Rhyme is the repetition of the sound of one word or the last syllable(s) of one word in a second word or the last syllable(s) of a second word. What is important is the sound and not the spelling. Thus, ‘rough’ rhymes with ‘buff’ but not with ‘through’.

The rhyme is constituted by the vowel sound(s) and each part of the rhyme (i.e. the two words or syllables) must begin with a different consonant. Two words with totally different spellings and meanings but identical pronunciation cannot be rhymed. While ‘rough’ can be rhymed with ‘buff’ (above), it cannot be rhymed with ‘ruff’ because the two words have identical sounds (but see Identity rhyme below).

In poetry, rhyming words would normally occur at the end of two lines, which may or may not be adjacent to each other. How the rhyming lines are arranged within the poem is unimportant, but whatever the pattern used, it must be consistent. So lines can quite properly rhyme aabb, or abab or abac or abcb where ‘a’ represents the first rhyme sound, ‘b’ the second and so on (See Rhyme schemes below).

The word ‘rhyme’ is sometimes seen spelled ‘rime’. If anything, this is the more correct spelling although little used, since the word derives from the Provençal word rim. At some point in its history the word was falsely identified with the Greek word rhythmos (from which the word ‘rhythm’ comes), but as the Greeks had no concept of rhyme, this was probably the result of someone being more than a little pretentious!

While rhyme is optional in many forms of verse, there are many other forms in which a pattern of rhyming is fundamental to the structure. Where used, rhyme adds much to a group of words, enriching both the sound and the sense.

Perfect rhyme

Where a line ends with an accented syllable, it is deemed to have a strong ending and is thus described as ‘masculine’ rhyme. This is either achieved with monosyllabic words like ‘mind’, ‘kind’ or ‘blind’, or with polysyllabic words ending on an accented syllable like ‘today’, ‘delay’ or ‘defray’. Iambic or anapaestic (See Metre) lines normally end in this way. Trochaic or dactylic (See Metre) lines can also end on an accented syllable but only if one or two unaccented syllables are truncated.

Rhyme ending on an unaccented syllable is said to be weak and thus described as feminine. However while feminine rhyme ends on an unaccented syllable, it must also include a preceding accented one and both syllables must sound the same to achieve perfect rhyme. ‘Grammar’ rhymes with ‘hammer’ but not with ‘simmer’ or ‘dumber’ even though all end in the same unaccented sound.

Feminine rhyme is also known as trochaic rhyme because it follows the pattern of a trochee and a perfect trochaic line must have this type of rhyme (although as stated above it is permissible to truncate the final foot to create a masculine rhyme).

Dactylic (See Metre) rhyme, as might be expected, ends in two unaccented syllables, for example 'liable' and 'viable'.

In reality masculine and feminine rhymes can be used interchangeably in any metric form so long as it is consistent, i.e. accented with accented, and unaccented with unaccented. An accented syllable cannot be rhymed with an unaccented one. ‘Today’, for example, would not be considered to rhyme properly with ‘party’.

In practice, merely because of the nature of the language, masculine rhyme is far more common in English than feminine (unlike, say, Italian where the converse is true for the same reason).

Near rhyme

There are many forms of near rhyme, which though not strictly correct, have been used by many poets and are deemed acceptable (?) as a result.

Imperfect rhyme

This is the pairing of accented with unaccented syllables as in ‘garrotte’ and ‘parrot’, or ‘organ’ and ‘began’.

This is often used to camouflage or hide the rhyme.

Unaccented rhyme

This describes the rhyming of final unaccented syllables which would rhyme fully if accented, such as ‘patter’ and ‘bother’.

Half rhyme

This occurs when the final accented syllables of two lines rhyme but the following unaccented ones do not, as in ‘heading’ and ‘bedded’.

Spelling rhyme

Spelling rhyme occurs when two words with similar spelling but different pronunciation are rhymed. ‘Move’ and ‘love’ have been made to rhyme by so many poets that this has become accepted. However to achieve this acceptance a common consonant, in this case ‘-ve’ is required.

Words ending in differently pronounced but similarly spelled vowel sounds, such as ‘through’ and ‘rough’ can never be considered as rhyming.

Identity rhyme

This occurs when two words, which sound the same but have different meanings, are used to rhyme, as in ‘rough’ and ‘ruff’. While not strictly correct, this can often be achieved acceptably by combining words as in ‘theatre’ and ‘th’eater’ (the eater).

Dissonance

This is where the vowel sound of the final words is the same but the ensuing consonants are not, as in ‘wait’ and ‘quake’. The consonants must be of the same type, e.g. unvoiced explosives. This is to be avoided on a one-off basis but used regularly throughout a poem can work very well. However its success is more than a little dependent on a good knowledge of phonetics.

‘t’ ,’k’ and ‘p’ may be paired up as unvoiced explosives

‘d’, ‘g’ and ‘b’, the voiced explosives, may be paired

‘s’ and ‘sh’ may be paired as unvoiced sibilants

‘z’ and ‘zh’ may be paired as voiced sibilants

‘f’ and ‘th’ (as in thing) may be paired

‘v’ and ‘th’ (as in father) may be paired

‘l’, ‘m’, ‘n’ and ‘r’ may be paired

Assonance and vowel rhyme

Assonance is the use of many similar vowel sounds in a short space to intensify mood. This can include adjacent words and/or adjacent lines.

Assonance (or similar vowels with different consonants) at the end of two lines in place of rhyme is known as vowel rhyme.

Alliteration and consonant rhyme

Alliteration is the repetition of the same consonant either in the same or adjacent words to achieve effect.

Consonant rhyme occurs when only the consonants in the rhymed words are the same.

Consonance

Consonance is the use of identical sounds at the beginning and end of the rhymed words as in ‘bite’ and ‘bait’.

Grotesque rhyme

This is a very exaggerated rhyme often found in humorous verse. This is usually a polysyllabic rhyme and the more bizarre it is, the more effective its use, as in ‘jokey morale’ and ‘OK corral’.

Included within this category is inverted spelling rhyme where one or more words are deliberately mis-spelled to look the same as another of the rhyming words for humorous effect.

Rhyme schemes

It is usual to apply rhyme in a fixed pattern. While it requires 2 lines to create a rhyme, these do not have to be adjacent to each other. Where two successive lines do in fact rhyme, this is known as a rhyming couplet and is the simplest and arguably the most common form of rhyme.

In denoting a rhyme scheme, the convention is to use a letter of the alphabet (starting with ‘a’) to denote each successive rhyme. Thus, the rhyme scheme of a rhyming couplet would be denoted as a-a, b-b, c-c, d-d, etc. Alternately-rhyming lines would be represented as a-b, a-b.

Typically certain verse forms use established rhyme patterns such as:

Couplet a-a, b-b. etc

Triplet (Tercet) a-b-a, b-c-b, c-d-c, d-e-d. etc.

Quatrain a-a-b-b, or a-b-a-b

Quintet (Cinquain) x-a-b-b-a

In addition certain stanza forms have fixed rhyme patterns. For example, a 4 line ballad stanza would rhyme x-a, y-a where x and y are random.

Internal and initial rhyme

Rhyme can be used in poetry other than at the end of a line. Rhyme at the beginning or in the middle of a line is used to achieve effect much in the same way as alliteration. No pattern is necessary and it can be quite random.

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