Anapest

Definition of Anapest
Anapest is a poetic device defined as a metric foot in a line of a poem that contains three syllables in which the first two syllables are short and unstressed, followed by a long, stressed third syllable. For example: "I must finish my trip alone." Here, the anapestic foot is marked in bold.

Difference between Anapest and Dactyl
Anapest is known as antidactylus, as it is an inverse pattern of the dactyl meter. The difference is that anapest consists of three syllables, where the first two are unstressed and the last one is stressed, in an unstressed / unstressed / accented pattern; however, dactyl is the opposite of this pattern; it is a metric foot consisting of three syllables in which the first two syllables are accented and the last not accented, as accented / stressed / unstressed pattern

Examples of Anapest in literature
Example # 1: The destruction of Sennacherib (by Lord Byron)
His spears were like stars in the sea,
When the blue wave It rolls every night in the deep Galilee.

Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green,
That host with their banners at sunset is:
Like the leaves of the forest when autumn has blown ... 40a 4
Because the angel of death spread its wings in the explosion ...
And his hearts, but once stirred, and forever stood still! ”

Byron has written this poem in an anapestic tetrameter pattern, consisting of four anapestres in each line. In this excerpt, anapestes are marked in bold. The entire poem follows the same pattern, with the first two syllables unstressed, followed by a third stressed syllable.

Example 2: Verses allegedly written by Alexander Selkirk (by William Cowper)
“I am monarch of all I survey,
My right, there is no one to dispute;
From the center around the sea,
I am master of fowl and beast.
Oh, loneliness! Where are the stimuli ...

Better live in the middle of alarm situations ...

I am beyond the reach of humanity,
I have to end my journey alone,
Never hear the sweet music of language ...
You are so unfamiliar with people,
Your tameness shocks me ... “

This is Poem shows examples of anapests and iamb combinations and in some places iambs are replaced by anapests. The poem is written in an anapestic trimeter on each line, which means there are three anapests in each line.

Example 3: "It was the night before Christmas (by Clement Clarke Moore)
" 'Twas t The night before Christmas, when
Not a creature moved throughout the house, not even a mouse;
The stockings were carefully hung on the chimney ...
While visions of sugar plums danced in their heads ...
had just calmed our brains for a long winter's nap ...
As dry leaves that fly before the wild hurricane,
, when they hit an obstacle they go up into the sky ...
with the sleigh full of toys and St.Nicholas too. ”

This poem is a perfect example of an anapest that runs throughout the poem. Most of the lines follow an Anapest tetrameter. As in the first line, there are four anapests. In other lines, however, three anapestes are also used.

Example 4: The cloud (by Percy Bysshe Shelley)
“May have broken the shot
The stars look behind her and peer;
And I laugh to see them swirl and these flee ...
And the moon with a pearl belt;
The volcanoes are dark and the stars tumble and swim what I march ...
When the forces of the air are chained to my chair ...
While the damp earth below laughed. “

This poem is also a very good example for Anapest. Each long line has three anapeste (anapestic trimeter) followed by shorter lines with two anapeste (anapestic dimeter) gives the poem rhythm and regular beats. Since Anapest ends in a stressed syllable, it creates strong lines of rhyme that create music in a poem. It plays a very important role in poetry, and the most common role in verse is that of a comic meter, that is, the foot used in the limerick for comic purposes.

Analogy Anaphora