The first text on how to write poetry in English, George Gascoigne’s short essay from 1575 contains much advice for poets that still rings true. Nearly five centuries later, his guidance on metaphor, compression, meter and rhyme stands up well alongside the counsel of poets such as Mary Oliver, Stephen Dobyns and Robert Hass.
After encountering repeated citations of the work in books on prosody and poetics, I discovered the only complete copies I could find remained in the archaic English of its original publication, with typography, spelling and turns of phrase that are challenging for a modern reader. I undertook to update the printed text to contemporary spelling and typesetting to make it accessible to students of poetry in the 21st century.
Interpretations of Latin and idiomatic phrases Gascoigne employs are provided alongside the text. Notes on my renovations follow at the end, along with background on the essay and a capsule biography of the author.
Signore Edouardo, since promise is debt and you (by the law of friendship) do burden me with a promise that I should lend you instructions towards the making of English verse or rhyme, I will assay to discharge the same, though not so perfectly as I would, yet as readily as I may: and therewithal I pray you consider that Quot homines, tot Sententio, especially in Poetry, wherein (nevertheless) I dare not challenge any degree, and yet will I at your request venture to set down my simple skill in such simple manner as I have used, referring the same hereafter to the correction of the Laureate. And you shall have it in these few points following.
The first and most necessary point that ever I found meet to be considered in making of a delectable poem is this: to ground it upon some fine invention. For it is not enough to roll in pleasant words, nor yet to thunder in Rym, Ram, Ruft, by letter (to quote my master Chaucer) nor yet to abound in apt vocables or epithets, unless the invention has in it also aliquid salis. By this aliquid salis I mean some good and fine device, showing the quick capacity of a writer: and where I say some good and fine invention, I mean that I would have it both fine and good. For many inventions are so superfine, that they are hardly ever any good.
And again, many inventions are good, and yet not finely handled. And for a general forewarning: whatever theme you do take in hand, if you do handle it but tanquam in oratione perpetua, and never study for some depth of device in the invention, and some figures also in the handling thereof: it will appear to the skillful Reader but a tale of a tubbe.
To deliver unto you general examples it were almost impossible, since the occasions of inventions are (as it were) infinite: nevertheless take in worth my opinion, and perceive my further meaning in these few points. If I should undertake to write in praise of a gentlewoman, I would neither praise her crystal eye, nor her cherry lips, etc. For these things are trite and obvious. But I would either find some supernatural cause whereby my pen might walk in the superlative degree, or else I would undertake to answer for any imperfection that she has, and thereupon raise the praise of her commendation. Likewise if I should disclose my pretence in love, I would either make a strange discourse of some intolerable passion, or find occasion to plead by the example of some history, or discover my disquiet in shadows through allegory, or use the covertest means that I could to avoid the uncomely customs of common writers.
Thus much I venture to deliver unto you (my friend) upon the rule of invention, which of all other rules is most to be marked, and hardest to be prescribed in certain and infallible rules, nevertheless to conclude therein, I would have you stand most upon the excellence of your invention, and stick not to study deeply for some fine device. For that being found, pleasant words will follow well enough and fast enough.
Quot homines, tot Sententio:
There are as many opinions as there are people.
Rym, Ram, Ruft: Alliteration, such as in popular doggerel or light verse.
aliquid salis: literally, some salt. Gascoigne means the metaphor needs to have some pungency, wit and intelligence to it that brings it alive. He also means salt in the sense of seasoning and depth.
tanquam in oratione perpetua:
as if in continuous speech, i.e rhetoric (persuasion), rather than dialectics (exploring ideas through dialogue).
a tale of a tubbe: a cock-and-bull story; apochryphal.
2. Your invention being once devised, take heed that neither pleasure of rhyme, nor variety of device, do carry you from it: for as to use obscure and dark phrases in a pleasant sonnet, is nothing delectable, so to intermingle merry jests in a serious matter is an indecorum.
3. I will next advise you that you hold the just measure wherewith you begin your verse, I will not deny but this may seem a preposterous order: but because I covet rather to satisfy you particularly, than to undertake a general tradition, I will not so much stand upon the manner as the matter of my precepts. I say then, remember to hold the same measure that you begin with, whether it be in a verse of fixed syllables, eight, ten, twelve, etc. and though this precept might seem ridiculous to you since every young scholar can conceive that he ought to continue in the same measure that he began with, yet do I see and read many men’s poems nowadays, which beginning with the measure of xij. in the first line, and xiiij. in the second (which is the common kind of verse) they will yet (by that time they have passed over a few verses) fall into xiiij. and fourteen, et sic de similibus, the which is either forgetfulness or carelessness.
et sic de similibus: and so on of similar things
4. And in your verses remember to place every word in its natural emphasis or sound, that is to say, with the same length or shortness, elevation or depression of syllables, as it is commonly pronounced or used: to express the same we have three manner of accents, gravis, lenis, et circumflexa, which I would translate into English as the long accent, the short accent, and that which is indifferent:
the grave accent is marked by this character: /
the light accent is noted thus: \
and the circumflex or indifferent is thus signified: ~
The grave accent is drawn out or elevated, and makes that syllable long whereupon it is placed; the light accent is depressed or snatched up, and makes that syllable short upon which it alights; the circumflex accent is indifferent, sometimes short, sometimes long, sometimes depressed and sometimes elevated.
For example of the emphasis or natural sound of words, this word Treasure, has the grave accent upon the first syllable, whereas if it should be written in this sort, Treasúre, now were the second syllable long, and that were clean contrary to the common use wherewith it is pronounced. For further explanation hereof, note you that commonly nowadays in English rhymes (for I dare not call them English verses) we use none other order, but a foot of two syllables, where of the first is depressed or made short and the second is elevated or made long: and that sound or scanning continues throughout the verse. we have used in times past other kinds of meters: as for example, this following:
Also our father Chaucer has used the same liberty in feet and measures that the Latinists do use: and whosoever do peruse and well consider his works, he shall find that although his lines are not always of one self same number of syllables, yet being read by one that has understanding, the longest verse and that which has most syllables in it, will fall (to the ear) correspondent unto that which has fewest syllables in it: and likewise that which has in it fewest syllables, shall be found yet to consist of words that have such natural sound, as may seem equal in length to a verse which has many more syllables of lighter accents.
And surely I can lament that we are fallen into such a plain and simple manner of writing, that there is none other foot used but one: whereby our poems may justly be called rhythms, and cannot by any right challenge the name of a verse. But since it is so, let us take the ford as we find it, and let me set down unto you such rules and precepts that even in this plain foot of two syllables you wrest no word from his natural and usual sound, I do not mean hereby that you may use none other words but of two syllables, for therein you may use discretion according to occasion of matter: but my meaning is, that all the words in your verse be so placed as the first syllable may sound short or be depressed, the second long or elevated, the third short, the fourth long, the fifth short, etc.
For example of my meaning in this point mark these two verses:
In these two verses there seems no difference at all, since the one has the very selfsame words that the other has, and yet the latter verse is neither true nor pleasant, and the first verse may pass muster. The fault of the latter verse is that this word understand is so placed that the grave accent falls on der and thereby makes der in this word understand to be elevated: which is contrary to the natural or usual pronunciation: for we say underSTAND, and not unDERstand.
gravis: heavy;
lenis: soft;
circumflexa: curved
take the ford as we find it: play the hand we are dealt.
5. Here by the way I think it not amiss to forewarn you that you thrust as few words of many syllables into your verse as may be: and hereunto I might allege many reasons: first the most ancient English words are of one syllable, so that the more monosyllables that you use, the truer Englishman you shall seem, and the less you shall smell of the inkhorn. Also words of many syllables do cloy a verse and make it unpleasant, whereas words of one syllable will more easily fall to be short or long as occasion requires, or will be adapted to become circumflex or of an indifferent sound.
inkhorn: to use highfalutin academic expressions in order to sound impressively educated.
cloy: clog, weigh down, overload.
6. I would exhort you also to beware of rhyme without reason: my meaning is hereby that your rhyme lead you not from your first invention, for many writers when they have laid the platform of their invention, are yet drawn sometimes (by rhyme) to forget it or at least to alter it, as when they cannot readily find out a word which may rhyme to the first (and yet continue their determinate invention) they do then either botch it up with a word that will rhyme (how small reason soever it carry with it) or else they alter their first word and so perhaps decline or trouble their former invention: But do you always hold your first determined invention, and do rather search the bottom of your brains for apt words, than change good reason for rumbling rhyme.
rumbling rhyme: make senseless rhymes, like low murmuring sounds with no meaning.
7. To help you a little with rhyme (which is also a plain young scholars lesson) work thus, when you have set down your first verse, take the last word thereof and count over all the words of the selfsame sound by order of the alphabet: As for example, the last word of your first line is care, to rhyme therewith you have bare, clare, dare, fare, gare, hare, and hare, mare, snare, rare, flare, and ware, etc. Of all these take that which best may serve your purpose, carrying reason with rhyme: and if none of them will serve so, then alter the last word of your former verse, but yet do not willingly alter the meaning of your invention.
8. You may use the same figures or tropes in verse which are used in prose, and in my judgement they serve more aptly, and have greater grace in verse than they have in prose: but yet therein remember this old adage, Ne quid nimis, as many writers which do know the use of any other figure than that which is expressed in repetition of sundry words beginning all with one letter, the which (being modestly used) lends good grace to a verse: but they do so hunt a letter to death, that they make it Crambé, and Crambé bis positum mors est: therefore Ne quid nimis.
Ne quid nimis: nothing in excess.
Crambé: figuratively, distasteful repetition, from the expression Crambé bis positum mors est: cabbage cooked twice is death.
9. Also as much as may be, eschew strange words, or obsoleta et inusitata, unless the theme do give just occasion. To be sure, in some places a strange word does draw attentive reading, but yet I would have you therein to use discretion.
obsoleta et inusitata: obsolete and unusual.
10. And as much as you may, frame your style to perspicuity and to be sensible: for the haughty obscure verse does not much delight, and the verse that is too easy is like a tale of a roasted horse: but let your poem be such as may both delight and draw attentive reading, and therewithal may deliver such matter as be worth the marking.
tale of a roasted horse: unconvincing; a story so ridiculous and unbelievable it would fool no one but a naive simpleton.
11. You shall do very well to use your verse after the English phrase, and not after the manner of other languages: The Latinists do commonly set the adjective after the Substantive: As for example Femina pulchra, ædes altæ, etc. but if we should say in English a woman fair, a house high, etc. it would have but small grace: for we say a good man, and not a man good, etc. And yet I will not altogether forbid it you, for in some places, it may be borne, but not so hardly as some use it which write thus:
Now let us go to Temple ours,
I will go visit mother myne &c.
Surely I smile at the simplicity of such devices which might as well have said it in plain English phrase, and yet have better pleased all ears, than they satisfy their own fancies by such superfineness. Therefore even as I have advised you to place all words in their natural or most common and usual pronunciation, so would I wish you to frame all sentences in their mother phrase and proper Idióma, and yet sometimes (as I have said before) the contrary may be borne, but that is rather where rhyme enforces, or per licentriam Poëticam, than it is otherwise lawful or commendable.
Femina pulchra: beautiful woman.
ædes altæ: tall building.
12. This poetic licence is a shrewd fellow, and covers many faults in a verse, it makes words longer, shorter, of more syllables, of fewer, newer, older, truer, falser, and to conclude it turkeneth all things at pleasure, for example, ydone for done, adowne for downe, orecome for overcome, tane for taken, power for powre, heaven for heavn, thewes for good parts or good qualities, and a number of other which were but tedious and needless to rehearse, since your own judgement and reading will soon make you espy such advantages.
turkeneth: according to the OED, turken means to transform, particularly to reuse in a new way, as Turks transformed Christian churches into mosques. But its etymology is uncertain. (This passage from Gascoigne is cited in the OED‘s entry for turken, as a matter of fact.).
13. There are also certain pauses or rests in a verse which may be called Caesuras, whereof I would be loathe to stand long, since it is at discretion of the writer, and they have been first devised (as should seem) by the Musicians: but yet this much I will venture to write, that in my opinion in a verse of eight syllables, the pause will stand best in the middle, in a verse of ten it will best be placed at the end of the first four syllables: in a verse of twelve, in the midst, in verses of twelve in the first and fourteen in the second, we place the pause commonly in the midst of the first, and at the end of the first eight syllables in the second. In Rhyme royal, it is at the writer’s discretion, and does not force where the pause be until the end of the line.
14. And here because I have named Rhyme Royal, I will tell you also my opinion as well of that as of the names which other rhymes have commonly borne heretofore. Rhyme royal is a verse of ten syllables, and seven such verses make a stanza, whereof the first and third lines do answer (across) in like terminations and rhyme, the second, fourth, and fifth, do likewise answer each other in terminations, and the two last do combine and shut up the sentence: this hath been called Rhyme royal, and surely it is a royal kind of verse, serving best for grave discourse.
There is also another kind called Ballad, and thereof are sundry sorts; for a man may write ballad in a stanza of six lines, every line containing eight or six syllables, whereof the first and third, second and fourth do rhyme across, and the fifth and sixth do rhyme together in conclusion. You may write also your ballad of ten syllables rhyming as before is declared, but these two were wont to be most commonly used in ballad, which proper name was (I think) derived of this word in Italian Ballare, which signified to dance. And indeed those kinds of rhymes serve best for dances or light matters.
Then have you also a rondlette, which always ends with one self-same foote or repetition, and was thereof (in my judgement) called a rondelet. This may consist of such measure as best likes the writer, then have you sonnets, some think that all poems (being short) may be called sonnets, as indeed it is a diminutive word derived of Sonare, but yet I can best allow to call those Sonnets which are of fourteen lines, every line containing ten syllables. The first twelve do rhyme in stanzas of four lines by cross meter, and the last two rhyming together do conclude the whole.
There are dizains and sextains which are of ten lines, and of six lines, commonly used by the French, which some English writers do also term by the name of Sonetter.
Then is there an old kind of rhythm called Vish layes, derived (as I have read) of this word Verd which betokeneth Green, and Laye which betokeneth a Song, as if you would say green songs: but I muste tell you by the way, that I never read any verse which I saw by authority called Verlay, but one, and that was a long discourse in verses of ten syllables, whereof the four first did rhyme across, and the fifth did answer to the first and third, breaking off there, and so going on to another termination. Of this I could show example of imitation in mine own verses written to the right honorable the Lord Grey of Wilton upon my journey to Holland, etc.*
There are also certain poems devised of ten syllables, whereof the fifth answers in termination with the fourth, and the second and third answer each other : these are more used by other nations than by us, neither can I tell readily what name to give them. And the commonest sort of verse which we use nowadays (viz. the long verse of twelve and fourteen syllables) I know not certainly how to name it, unless I should say that it consists of Poulter’s measure, which gives xii. for one dozen and xiiij. for another. But let this suffice (if it be not too much) for the sundry sorts of verses which we use nowadays.
* Gascoigne’s Voyage into Holland, An. 1572, in his Herbes, 1575.
Poulter’s measure: a coinage of Gascoigne’s for verse written in alternating lines of 12 and 14 syllables, after the practice of poulters (poultry sellers) to give an extra egg or two with a purchase of twelve, similar to a ‘baker’s dozen.’
15. In all these sorts of verses when soever you undertake to write, avoid prolixity and tediousness, and ever as near as you can, do finish the sentence and meaning at the end of every stanza where you wright stanzas, and at the end of every two lines where you write by couplets or poulter’s measure: for I see many writers which draw their sentences in length, and make an end at latter Lammas: for commonly before they end, the Reader has forgotten where he began. But do you (if you will follow my advice) eschew prolixity and knit up your sentences as compendiously as you may, since brevity (so that it be not drowned in obscurity) is most commendable.
latter Lammas: a day that will never come; to make an end at a later Lammas means to never finish, or to go on for far too long.
16. I had forgotten a notable kind of rhyme, called riding rhyme, and that is such as our Master and Father Chaucer used in his Canterbury Tales, and in diverse other delectable and light enterprises: but though it come to my remembrance somewhat out of order, it shall not yet come altogether out of time, for I will now tell you a concept which I had before forgotten to write: you may see (by the way) that I hold a preposterous order in my traditions, but as I said before I write moved by goodwill, and not to show my skill.
Then to return to my matter, as this Riding rhyme serves most aptly to write a merry tale, so Rhyme royal is fittest for a grave discourse. Ballads are best of matters of love, and rondlettes most apt for the beating or handling of an adage or common proverb. Sonnets serve as well in matters of love as of discourse. Dizains and sextains for short Fantasies. Verlayes for an effectual proposition, although by the name you might otherwise judge of Verlayes, and the long verse of twelve and fourteen syllables, although it be nowadays used in all themes, yet in my judgement it would serve best for Psalms and Hymns.
I would stand longer in these traditions, were it not that I doubt mine own ignorance, but as I said before. I know that I write to my friend, and assaying my self thereupon, I make an end.
FINIS.
Notes on this text
In renovating Gascoigne’s essay for contemporary readers, I took on the posture of a printer aiming to set down the text as though I was transcribing a recording of the author reading his essay aloud. I wanted to faithfully render the author’s voice and diction within the vocabulary, spelling, punctuation and typography of our present time.
The texts available to readers through the Internet Archive and other sources present barriers to today’s readers such as variant spellings like rime and rithme, antique letters u, v, j and the s that looks like an italicized f — f — and bygone verbs endings, e.g. maketh that altogether result in a text that is “almofte vnpoffible” to read with ease.
I set out to transform the text to a more readable format. My hope is that the renovated text above affords readers unfettered engagement with Gascoigne’s ideas about how to write poetry in English.
There are a few things Gascoigne gets wrong (his remarks on Chaucer’s meter, and the iamb being the only kind of foot in English, for instance) but the overall gist of his ideas about writing poems is sound. That is remarkable given how much poetry in English has evolved in the past few hundred years, but it is more noteworthy that so much of the essence of the technical craft of making poems has not changed. It is also noteworthy that George Gascoigne was the very first person to write about the tools and techniques of English poetry. Yet it is the directness, clarity and concision of his advice that makes his essay a valuable work for poets to this day.
There are a few specific vocabulary and spelling notes I wish to make, as follows:
Ryme, rime, rhyme, rithme, rhythm
The words rhyme and rhythm come from the same root and have been practically used interchangeably for centuries. Originally, they simply meant a regular repetition of sound.
The word rime originally meant to number or count to create a sequence or series of identical things.
Gascoigne and others use rhythm and rhyme both to refer specifically to the patterns of repetition of sound in poetry as well as a synecdoche for poem and poetry. Rhyme is also used as a verb synecdoche for composing verse.
Over time, these words became distinct from one another; rhyme came to refer to the repetition of identical sounds at the ends of lines of verse, and rhythm came to mean the regular repetition of accent or emphasis over a flow of syllables to form a beat. In reading Gascoigne’s essay, take care not to get confused by his loose use of these terms.
Staffe, stanza
In Gascoigne’s original text, he uses the word staffe for the paragraph-like sections of lines set off with breaks of blank lines and traditionally having a defined rhyme scheme — that we call stanzas today. Staffe (and its plural, staves,) was the common term when he wrote, borrowed from music and with a Germanic root. In my renovation I use the word stanza in place of the obsolete staffe so as not to jar contemporary readers and also to avoid an analogy with music that could be misleading.
Stanza comes to English from the Italian word for room. One can think of each stanza as a room for a separate activity or scene, and the poem strings together these scenes.
Lower-case Roman numerals
In several places in the text, Gascoigne refers to the syllable counts of lines in Roman numerals. The reader will note the letter j is used as the final i in some of these numbers. vij. = 12 and viiij = 14, for instance. The use of the letter j as a swash variant for the numeral i is an older convention for lower-case Roman numerals that I was not familiar with until now.
December 2024
Certayne Notes of Instruction concerning the making of verse or ryme in English
The first manual for English versification, it appeared alongside The Poesies of George Gascoigne, published in London in 1575. In promoting iambic pentameter, advising poets to follow the sound and rhythms of words in their natural state of everyday speech and warning against long, multisyllabic words, Gascoigne encouraged practices that created a distinctive English poetry.
The essay is nominally addressed to a Signor Edouard Donati, however there does not appear to be any evidence this is anything other than a conceit.
George Gascoigne
c. 1535 –1577
Early Elizabethan poet and playwright. His innovations in a diverse range of genres and forms, including blank verse, prose drama and fiction, translations and sonnets influenced the work of Edmund Spenser, Philip Sidney, Christopher Marlow and William Shakespeare, among others.
Gascoigne worked as a barrister and a mercenary soldier and pursued an unsuccessful career at court. His extravagant living, gambling and disorderly behavior left him deeply in debt and tarred with a poor reputation. Nevertheless, Gascoigne’s literary works earned him respect among his contemporaries.