Description
Book SynopsisSurveys the schemes, patterns and forms of English verse, and illustrates each variation with an original and witty self-descriptive example. In this fourth edition, the authors offer a personal take on why the book has played such an important role in the education of young poets and student scholars.
Trade ReviewThe first edition of
Rhyme’s Reason was awarded the Modern Language Association’s Mina P. Shaughnessy Medal for an outstanding research publication in the field of teaching English language and literature
"How lucky the young poet who discovers this wisest and most lighthearted of manuals."—James Merrill
"[Hollander] put everything he knew about the structures of poetry—those fabled magic tricks—into a sort of guidebook for those starting out on the trail up Mount Parnassus, as well as for those who may already know the path but would take unusual delight in Hollander’s marvelously ingenious blazes along the way. . . . There are astonishments on every page."—from the Foreword by J. D. McClatchy
"This book's wit and inventive spirit, its self-describing embodiments of form, now offer the beginning poet a happy chance to discover the technician in himself."—from the Afterword by Richard Wilbur
"This virtuoso work from a master, a book which is accurate and useful without ever ceasing to be funny."—Paul Fussell
"What the E. B. White-William Strunk
The Elements of Style is to the writing of prose,
Rhyme’s Reason could very easily become to the writing of verse . . . . Marvelously comprehensive, clarifying and useful [and] a delight to read."—John Reardon,
Los Angeles Times Review of Books
