Bengy is working through The Grammar of Poetry and I asked him to use write a narration based on the Battle of Bosworth (covered in AO Year 7) using alliteration:

 

 

Lesson 23 is on Alliterative Imitation and the student is asked to read some excerpts from Beowulf and then write an alliterative poem with a similar sound and feel. Bengy chose to base his poem on Ivanhoe.

 

 

We’re not rushing through The Grammar of Poetry but it’s been interesting to note that this is my son who would choose to do a poetic narration any day over any other kind of narration but he struggles with the more formalised presentation in this book. I have the older spiral edition which doesn’t have a great deal of practice in some sections where it would have been helpful but there is a new version with additional aids that I haven’t seen.

The book does go in to quite a bit of technical detail on the different types of ‘feet’ which is probably the hardest part and there are numerous exercises in scansion. I like how the tropes or pictures such as similes, metaphors etc. are presented but more ideas for practice would have been helpful.

The book is easy to use and so far I haven’t seen a book that includes both the writing of poetry and the appreciation of poetry that I like better.
Bengy says of the book: ‘Some parts of it are interesting but some I find extremely boring.’