Meter and Rhyme

When looking at meter and rhyme, several stories contain different uses of each, while some a very similar in their uses. To begin, A Handbook to Literature states that meter is “the reoccurrence in poetry of a rhyming pattern, or the rhythm established by the regular occurrence of similar units of sound," while rhyme is "identity of terminal sound between accented syllables, usually occupying corresponding positions in two or more lines of verse" (323, 449). In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, it displays a bob and wheel rhyme scheme; this consists of an irregular number of four stressed, unrhymed, alliterative, long lines, followed by the bob and wheel, which contains an ABABA rhyme scheme. Lanval by Marie de France has a rhyming couplet, which follows and AABB scheme. Displaying the Anglo-Norman influence of the French in his work, Chaucer also has a rhyming couplet in The Canterbury Tales, as does Eloisa to Abelard. Also, Doctor Faustus displays a rhyming pentameter. Not to mention that Beowulf contains a scheme that consists of two accents, a caesura, followed by two accents.