they're more subtle than metaphor. I like that you're using a LOTR poem; I find that in pursuit of the narrative I never spent as much time on these as I should have, and they're sort of chill-inducing.

Re: I think the picture of Pooh is right on... kellyrfineman April 22 2016, 14:34:23 UTC

I often skipped Tolkien's poems after the first reading, just as I skipped the stuff in Elfish, which would undoubtedly outrage Tolkien, who was a linguist and poet first, so those were actually his favorite bits. (Poor guy.) Then again, lots of folks skipped the poetry in A.S. Byatt's Possession (not me), and thereby missed significant plot points/clues. Those blocks of verse in antiquated forms can be a bit mind-numbing, though, so it's understandable that we skip stuff we don't see/understand the importance of.

This Théoden poem is really boss, isn't it?