Stephen Fry – The Ode Less Travelled

This is a manual for the aspiring poet. Fry, as you might have guessed, writes witty and engaging prose to explain the technical aspects of metre and then form, each set out in the two sections of the book.

The Ode Less Travelled is also Fry’s manifesto against free verse. He argues that form and discipline ultimately set us free to be creative and that not knowing them puts you in the dark. If you opt for the easy road of free verse, perhaps you aren’t writing poetry at all. In the opening section he drones on about this at length, with a multitude of analogies along the lines of – you wouldn’t take up the piano without some music lessons. He makes the point well, although I still wondered if using forms developed hundreds of years ago will help you write fresh and powerful poetry from today’s language and themes. Metre, definitely yes, but strict form, I’m not so sure. Fry frequently claims that he is not a fogey, but if he isn’t, who is? Some of it comes across as a last defensive stand on the part of Edwardian public school England.

He covers the clerihew, so here we go . . .

Stephen Fry
Thinks free verse is awry
And that it doesn’t make him a pompous old dinosaur to insist that from formal form it ought
To be wrought.

The best part is the host of exercises for you to try, like self-help for poets. I learnt a lot and this book has enhanced my reading as well as my writing of poetry. I especially enjoyed gaining a better understanding of the different metric feet. I knew, of course, about pentameters – an educated man is what iamb; but I can now add the trochee, dactyl, spondee and anapaest to my pretentious vocabulary.

I read it on holiday, and it was fun to immerse myself in the theory and practice of poetry. The book is exclusively about technique; it does not cover the imaginative or artistic aspects of what makes for good poetry. He does not help you to pull together a fresh metaphor or talk about the importance of making things concrete, although he does have a short section on poetic diction.

It all leaves the impression that poetry is a bit like a crossword puzzle for Stephen Fry. His own answers to the exercises are nearly always impressive, but hardly ever beautiful. He uses the word wrought too often, and I believe this betrays not only his predilection for the word, but also his view of how poetry is made.