Talk:Sestina

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I'm having difficulty explaining how the sestina works: what we had before didn't explain it at all, so I think my attempt is an improvement, but can anyone help me clarify it?  Also, I didn't know how to reference the web site I got those stanzas from--the fellow's web site says the poems are free to be used for any non-commercial purpose...is that acceptable for here?  I feel like I should know the answers to this, but my mind will not deliver them up today, it seems. Jwrosenzweig 23:41, 10 Dec 2003 (UTC)

message: I'm not a fan at all of the "how to" section, which I believe has several faults.  It needlessly duplicates the description of the changing word order that appears earlier on (and it fails to follow the pattern all the way through to the final stanza) -- if that description is poor, surely we can fix it rather than repeat it?  It adds some advice for how to write a sestina....but we could have pages of advice for how to write poetry -- should we really advise what kind of words to use when constructing this kind of poem?  Finally, the style becomes, in my opinion, a bit too informal and chatty.  Should this section be preserved at all?  If some of it is worth saving, can we better integrate it into the article?  I'd like to see this article expand and become more informative, but I don't think this section is the right approach. Jwrosenzweig 09:10, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Do you query it? Span (talk) 18:38, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: No, I wouldn't say it's obvious. If you know how it works I guess you can see it. It's a fair question about sourcing. And yes, the Britannica citation should certainly be included. I didn't add the diagram. We could take it down if there is a copyright question. I can the exploration to my to do list - please follow it up if you have info. All best wishes Span (talk) 17:34, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry, reading your comment again I see that you were not suggesting that some Britannica text is used here. Looking at the image file, editor - ZooFari - says he made the diagram himself. Image sourcing is usually cited on the file (if you click on the image on a Wikipedia article). Hope that helps. Span (talk) 20:06, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: How to section

message: I'm not at all sure that the diagram helps matters at all. I suggest deleting it. Span (talk) 18:55, 10 July 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I guess if you can understand the transition from the first stanza to the second you can get the principle of rotation.  We have given the text for the first two stanzas, so the diagram (supposedly)  illustrates what's going on. Span (talk) 22:30, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Diagram

message: Why is "Two Lorries" by Seamus Heaney included as an example of a sestina?  It's not really a sestina at all and is more likely to confuse than elucidate matters for anyone who is unsure about what can be quite a complicated form to get to one's head around.  There are plenty of other true sestinas to choose from so why not pick one of those instead?  Please understand that this is not a matter of literary criticism, simply an attempt to make the information in the article more accessible.
90.208.242.173 (talk) 18:37, 5 November 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: It is a sestina but feel free to change it to a poem with full line endings. Span (talk) 20:15, 5 November 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: The poem is still under copyright and too long to include the whole. I've pared it down to the first two stanzas. It shows the idea of a progression of line endings. Span (talk) 11:31, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

text: I think Auden is a good choice. The issue is only the use of the full poem. I put in two stanzas of Heaney. Sestinas are pretty long poems. Guidelines encourage short excepts. What counts as 'short' is the subject of much discussion. We discussed this at length at Larkin (GA) a short while ago. Also, there isn't that much text in this article so the poem would greatly dominate. It's not ideal, but I think that having two stanzas shows the principle of rotation. There are a tonne of webpages out there, if people want to find out more. I am personally doubtful if the diagram helps much, but others seem to think it assists. Hey ho. The page certainly needs much work. It's very stuffily written with no rope thrown out to the reader. A simpler, readable (ref'd) account of how it works with some discussion of what sestinas are for and what they are good at would be a great improvement. Cited discussion of three or four poems with links would also help the page fog to lift a bit. It's on my list, but I a have a very long list. Best wishes Span (talk) 13:10, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Seamus Heaney's "Sestina"

message: This is just a small notice to flag up the fact that I am currently undertaking a major expansion and re-working of the article. It's my intention to bring the quality up to that of a GA, and possibly an FA (within time). Any queries or concerns about my edits can be put here (or on my talk page) and I'll get back as soon as possible! MasterOfHisOwnDomain (talk) 01:13, 1 February 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Who knew there would be so much to write about a mediaeval poetic form, eh? Despite coming across content that I didn't even know it existed (and which it seems, many other sources are unaware of either...), I think the article is approaching the stage at which it can be put into GAN and stand a fair chance of passing. MasterOfHisOwnDomain (talk) 17:53, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Major expansion / re-working 

message: There was some discussion regarding confusion about the graphics. I wonder if this isn't a little more clear. I've put in a little more labeling and tried to clarify how the spiral creates a new order. The cost is that it requires the end-words to be represented by letters -- rather than numbers which I suspect are a little more usual and which the article currently favors (since numbers are here used in the spiral we won't want 2 sets of numbers meaning two different things!). Phil wink (talk) 03:29, 15 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Great work! That is a definite improvement - the labelling certainly would help the un-initiated reader, and removes the need for a caption to explain the elements. Truth be told, I still find it difficult to visualise the sestina as a spiral despite sitting down with Fry's The Ode Less Travelled (which has the same type of graphic) - but no doubt some people find it useful. I don't see any way in which the current/original is superior to this, so it should be replaced. MasterOfHisOwnDomain (talk) 12:51, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

text: My only gripe is that the label under Stanza I would perhaps be more accurate as 'end-word', rather than 'word'. MasterOfHisOwnDomain (talk) 12:55, 15 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text:   Phil wink (talk) 03:02, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I've replaced the "retrogradatio cruciata" graphic, to one which is hopefully a little clearer.  Also, I think in the first graphic my replacement of end-word numbers for letters was a mistake, so I have re-uploaded a new version. Here's my reasoning: 1) various sources use either letters or numbers for the end-words, but by far the most I'm seeing are numbers, so these are closer to a "standard" nomenclature; 2) if we get into rime schemes, we'll definitely want to reserve letters for rimes (very standard) -- better something else (numbers) is used for the end-words; 3) numbers may better mesh with any number symbolism which might creep into the article. So now I think we should make the whole article consistent and use only 1 system (numbers) for end-words -- thus I think we should remove the letters from the table; they now add nothing and can only confuse. Phil wink (talk) 02:48, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: If not more clear, the replacement graphic is at least much more informative - well done on that. I'm not so sure about the letters v. numbers debate; I tend to think that they're another way for the reader to conceptualise the end-word pattern - some people just prefer to think of it alphabetically than numerically. This would probably be why some publications choose to have both, in order to to let the reader opt to foreground whichever method they find clearer. Hence, I personally would prefer the letters to remain. Also, being capitalised, they would be less likely to conflict with an identification of rime. MasterOfHisOwnDomain (talk) 10:31, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Altered graphic? 

message: *First, MOHOD, thanks for cleaning up after me. I care about accuracy and clarity, but not much about MoS. So I'll try to make my edits worth cleaning up!
*To match English I envision at least Occitan and Italian subsections before it. I think these are preferable to, say, France and Italy; for example it is easier to explain that the form traveled from Occitan to Italian to French, than from France to Italy to France.
*Obviously, the new Spenser/Sidney/Drummond paragraph assumes that the Form section will come first. It exemplifies my ideal of a lot of structural information in History that can nevertheless be presented very briefly because the foundation has been laid. Incidentally, I still prefer Form, History, then Effect.
*I also intend to expand the now tiny Swinburne paragraph a bit later.
*Sidney still needs work, specifically: My sense is that the New Arcadia (confusingly the first to be published) was published in 1590 with none of these poems. The 3 poems in question (which are said I think rightly by Shapiro to come from the Old Arcadia) were then interpolated into the 1593 printing. But I don't know. Until we get better sources these questions remain:
#Did Sidney really introduce the form into English? (Probably unanswerable: his Arcadian poems seem to have been written 1577-80, and Spenser's published in 1579 -- without further information, there's no way to choose.)
#What about the 3rd sestina? Where is it? What is its form? (I just don't have it in front of me, so I don't know.)  Found it; noted in article. Phil wink (talk) 00:48, 28 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: *Thanks for the content Phil. I've had work and other commitments, so haven't been able to spend much time on the article or Wikipedia generally in recent days. Hopefully, I'll be able to do a bit more in the coming weeks. Some of the statements seem like they need references, are you able to provide them? Or, for instance, are all the poems linked to (i.e., on an online poetry repository)? MasterOfHisOwnDomain (talk) 15:25, 8 June 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: *Drummond's sextains can be found on pp 43 & 83 here. "Ye Goatherd Gods" is available in a facsimile of the 1590 original on page 95v-96v here. Sidney's 2nd and 3rd on pp 570 & 575 here. If there are other references you need, let me know and I'll try to find them. Phil wink (talk) 19:20, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

text: *I'm sorry, I don't know exactly how you wish to reference specific poems within the article, so I'll just note here that the 2 Swinburne poems are on pp 46-8 ("Sestina") and pp 60-8 here. I'll also mention that the Gleeson White citation I've added has a little info that may usefully be compared with Kastner on pp lxviii-lxx. Finally, I can certainly add more about the 5 other sestinas anthologized by White, or the other double-sestina mentioned by him (which I've found, and more or less shares Swinburne's structure -- or lack thereof). But perhaps it's better to get on with the 20th century. Phil wink (talk) 03:58, 10 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Notes on the new "English" section