Canto - Academic Mode

Definition of Canto
Canto is a subdivision or part of a narrative or epic poem made up of five or more lines, e.g. B. a stanza that can also be a chant. The word “song” comes from the Latin word cantus, which means “a song. “

The Italian poets Dante, Matteo Boiardo and Ludovico used Cantos to break their poems into shorter sections for thematic understanding. In English literature, Edmund Spenser is the first poet to use this division in his famous poem "The Faerie Queene". Lord Byron also used this subdivision in his poem Childe Harold's Pilgrimage.

Examples for Canto in the literature
Example 1: The Queen of the Fairies (by Edmund Spenser)
"The patron saint of true holiness,
FouleErrour doth defeate:
Hypocrisie to entreate his house.
If old traces of deep wounds remained,
The cruel traces of many Bloudyfielde;
Yet guns by that point he was furious; chose his foming bitt,
How much contempt for the curbe to give in. “

This chant describes the character of the knight who represents all the qualities of chivalry, such as bravery and fighting spirit. It is eleven lines compared to six or seven lines of Italian chants.

Example 2: Inferno (by Dante Alighieri)
“One night, when half my life was behind me, I was wandering off the straight, lost path from afar.
Through the great darkness there was no way of liberation;
But this darkness was no relieving star.
If this frightened night was still there, I think or say,
When the cold hands of death reappear, the fears.a pathless, lightless hours are forgotten,
I turn my story around what happened next ,
When the dawn opened and the night did not. "

This is another good example of singing, an important part of Dante's" Divine Comedy ". Here Dante describes how he loses the right path when traveling through the forest. This chant, however, consists of ten lines as opposed to eleven lines in the first example.

Example 3: The Cantos (by Ezra Pound)

“And then went down to the ship,
Set the keel to the breakers, further on the divine sea, and
We set mast and sails on this swart ship,
Bore sheep on board, and our bodies too
Heighted with weeping and winds from stern
Bore us on with believing canvas,
Circes This craft, the goddess with the moldings ... “

Ezra Pound has this poem in 129 parts are written, and each part is a separate chant. This is the first part in which he describes a ship voyage laden with sheep and is The word "Circe" refers to Homer's epic poem "The Odyssey" which alludes to the eerie atmosphere Pound created in this poem.

Example 4: Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (by Lord Byron)
“I was standing on the bridge in Venice
A Palace and a prison on each hand
I saw out of the wave how their structures rose from the wizard's wand:
A A thousand years stretch her cloudy wings
Around me, and a dying glory smiles
O'er the distant times when many a country
See the marble piles of the winged lion,
Where Venice is enthroned in the state on its hundred islands!

This is the fourth song of "Child Harold's Pilgrimage", in which he describes his trip to Italy. It also shows his lamentation over the decline of ancient civilization.

Example # 5: Don Juan (by Lord Byron)
"I want a Hero: a rare wish,
When every year and month he sends a new one,
Until, after impaling the Gazettes with Cant,
The Age discovers that he is not the real one;
Of such as these I would not mind boasting
Therefore, I will take our old friend Don Juan;
We have all seen him in the pantomime,
Sent to the devil, something before his time. ”

This is the first song, in which Lord Byron says that his own age cannot provide a suitable hero for his poem - the reason why he is using an old friend, Don Juan, as a hero.

Function
Song se Used as an introduction to a poem, in addition to serving as a unitary prologue to an entire epic, it also enables the reader to understand different turning points in the poem.It's episodes in a poem to facilitate reader understanding.