Home › Glossary › Letter V

Variable pentameter

Meter
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

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 pentameter line that shifts between different metrical feet (e.g., iambic, trochaic, anapestic) for expressive variation.

Detailed Definition
Variable pentameter is a five-beat line that incorporates diverse metrical feet to avoid monotony and reflect natural speech cadences; while retaining the pentameter’s traditional length, it varies stress patterns to accommodate conversational flow, emotional nuance, or syntactic complexity, as seen in much post-Shakespearean dramatic and lyric verse.
Example
Example in poetry:
Shakespeare’s later blank verse uses variable pentameter with mixed feet; “Break, break, break on thy cold gray stones” (Tennyson) varies pentameter stress; “Not with a bang but a whimper” (Eliot) uses irregular pentameter; Contemporary poets vary pentameter for expressive effect
Additional Notes
Variable pentameter maintains five beats per line but allows mixed feet and irregular stresses, loosening iambic constraints for expressive freedom; common in 20th-century dramatic verse.
Also Known As
Adaptive Pentameter Elastic Five-Foot Shifting Iambic Line Responsive Pentameter Logaoedic pentameter
Skip to main content