TALK SIX We spoke of Hugo soon after discussing, the value of metre. Apropos of Hugo I may continue my remarks on metre by a brief consideration of how metre operates in English and French and some other languages. Let me give you, as a short guide, a piece of verse composed by Coleridge and adapted in some places as well as enlarged at the close by Amal — not exactly rendered, as I would believe if I were of D'Annunzio's temper, belle or magni-fique by being made Amalienne. At the same time it tells us the characteristic of each important metrical foot and illustrates in the greater part of the line the very foot which is being spoken of. Cole

-01_Publisher^s Introduction.htm Publishers' Introduction Talking on poetry is best done if the talker is not only a critic but also a poet. It is with an eye to this double role that Amal Kiran (as Sri Aurobindo had renamed K. D. Sethna, giving the new designation's meaning as "The Clear Ray") was appointed lecturer in poetry soon after the Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education had been founded. The class he took twice a week was from the beginning an unusual one. He had told the Mother of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, who had appointed him, that he would follow no set method but teach according to his inspiration. The Mother at once said: "Then I shall be with you." And she must have been wit