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Dictionary definition: anapaest
- Article from:
- The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms
- Author:
Copyright© The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms 2004, originally published by Oxford University Press 2004. (Hide copyright information)
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anapaest (US
anapest
) [
an
‐ă‐pest],
a metrical
foot
made up of two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed syllable, as in the word ‘interrupt’ (or, in
quantitative verse
, two short syllables followed by a long one). Originally a Greek marching beat, adopted by some Greek and Roman dramatists, the
rising rhythm
of
anapaestic
(or
anapestic
) verse has sometimes been used by poets in English to echo energetic movement, notably in Robert Browning's
‘How they Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix’
(1845):Not a word to each other; we ...