What is sestina of the Tramp Royal about?

Kipling uses a sestina for this monologue of a ‘tramp royal’, a man who has wandered from job to job and place to place, never settling into one place or routine before quitting his job, upping sticks and moving somewhere else.

How is Bishop’s poem An example of a sestina?

Structure. ‘Sestina’ by Elizabeth Bishop is a seven stanza poem that’s separated into uneven sets of lines. The poem form is known for its looping repetition and heritage dating back to the 12th century and troubadour music. The repetition of words at the end of the lines of a sestina is of the utmost importance.

What characterizes the sestina as a poetic form?

The sestina is a complex, thirty-nine-line poem featuring the intricate repetition of end-words in six stanzas and an envoi. The envoi, sometimes known as the tornada, must also include the remaining three end-words, BDF, in the course of the three lines so that all six recurring words appear in the final three lines.

How many lines are in a sestina poem?

It is a poem of sixes: six stanzas, each comprising six lines (known sometimes as ‘sixains’: like ‘quatrains’ but with six instead of four lines), with a final tercet – a concluding ‘envoi’ – bringing the whole poem to a close.

When did Kipling write his first sestina poem?

Dating from 1896, this poem is one of Kipling’s many poems showcasing his ability to capture the speech of the ordinary man – here, a tramp or super-tramp (or ‘tramp-royal’). As with Sidney’s shepherds, this most elaborate of verse forms is here used to give voice to a down-to-earth figure… Ezra Pound, ‘ Sestina: Altaforte ’.

Which is the best example of the sestina form?

You can find more background to the sestina form here. Here, we select ten of the best examples of the sestina form in all of English – and American – verse. Sir Philip Sidney, ‘ Ye Goatherd Gods ’. And draws the dolor on till weary evening.

When did the sestina first appear in English literature?

However, it didn’t arrive in English literature until the late 1570s, when both Sir Philip Sidney and Edmund Spenser, poets at the court of Queen Elizabeth I, used it … and then sestinas disappeared from English verse until the late nineteenth century. Since then, the sestina has remained a part of Anglophone poetry.