Mixing poetry into prose

[Ireth]

What are your thoughts on including poetry in prose? I've seen a few different examples of it in published fiction, some that I think worked out better than others. Brian Jacques did a good job with the various songs, poems and prophecies, of which there were always several per book, in his Redwall series.

I have a couple of instances where I've incorporated poetry into my prose. In the first book of my Faerie duology, a minor character is a Pooka who speaks exclusively in rhyming couplets; in the second, a father sings a lullaby to his daughter. The second example falls under Stylistic Suck, as the singer is by no means a poet, and made up the song off the top of his head; I've tried to reflect that in the lullaby itself, which is rife with imperfect rhymes. The Pooka is more adept at rhyming on a dime.

Do any of you include poems in your prose?

[T.Allen.Smith]

I see songs done quite a bit in fantasy which when written in a novel probably would serve the same purpose as poetry with a few differences.

In all honesty though, I almost always skip these when I see them. Someone must like it though. It occurs often enough for me to believe there's an audience for it.

For what it's worth, I like your cantina rhymes though. That would play better to me as a reader than most songs in see in fantasy books.

[Chilari]

I have decided that my main character is quite a fan of poetry, and an amateur composer of poems herself. So I'll have to include some poetry at some point, certainly at celebratory events like weddings and religious festivals where it culturally expected, but also when my main character and her friend are out walking in the hills as the prefered poetry of the culture (and my main character) is in praise of nature. I might be able to avoid having to write the celebration ones by just saying that everyone was listening intently to the poet as she wove an image of some aspect of nature, or that my main character wished the poem about some ancient hero that she'd heard a hundred times before would end because she was hungry. But for the ones she's composing, I plan on weaving the composition into her discussions with her friend, interuptting herself in the middle of a sentence about some new law or an upcoming religious ritual to ask whether a particular turn of phrase worked when describing the movement of ripening wheat in the wind.

As far as reading poetry in fiction is concerned, unless it's short or a prophecy, I often skip over it. If it's not plot or character relevant, it comes across as the author trying to show off or shoehorn their poetry in somehow. The same goes for stories characters are told at bed time or whatever - this happened in a book I read a decade or so ago, where a chapter's worth of the book was just this unrelated myth as it was being told to one of the characters as they sheltered in a cave or something. It was completely superfluous, unrelated to the plot, and seemed like filler to make the book long enough and show off the depth the author had gone to in worldbuilding.

[The Dark One]

I'm profoundly shocked.

You skip over poems and songs in literature but contemplate putting poems in your own literature? Why would you expect people to read yours if you don't read that of others?

I always read the poems and songs in LOTR...even the ones in elvish, which I don't understand but I'm doing Tolkien the courtesy of reading his pointy-eared gibberish because he took the trouble to write it. Even though I've read his book 60 times! (Sad but true.)

I use songs and poems a lot. I even wrote some original music (and recorded some video) and linked to it from my first book, which was paper, but theoretically in an ebook they could go straight to the URL embedded in the text.

In my recently published book there are poems by a fictitious/famous poet which are important reflections of the story (and quite funny, I hope).

In my recently finished (not yet published) book, a poem is absolutely critical to the resolution of the plot. I would be horrified to think people might not read it. There's no way they could get the book if they didn't.

[Chilari]

I skip over poems if they have no bearing on the story. To take Brian Jaques' Redwall books as an example, I read the prophecy poems and the riddles that help various characters find stuff they need, but when there's a song about food for two pages, I'd skim it. My approach for inclusion of poetry in my own works is the same: if it's just to show off that I can write poetry, I won't include it. If it's to establish a religious ritual which later becomes important, or a mnemonic poem about dispelling curses, or part of character development, I will include it.

Say I've got this feast going on, and a poet comes up and starts reciting a poem while the feasters are eating. I would not include the poem. What I might do is use it to demonstrate cultural differences. In my WIP, many of the characters present in the town are not natives, but from an allied city of a different culture some way away. So the people of the town might expect to listen to the poem, eating as quietly as possible, because poetry is an important part of their culture. The people from the allied city might just see it as entertainment, and start whispering to their neighbours and talking over the poet because they're not interested in listening and don't see it as important to so do. In that situation, I might have my main character trying to listen to the poem while being constantly interrupted by someone trying to talk to her, or talking near to her to someone else. In that situation, I might include a few snippets of the poem, written in dialogue insterspersed with other aspects of what is happening, to illustrate the cultural differences. I would not include the whole poem in an indented block, because it would serve no purpose to do so.

Simiarly, when my character is out on a nice walk with her friend, I want to portray the closeness of their relationship, demonstrate that my main character has likes and hobbies like anyone else and that she is quite happy to ask her friend advice on it in the middle of discussions on unrelated topics. I want to establish that this is normal, that this is how their relationship works, such that later in the story when the nature of their relationship changes there is a comparitive episode as a measuring stick. As with the above example I don't intend to include an entire poem, but rather little snippets as my main character asks for advice on a single line.

I don't expect readers to read my poetry. What I expect is for poetry, or stories and myths which take place in the world of a fantasy story, to be relevant to the story itself.

[SeverinR]

I dislike the rules of poetry when writing.
I like the freedom of Prose.

True freedom and wisdom, is not found in following the rules.

[Ireth]

I dislike the rules of poetry when writing.
I like the freedom of Prose.

True freedom and wisdom, is not found in following the rules.

Not all poetry has strict rules. Free verse has its own merits.

[SeverinR]

I always think of poetry as structured and rigid.
Thats why I like prose.
But some say free verse is prose. (I admit I had to look up the difference.)

[Lorna]

I draw as much of my inspiration from poetry as prose. Most of the oldest myths, for example the stories in the Mabinogion and the Norse Sagas combine poetry with prose as do many of the plays of Ancient Greece.

I frequently use poetry to open chapters because I think it can work well to set the scene, introduce a character or group of characters at the beginning without breaking the flow of the prose. I draw on the idea of the chorus in Greek tragedy in some scenes and have intermissions featuring the songs of elementals. Elemental songs are also a part of the rituals. Art is very important and magical force within the world I'm writing about.

[Helleaven]

In my opinion, the poetry strenghtens the feeling of an entire different culture is alive out there. Every culture has it's own legends or epic stories and in early ages most of them were witten in the form of poetry (such as ancient Greek).

I love poetry as long as it's epic or really emotional. Poems about death or losing someone forever, poems about heroes whose names are now remembered as legends, etc.

But for the 2 pages of food poem thing, it's unnecesserily long and unless it's funny, it's not worth the while. However, in the books of Tolkien, there is a huge amount of poetry and they have their own fans too.