[tei-council] versificatory matters

[James Cummings]

M. J. Driscoll wrote:
> This could presumably also be used for alliteration ("stave-rhyme"), a 
> prominent feature of Germanic verse, incl. Old and Middle English, could it 
> not?
> 
> <line><rhyme type="allit">Hige</ryhme> sceal &thorn;e <rhyme 
> type="allit">heardra</rhyme> <caesura/> <rhyme type="allit">heorte</rhyme> 
> &thorn;e cenre</line>
> <line><rhyme type="allit">mod</rhyme> sceal &thorn;e <rhyme 
> type="allit">mare</rhyme> <caesura/> &thorn;e ure <rhyme 
> type="allit">m&aelig;gen</rhyme> lytla&eth;</line>
> 
> [from The Battle of Maldon]
> 
> Now if we just had a good way of dealing with kennings.

I've been reading the various suggestions for the <rhyme> element with interest.
One of my concerns is that as soon as we simply depart from indicating a general
rhyme scheme on the <lg> is that we enter into the realm of possibly marking up
all sorts of complicated rhetorical tropes and schemes.  Fair enough, for it to
be envisioned as a simple <rhyme label="a">, and I have no problem with the
'a'-ness of that being determined by its ancestral <lg>.  In fact, in recently
producing some word indexes and tables of rhyme-words, etc. from some medieval
psalters for a project, I could have used just this structure rather than the
cobbled together <seg>s that I did.

My worry is that people won't just limit it to simple straightforward rhymes in
the modern concept, but other rhetorical structures (such as Matthew's
alliteration example) which become increasingly complex or interlinear.  The
reason this worries me is there are some rhetorical structures out there that
seem quite complicated and that this might find itself being co-opted for lots
of other (ab)uses.  I'm happy to agree that having <rhyme> is a good thing, but
perhaps if we are going to add it, we should maybe look again at marking all
sorts of other rhetorical structures to see if there are some more general
elements.  These can, I think, generally be done with existing TEI elements but
if there is a more general solution which works for rhymes and as well as other
similar things, then that would seem like a good idea.

Just my initial thoughts, this time at least not from a pub in Sofia.

-James