MyLearnings

Source

Hindi poetry

A poen is a reprtitive structure of a unit

A unit consists of -

  1. Sthayee (begginging phrase that is repeated)
  2. Sahyogi
  3. Antara = Many chhands (doha, chaupayee etc.)
  4. Samapti

Rules regarding these components are -

  1. Sthayee is repeated to bring out the lyrical nature of the poem
  2. Sahyogi can come above or below sthayee or samapti.
  3. Sthayee, sahyogi and sampti must rhyme Antara can be differnt
  4. Meter or matraas of sthayee, sahyogi and antara must be same, or the meter of sthayee is an even fraction of the meter of antara.

Urdu ghazal

  1. Both the lines in the matla (first couplet) must rhyme.
  2. In subsequent couplets the second line must rhyme with the matla, the first one may not rhyme.
  3. All the lines should have the same metre or matraas.

Calculation of maatras in hindi poems

  1. All small vowles i.e. ‘a’, ‘ee’, ‘oo’ except ‘ae’ and ‘ao’ are given matra 1
  2. All big vowels i.e. ‘aa’, ‘eee’, ‘ooo’, ‘au’ are given a matra of 2.
  3. For ‘ae’ and ‘ao’ the convetions depends on the dialet, it is 1 in Khadi Boli and 2 in awadhi
  4. For half consonants the rules are are follows -
    1. If the half consonant is at the beggining of the word then it is given a maatra of 0
    2. If the half consonant follows a small vowel with matraa 1, then it receives a maatra of 1
    3. If the half consonant follows a big vowel with matra 2, then it receives a maatra of 0
    4. If the half consonant appears between two big vowels with matra 2, then it has a maatra of 1

Rule of thumb for half consonants is to check if saying the word without the half consonant takes as long as saying the word with the half consonant. If removing the half consonant reduces the time taken to say the word then the half consonant is given a maatra of 1, otherwise it is given a maatra of 0.

Rules of matching maatras

For any two lines that need to have the same maatra both the follwoing conditions shoudl hold -

  1. The sum of matras is the same
  2. The order of maatras must match. So the two lines of the poem must have a similar sequence of matras eg. 1+1 and 1+1, 1+2 and 1+1+1, 2 + 1 and 1 + 1 + 1. 1 + 2 and 2 + 1 do not match.

The lines usualy end in a 1 matra