Rhyme's Rooms

The Architecture of Poetry

By: Brad Leithauser

Narrated by: Kevin R. Free

From the widely acclaimed poet, novelist, critic, and scholar, a lucid and edifying exploration of the building blocks of poetry and how they've been used over the centuries to assemble the most imperishable poems.

“Anyone wanting to learn how to remodel, restore, or build a poem from the foundation up, will find this room-by-room guide on the architecture of poetry a warm companion.” —Tomás Q. Morín, author of Machete

We treasure our greatest poetry, Brad Leithauser reminds us in these pages, "not for its what but its how." In chapters on everything from iambic pentameter to how stanzas are put together to "rhyme and the way we really talk," Leithauser takes a deep dive into that how—the very architecture of poetry. He explains how meter and rhyme work in fruitful opposition ("Meter is prospective; rhyme is retrospective"); how the weirdnesses of spelling in English are a boon to the poet; why an off rhyme will often succeed where a perfect rhyme would not; why Shakespeare and Frost can sound so similar, despite the centuries separating them. And Leithauser is just as likely to invoke Cole Porter, Stephen Sondheim, or Boz Scaggs as he is Chaucer or Milton, Bishop or Swenson, providing enlightening play-by-plays of their memorable lines.

Here is both an indispensable learning tool and a delightful journey into the art of the poem—a chance for new poets and readers of poetry to grasp the fundamentals, and for experienced poets and readers to rediscover excellent works in all their fascinating detail.

Portions of this book have appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, and The New York Review of Books.

©2022 Brad Leithauser (P)2022 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

An AudioFile Best Audiobook of the Year

“Seldom has a guidebook to prosody ever been so sprightly, so much fun to read, with deeply knowledgeable insights gingered throughout with low-keyed humor . . . Leithauser’s witty Rhyme’s Rooms: The Architecture of Poetry blueprints the struts and girders, the iron armature, needed to create even the airiest lyric. [It] is a book of revelations.”—Michael Dirda, The Washington Post

“Readers ready to discover the power of poetry need look no further . . . Leithauser brilliantly elucidates poetry for ‘the reader who loves words and literature, but maybe feels some trepidation . . . on confronting a poem on a page’ . . . [He] facilitates a deep appreciation of the craft without slipping into academic jargon, and his own prose is lyrical . . . His writing is a joy to read, as is his message that poetry can benefit one’s mind—the first message of all poems, he writes, is to ‘slow down.’”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“A warm, well-considered celebration of a rich literary form. . . [Leithauser] aims his thoughtful overview of prosody at general readers who may feel trepidation when encountering a poem . . . Unlike scholarly books that focus mostly on what a poem says, Leithauser is equally concerned with how a poem conveys meaning: the building blocks that make for its particular architecture.”—Kirkus Reviews