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Cento

Form
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

A poem constructed entirely from lines or fragments borrowed from other authors, recontextualized to form a new unified work.

Detailed Definition
A cento is a collage poem composed entirely of lines or phrases borrowed from other poets, reassembled to create new meaning; dating to antiquity, it celebrates intertextuality and homage, as in David Lehman’s or Anne Carson’s inventive appropriations.
Example
Example in poetry:
Cento: John Ashbery’s “The Dong with the Luminous Nose” stitches lines from other poets; Cento from Dickinson: “Hope is the thing with feathers / I heard a Fly buzz— / Because I could not stop for Death”; Contemporary cento on war using lines from Homer, Owen, and Rich
Additional Notes
Poem composed entirely of lines borrowed from other works, creating new meaning through juxtaposition. Ancient practice; modernists revived it. Related to collage and found poetry but exclusively uses existing verse lines.
Also Known As
Patchwork poem collage verse composite poetry assembled quotations
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