Prose Rhythm: An Analysis for Instruction

Author(s): Timothy M. B. O'Callaghan

Source: The Journal of Aesthetic Education, Vol. 18, No. 3 (Autumn, 1984), pp. 101-110
Published by: University of Illinois Press
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Prose Rhythm: An Analysis for Instruction

TIMOTHY M. B. O'CALLAGHAN

R. M. Gagn6' has analyzed learning into a number of processes, which he

considers to have important implications for the planning of instruction.
One such process is that of expectancy, and a typical means of establishing
it is to inform the learner of the objective of the task. This approach is fre-
quently taken by textbooks on literary appreciation.2 A section on meta-
phor, for example, will first establish the relevant expectancy by giving a
definition of metaphor together with some obvious examples; it will then
get the student to work on selected passages. The same applies to features
such as alliteration and diction. Prose rhythm, however, appears to be an
exception. Textbooks tend to refer vaguely to this feature or deal with it
by concentrating on its expressive effects. H. Coombes,3 for example,
devotes almost all of a chapter on rhythm to rhythm in poetry. His para-
graphs on prose rhythm are more concerned with its expressive effects
than with its analysis.
One possible explanation for the odd status of prose rhythm is the
belief that skill in its appreciation is "caught rather than taught." N. F.
Donald and H. Bell,4 for example, offer little hope for "helpful instruc-
tion" in this skill. They view its development as "largely a question of sen-
sitiveness and of experience." The present essay rejects this point of view;
it analyzes prose rhythm to provide objectives for a unit of instruction.

Preliminaries to Analyzing Prose Rhythm

Any attempt to analyze prose rhythm must recognize the nature of the act

Timothy M. B. 0 'Callaghan is Director of Psychology at Stewart's Hospital, Palmers-

town, Dublin, Ireland. He is researching the practical implications of percipience
theories of art appreciation for aspects of literary training and has presented papers
relating to his researches at the 1979 and 1980 annual conferences of the Psycho-
logical Society of Ireland. This article originated as Dr. O'Callaghan's 1982 confer-
ence paper.

Journal of Aesthetic Education, Vol. 18, No. 3, Fall 1984

?1984 Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

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102 Timothy M. B. O'Callaghan
of reading. In any reading situation there is a fixed element (the text) and
a variable element (the reader). Readers, therefore, will differ in the
rhythms they mark in the same prose piece. Some readings will be better
than others, however. The rhythms marked by a beginner are in no way
comparable with those marked by a skilled literary critic. An analysis of
prose rhythm must clarify, therefore, the criteria by which marked rhythms
are evaluated.
Attempts at analysis must also concern themselves with rhythm as it is
found in the environment and in nonliterary art forms. Rhythms in the
environment include the ebb and flow of the sea; the waxing and waning
of the moon; the tick-tock of a clock. If we examine these rhythms, we
find that they involve alternating units, ebb alternating with flow, for
example. Rhythm in the visual arts also involves alternation: the alterna-
tion of solid and void, of shape and interval, of light and dark, to list a
few. In music there is the alternation of sound and silence, of phrase and
contrasting phrase. Thus rhythm involves alternating units. Hence to speak
of prose rhythm is to speak of alternating units in a prose piece.

The Literature on Prose Rhythm

Though there is a large literature on prose rhythms, it places little emphasis

on the concept of alternating units and instead characterizes prose rhythm
in a variety of ways that at best provide a partial account of the phenome-
non. The approach that makes accent the basis of prose rhythm is a com-
mon one. It considers the stressed and unstressed syllables of a prose piece
to constitute its rhythm. Quality of rhythm is regarded as a distribution of
stresses that is irregular but balanced. F. L. Lucas,s for example, suggests
that the prose writer should "avoid too metrical rhythms; and observe vari-
ety by mingling sentences that end on a stressed syllable with others that
end on an unstressed." The accent approach can be seen, however, as an
instance of the concept of alternating units: stressed syllables alternate
with unstressed. So understood, this point of view shows its limitations,
for it excludes all other alternating units from prose rhythm.
Another approach emphasizes smoothness of flow in the sentences of a
prose piece. This approach is rooted in the sequential nature of language,
in the fact that the writer, to quote W. T. Brewster, "must get from one
point to another."6 According to this approach, a passage with good
rhythm "flows," while one with bad rhythm is "jerky." Thus one finds J.
M. D. Meiklejohn7 criticizing Carlyle for his "harsh and jerky" phrases.
This illustrates the limitation of the flow approach: it arbitrarily rejects
staccato rhythms. In some prose pieces units alternate so that one flows
into another, in others units alternate in a staccato manner; both types are
rhythmical.

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 Analysis of Prose Rhythm 103

A more precise approach than the one based on smoothness of flow

sees prose rhythm as a sequence of units which results from organizing into
groups the language material of the prose piece. This notion has been
explored in detail by D. W. Harding,8 who characterizes the units as syl-
labic runs. Thus Caesar's famous utterance, "I came, I saw, I conquered,"
can be seen as a sequence of three syllabic runs: "I came," the first; "I
saw," the second; and "I conquered," the third. Harding uses the term
"rhythmization" to describe the process of shaping the language material
into units. He regards rhythmization as totally subjective only in excep-
tional cases and as mainly "guided, and sometimes closely controlled, by
objective features of the sound sequences and by the usages of the particu-
lar language."9 Common controlling features are stresses and pauses.
This conception of prose rhythm strongly emphasizes the effects of
syllabic run following syllabic run. Little attention, however, is focused on
the alternations that can be built into these runs, thus excluding compara-
bility with the various rhythms found outside literature. Another limita-
tion of this approach is the narrowness of its focus. As we shall see, rhythm
in prose is not confined to syllables.

Alternating Units in Prose Works

The notion of alternating units is fundamental to the present analysis of
prose rhythm, the aim of which is to indicate the range of alternations that
can be found in prose works. The resulting list is not presented as com-
plete, however. Because of the creative nature of literature, writers are
continually expanding this list. One can only aim, therefore, at indicating
the more common kinds of alternating units, leaving a residual category
for the rest. It is hoped that a student who has acquired a good grounding
in these units will be able to generalize his knowledge to the more esoteric
kinds as he comes across them in his reading.
In prose works, rhythm can be found at the level of content and at the
level of language material. By content is meant what is represented by the
words of a work, the imaginary world of a novel, for example. At the level
of content, D. Lodge'0 finds that the sequence of night and day in Jane
Eyre is "one of the basic rhythms of the book." M. Beerbohm,"1 discuss-
ing Lytton Strachey's account of what led to the death of General Gordon,
singles out for praise the alternation of the narrative from Downing Street
to the Soudan. In a novel one may find description alternating with reflec-
tion, focus on one character alternating with focus on another. The list of
content alternations is endless; each work of literary merit offers its own
variations.
Language material refers to the words and syllables of the work. At this
level, a rhythm common to all prose works is that of syllabic run and

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104 Timothy M. B. O'Callaghan
pause. To return to Caesar's famous utterance, the runs and pauses are:
I came, (pause) I saw, (pause) I conquered. (pause)
run run run
A well-known sentence from Ecclesiastes is:

Vanity of vanities, (pause) saith the preacher; (pause)

run run
all is vanity. (pause)
run

This latter sentence illustrates the active nature of pauses in the alterna-
tion, as its second is clearly longer than its first. When sentences are orga-
nized into a paragraph, run and pause sequences are far longer than in
these single-sentence examples.
Run and pause rhythms have three aspects: the syllabic runs;the pauses;
and the relationship between the two. The nature of syllabic runs has been
examined in detail by Harding,l2 who has described a number of ways in
which they can be compared. Syllabic runs may be compared in terms of
length: the run "I came" is shorter than the run "the flag flying in the
wind." They may be compared in terms of stress pattern: the runs "I saw
it in there" and "I saw ten big birds," though similar in length, differ in
number of stresses. They may be compared in terms of the duration of
their component syllables: a run of words composed of long vowels will
be of longer duration than a run of similar length but composed of short
vowels: "no way" compared with "tip top," for example.
Critics frequently compare syllabic runs in terms of their movement.
Coombes,' 3 for example, speaks of "the rate of movement, the tempo, of
the word-sequence." The movement of runs can vary from slow to swift.
Some lines from Pope's "Essay on Criticism" illustrate these extremes. An
example of a slow line is:
That, like a wounded snake, drags its slow length along.
An example of a swift line is:
Flies o'er th'unbending corn, and skims along the main.

These lines are from poetry, not prose; but they do clearly illustrate the
notion of movement.
At first glance the movement of runs may appear to be subjective, but
it is rooted in features of the language material. E. A. Greening Lamborn1 4
relates long vowels to slow movement and short vowels to swift move-
ment. The proportion of stresses to the number of syllables in a run is
another feature he indicates: the greater the proportion of stresses, the
slower the movement. There is no doubt that movement can be related to
a number of language material features; what is important is that the critic

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 Analysis of Prose Rhythm 105

justify his comments on movement by appealing to these features.

The pauses that alternate with syllabic runs may vary between two ex-
tremes: they may be emphasized or they may minimized. Pauses are com-
monly emphasized by punctuation. The following sentence consists of a
series of marked pauses:
It's my car, not your car; my property, not yours.
It will be noted that the second pause is more marked than the others and
acts as a pivot around which the sentence is balanced.
Harding' s provides the following from Matthew Arnold as an example
of a sentence with minimized pauses:

We all of us like to go our own way, and not to be forced out of the
atmosphere of commonplace habitual to most of us.
He demonstrates that minimized pauses give the reader greater freedom in
organizing the run units of a sentence. Thus the first clause of Arnold's
sentence may be organized as:

We all of us like to go our own way,

run run

or it may be organized as

We all of us like to go our own way,

run run

A danger with minimized pauses, however, is that the reader may have dif-
ficulty in articulating the run units of a sentence; the sentence may appear
as an amorphous mass of syllables. On the other hand, too heavy a use of
marked pauses produces a disjointed effect. The good writer will take care
to modulate the pauses between his runs.
The relationship between syllabic run and pause can vary between two
extremes. The run may end abruptly, or it may be drawn out across the
pause. The following sentence contains three runs with abrupt endings:
He fell into the pit, vanished, and is thought to be dead.
run run run

Three drawn-out endings are in the following sentence:

The bird's cry, the ocean's surge, I'll hear forever more.
run run run

In this essay the term cadence is used to refer to prolonged endings.

This usage accords with that of writers such as Greening Lamborn,' 6
Brewster, " and Poe.' 8s There is another usage of the term, however,
which refers to sentence endings characterized by special stress patterns
derived from Latin writings. Lucas1 9 lists a number of these, the tardus

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106 Timothy M. B. O 'Callaghan
and planus, for example. Such a usage is part of the accent approach to
prose rhythm, which we have seen to be only a partial account of the
phenomenon.
Part of the analysis of prose rhythm, therefore, involves noting the
way in which a writer handles his run closes. One notes whether they
are abrupt or cadenced and the general effect that this has on the pas-
sage as a whole.
Another rhythm at the level of language material is that of phrase
run alternating with phrase run. By phrase run is meant a higher-order
syllabic run. The typical phrase run is composed of two or more syllab-
ic runs, although some consist of only one. The following sentence from
one of Donne's sermons illustrates this rhythm:

IHe that starves I Ias well as he that surfeits, I

P1 P2

Ihe that lies in the spitting places I and excremental

P1

corners of the streets, I I as well as he that

P2

sits upon carpets I in the region of perfumes. I

This sentence is built on a rhythm of P1 alternating with P2. On their first

occurence, both phrase runs consist of one syllabic run; on their second,
both consist of two. The rectangular boxes illustrate the phrase runs; divi-
sions within a box illustrate the syllabic runs.
A variety of other rhythms are possible at the level of language materi-
al. These will depend on the ingenuity of the writer: long paragraphs may
alternate with short; long vowels with short vowels; polysyllables with
monosyllables. These occur less frequently, however, than the two lan-
guage material rhythms that we have examined. For this reason they do
not warrant special study in themselves; they are best considered as they
occur in individual works.
Our analysis of prose rhythm has resulted in two broad classes: content
rhythms and language material rhythms. The latter are subdivided into
three subclasses: syllabic run and pause rhythms; phrase run and phrase
run rhythms; and other language material rhythms, a residual class. This
division may give the appearance of being a formula for literary master-
pieces; that a writer has only to pile on the rhythms, and he has written
a work of art. Mere alternation, however, is of no value, as it may be mo-
notonous. What matters is how the writer handles his rhythms. This raises
the question of the standards that critics apply to the rhythms of prose.

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 Analysis of Prose Rhythm 107

Criteria Applied to Prose Rhythm

In literary criticism, two standards are commonly applied to prose
rhythms: that of unity in variety and that of expressiveness. A third stan-
dard applied to syllabic run and pause rhythms is that of syllabic compe-
tence. These three standards or criteria will now be examined.
We will start with syllabic competence as it is a negative value, in the
sense that prose which meets this criterion has avoided certain errors. It is
based, as Harding has observed, on the fact that words in a prose piece are
grouped "according to two systems, simultaneously operative."20 These
systems are syllabic runs and sense units. A problem for the writer of
prose is to ensure that his syllabic runs are coordinate with his sense units.
His syllabic runs must not, to quote Harding, "unite words that shouldn't
go together and help to separate those that should."2 1 If a writer avoids
these pitfalls, then he has demonstrated syllabic competence. The follow-
ing sentence, taken from a newspaper article, fails to meet this criterion:
They improvise in public parts of their private imaginative life.
Its first syllabic run carries the reader through "They improvise in public
parts," until he realizes that "public" and "parts" need to be kept separate.
The standard of unity in variety has wide application across the arts,
and an account of its history has been given by H. Osborne.22 When this
standard is applied to prose rhythm, the writer is expected to utilize rela-
tionships of similarity and contrast to pattern the rhythms of his work. An
example of a sentence with rhythms patterned in this manner is the fol-
lowing:
That mighty, (pause) that weighty, (pause) that ponderous God,
run run run
(pause) that blasts a state with a breath, (pause) that melts a Church
run run
with a look, (pause) that moulders a world with a touch. (pause)
run

This sentence, again from one of Donne's sermons, is composed of six syl-
labic runs. The runs, though similar, are also varied; in particular, there is
a marked contrast between the first three and the last three in terms of
length. The pauses are also patterned; for example, the first two are ca-
denced, while the third is abrupt, thus welding the first three runs into a
sharply defined unit and thereby intensifying their contrast with the last
three.
Prose rhythms which intensify the mood of a piece meet the criterion
of expressiveness.2 3 In a novel, a description of the emotional state of a
character may be intensified by the expressive qualities of its language
material rhythms: the agitated mood of a character, for example, may be

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108 Timothy M. B. O'Callaghan
reinforced by the agitated quality of the staccato rhythms used in the de-
scription. More complicated effects can be obtained when the expressive
qualities of language material rhythms contrast with what is being de-
scribed or narrated: an ironic effect, for example, obtained by describing
a mournful event in rhythms which are lively and frisking. It is not only
language material rhythms that intensify mood qualities; content rhythms
do so as well. To return to Lodge24 on Jane Eyre, he points out that the
alternation of night and day, storm and calm are used, together with other
elements of the novel's setting, to reflect the inner life of the heroine.
The above three criteria can be used in evaluating the rhythms marked
by different readers of a given prose piece. A good reading will have the
negative value of marking syllabic run and pause rhythms which show as
much syllabic competence as the piece permits. It will have the positive
values of marking rhythms that have as much unity in variety, and as much
expressiveness, as are permitted by the piece. Thus, even though readers
will differ in the rhythms they mark in a given piece of prose, reasons can
be given for deciding that some readings are better than others.

Learning to Appreciate Prose Rhythm

Our analysis permits us to outline a logical sequence for a course on the
appreciation of prose rhythm. The first stage will be to introduce students
to the rhythms in nature and in the nonliterary arts. The second will be to
introduce content rhythms. There is a close link between these two stages,
as many content rhythms are representations of those found in nature.
The third stage will be the introduction of the three classes of language
material rhythms. Of these, syllabic run and pause rhythms will be the
most important, as they occur in every prose piece. Students will be en-
couraged to compare syllabic runs, particularly in terms of movement.
They will also be encouraged to compare pauses.
Once students have familiarized themselves with content and language
material rhythms, they will then, as a fourth stage, be introduced to the
criteria for evaluating them. Again, because of the universality of run and
pause rhythms, particular attention will be paid to the evaluation of these.
When criteria are introduced, the criterion of syllabic competence will
be presented first, as it is a negative value. Then that of unity in variety
will be presented before that of expressiveness. Statements about unity in
variety, since they embrace relationships of similarity and contrast incor-
porated into patterns, are relatively easier to test against language material
than statements about expressive qualities. In addition, the expressive
qualities of prose rhythm are usually those of patterned rhythms. To per-
ceive them, the reader must first pattern the rhythms in terms of unity in
variety.

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 Analysis ofProse Rhythm 109
As a final stage, students will apply what they have learned to their
reading of selected prose passages. For each passage they will be required
to mark its major rhythms and describe their effects; they will then evalu-
ate the role of rhythm in the passage as a whole.
The present approach to introducing prose rhythm contrasts with that
of writers such as Coombes,2 5 who begins with the intensifying effects
that expressive qualities of rhythm have on what is described and narrated
in a prose piece. From our analysis, such an approach is premature, as it
omits a large body of foundational material. Without this knowledge,
statements about the expressive qualities of rhythm will be regarded as
arbitrary rather than as capable of being tested against the language mate-
rial of the piece.
Prose rhythm has been analyzed in this paper in a way that allows for
the variability of readers. It has been analyzed in a way that emphasizes
its similarity with rhythms outside of literature. A student, therefore, who
participates in a course based on this analysis will gain not only a realistic
concept of rhythm in prose, but also the beginning of an understanding of
how the different arts are interrelated.

NOTES

1. Robert M. Gagne, Essentials of Learning for Instruction, expanded ed. (New

York: Dryden Press, 1975).
2. Writers typifying this approach are G. E. Hollingworth, A Primer of Literary
Criticism (London: University Tutorial Press, 1930); and William S. Bunnell,
The Art of Criticism (Bath: James Brodie, n.d.).
3. H. Coombes, Literature and Criticism (Harmondsworth, England: Penguin
Books, 1963).
4. N. F. Donald and H. Bell, Planned Interpretation (London: Oxford University
Press, 1955), p. 64.
5. F. L. Lucas, Style (London: Pan Books, 1964), p. 222.
6. William T. Brewster, The Writing of English (London: Williams and Norgate,
1913), p. 118.
7. J. M. D. Meiklejohn, The Art of Writing English (London: A. M. Holden, 1899),
p. 38.
8. D. W. Harding, Words into Rhythm (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1976).
9. Ibid., p.6.
10. David Lodge, "Fire and Eyre: Charlotte Bronte's War of Earthly Elements," in
Language of Fiction (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1966), p. 140.
11. Max Beerbohm, Lytton Strachey (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1943), p. 19.
12. Harding, Words into Rhythm.
13. Coombes, Literature and Criticism, p. 17.
14. E. A. Greening Lamborn, The Rudiments of Criticism, 2d ed. (Oxford: Claren-
don Press, 1931), pp. 4142.
15. Harding, Words into Rhythm, p. 13.
16. The "deep toned cadences" of E. A. Greening Lamborn, Poetic Values (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1928), p. 214.

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110 Timothy M. B. O 'Callaghan
17. Brewster, The Writing of English, p. 212.
18. Edgar Allan Poe, "William Cullen Bryant," in Selections from Poe's Literary
Criticism, ed. John Brooks Moore (New York: F. S. Crofts, 1926), p. 56.
19. Lucas, Style, pp. 219-23.
20. Harding, Words into Rhythm, p. 113.
21. Ibid., p. 131.
22. Harold Osborne, Aesthetics and Art Theory: An Historical Introduction (Lon-
don: Longmans, 1968), pp. 191-99.
23. A history of the standard of expressiveness can be found in ibid., chap. 9, "The-
ories of Expression and Communication," pp. 155-75.
24. Lodge, Language of Fiction, p. 121.
25. Coombes, Literature and Criticism.

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