Ode

Definition of Ode:

"An ode is a long lyric poem, serious in subject, elevated in style, and elaborate in its stanzaic structure." (Abrams). It is often written to praise someone or something, or to mark an important occasion. Pindar, a Greek poet, developed the form of the ode from the varying stanza pattern of the choral songs in Greek tragedy. His complex stanzas were patterned in sets of three: moving in a dance rhythm to the left, the chorus chanted the strophe; moving to right it chanted the antistrophe; then standing still it chanted the epode.

The regular or Pindaric ode in English is a learned imitation of Pindar, with all the strophes and antistrophes written in one kind of stanza, and all the epodes in another. Thomas Gray's "The Progress of Poesy" is an example.

The irregular ode was introduced in 1656 by Abraham Cowley in English. He imitated the Pindaric style and matter, but disregarded the recurrent strophic triad, and allowed each stanza to find its own pattern of varying live lengths, number of line and rhyme scheme. The irregular ode has been the favourite form for the English poets.

Pindar wrote his odes to praise and glorify the winners in the Olympic Games. Many of the English odes, early and later, have been eulogistic, praising either a person, or art or abstract concept. Wordsworths "Intimations", Shelley's "Ode to the West wind", Coleridge's "Dejection", etc, are of this type.

Another type of ode is Horatian ode which is modelled on the matter, tone and form of the Roman Horace. It is homostrophic in stanza form, and calm, restrained, and meditative, in contrast to the passion and visionary boldness of Pindaric ode. Keats's "To Autumn" is an example.