heroic couplet

American  

noun

Prosody.

1. a stanza consisting of two rhyming lines in iambic pentameter, especially one forming a rhetorical unit and written in an elevated style, as, Know then thyself, presume not God to scan / The proper study of Mankind is Man.

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heroic couplet British  

noun

1. prosody a verse form consisting of two rhyming lines in iambic pentameter

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Etymology

Origin of heroic couplet

First recorded in 1900–05

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

heroic couplet

At the approach of the 18th century, John Dryden offered Virgil as a master of the heroic couplet: "Arms, and the man I sing, who, forced by Fate,/ And haughty Juno's unrelenting hate."

From Time Magazine Archive

French verse, decasyllabic, 177f.; influence on heroic couplet, 187, 190; perfect rime in,  121 n.; regular cesura in, 17, 18; influence on octosyllabic couplet, 154, 160f.,

From English Verse Specimens Illustrating its Principles and History by Raymond MacDonald Alden

This is an absolutely correct example of the heroic couplet, which ultimately reached such majesty in the hands of Dryden and such brilliancy in those of Pope.

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 7, Slice 6 "Coucy-le-Château" to "Crocodile" by Various

"The heroic couplet," says Mr. Gosse, "was never employed, even by Pope himself, with more melody than by Goldsmith in this poem."

From English Verse Specimens Illustrating its Principles and History by Raymond MacDonald Alden

The problem of the relative values of rimed and unrimed verse will come up in connection with the history of the heroic couplet and of blank verse.

From English Verse Specimens Illustrating its Principles and History by Raymond MacDonald Alden