BLANK TROCHAIC TETRAMETER WITH FFFM ENDINGS

This article deals with a Stanzaic modification of the ‘Spanish’ trochaic tetrameter with three feminine endings and one masculine (FFFM). This metre is best known from the “poetic correspondence” between Blok and Akhmatova (1913–1914) and is traditionally associated with Blok, who is considered to be the first Russian poet to have used the ‘Spanish’ trochaic tetrameter in the form of FFFM quatrains in a Stanzaic poem (see “Ty proxodish’ bez ulybki…”, 1905). We argue against this point of view and show that Blok was in fact inspired by Bal’montʼs poem (“Nezhnyj zhemchug, Margarita...”) written in 1903. We demonstrate that it is in Bal’mont’s poetic practice that this verse form took shape as an independent Metrical unit. Around the beginning of the century, Balʼmont began to consistently use FFFM blank tetrameter (both trochaic and iambic) as a functional counterpart of Romance, a type of Spanish octosyllabic verse in which even-numbered lines contain assonances. Originally used only in Bal’mont’s translations, it was later adapted by him for his original poem and then borrowed by Blok.