What is Prosody
Prosody-Prosody (छंदशास्त्र) is derived from an ancient Greek word that meant a song, accompanied (सहित, के साथ) by music. It is a particular (विशेष) tone (सुर, तान) or accent (स्वर, उच्चारण) given to an individual (विशिष्ट) syllable (उच्चारण-खंड).Definition-Prosody studies how to make poetic words more rhythmic (तालबद्ध, लयबद्ध)). In other words you can say that Prosody is a study of elements that create rhythmic (लयात्मक) effects in words.Prosody is the use of pitch (स्वर-मान, अंतराल), loudness (आवाज की ऊंचाई), tempo (ताल, गति) and rhythm in speech to convey information about the structure and meaning of an utterance (कथन, उक्ति).The study and the actual use of metres and forms of versification are both known as prosody.The Prosody improved the study of metre (छंद) or metrical forms (छंद-रूप) and its uses in different genres (रचना-पद्धतियों, शैलियों) like the lyric (गीत-काव्य), epic (महाकाव्य) or the dramatic verse (पद्य).Elements (तत्व) of Prosody-Main elements of Prosody are given below.VersificationMetreFootSyllableStanza FormsMetric Lines1- Versification (छाम्दोव्यवस्था) -The art of composing poems is called versification. The versification happens when something is turned on into a poem.2- Metre (छंद) -Metre is the rhythmic structure of a verse or lines in verse. It is a scheme which divides a verse into unaccented syllables and accented syllables.1- Foot (इकाई, पद)-Foot is a combination of unaccented and accented syllables. Each foot has a certain number of syllables in it, usually two or three syllables.Example-Discuss is made of two syllables dis and cussKinds of Feet-There are four most common types of metrical feet-IambsTrocheesAnapestsDactyls1- Syllable (उच्चारण-खंड)-Syllable is a part of a word, which has one vowel sound.They are of two kinds-Unaccented or UnstressedAccented or StressedSyllable has other kinds also-Anapaest-It has three syllables. The first two syllables are unstressed, but the third one is stressed.For example-The As syr/lan came down/like a wolf/on the fold.Dactyl-It is opposite to Anapaest. In this figure, first syllable is stressed, but the other two are unstressed.For example-Take her up ten-der-ly1- Stanza Forms (पद्यांश के रूप)-A stanza usually performs the rhyme scheme and Rhythm of the poem. It is a set of lines in a poem. Though most poems are written in stanzas some poems are written without stanza-breaking. Stanzas give structure to poem. Main forms of stanza are given below-