How To Write A Novel In Verse
What is a Verse Novel?
What makes something a poesy novel? Simply speaking, a verse novel (or novel in poesy) is exactly what the name implies: a novel that is told in verse rather than prose.
It's a bit more complicated than that, though. Why aren't works like Homer'southward Iliad and Odyssey and Virgil's Aeneid called ballsy poems and not verse novels? Later all, they are novel-length stories told in verse but epic poems and verse novels are not one and the same. Epic poems are poems on a yard scale, but they are still poems withal. Verse novels, on the other manus–whether they are written as one long verse form or a collection of shorter poems–must combine poetry with story. Perhaps the best definition I've found comes from Michael Symmons Roberts, who says:
A verse novel can just be written in witting awareness of the novel as a grade.
To write a true verse novel, you accept to be enlightened both of the musicality of the poetry and how the narrative construction works. This means that an an ballsy poem is still a poem, not a poesy novel. Nor does "prose-with-line-breaks" count as poetry novel cloth. Virginia Euwer Wolff (author of the Lemonade Trilogy) said in an interview with The Horn Volume (2001):
Writing my prose in funny-shaped lines does not render it verse. And in that location's nobody more than aware of that than I.
Which is ironic because Wolff insists her ain trilogy (one that reads like poesy) is actually prose-with-line-breaks and the books cannot be called verse novels. As she says, poetry is more than than just prose rearranged with line breaks in funny places. In fact, poetry has an element of surprise and a musicality that differs from prose. In my heed, prose emphasizes character and story before language whereas poetry puts imagery and language starting time. The line breaks in poetry serve as parallels to jiff and rhythm, whereas prose with line breaks must focus kickoff on telling the story.
Which leads me to an important question: who decides if a something is a poesy novel? The author? The reader? Some poetic authority from to a higher place? I'one thousand not sure. What is more than, if an author does not consider his/her work every bit verse, tin we the readers advisable information technology as such?
Once more, I'm not sure. If an author says his/her piece of work is prose then I feel that I must read and have it as prose, even if it looks similar verse. But what if the writer prepare out to write prose and somehow information technology morphed into poesy, with all the musicality and imagery that goes with it? Is it possible for an author to misplace their work every bit prose when actually it'southward poetry?
Some fence that verse and prose exist on a spectrum, that while certain books may clearly reside at i farthermost or the other verse novels live somewhere in between. Afterwards reading several poetry novels, however, I've come to the conclusion that for something to fit that category, it must be both verse and novel. Verse novels are not watered-down versions of each genre shoved together into one book. The verse novel must, in fact, practice double-duty, having all the elements of of both genres. This ways a poetry novel must have the music and imagery that nosotros find in poetry and at the same time character development and story structure of a novel. Verse novelists must write good poesy and a good story, and they must combine the ii seamlessly in order for the verse novel to piece of work.
Interested in checking out some verse novels?
There are several cracking lists on the web to become you started.
- Sarah Tregay'due south Listing of Novels In Verse (Middle Grade / YA / Adult)
- Novels in Poetry (Adult) – Lib Guides at Mohawk Valley Community College
- Goodreads: YA Novels in Poesy
- Connected Youth: Novels in Verse
Source: https://diymfa.com/reading/what-is-a-verse-novel
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