What Is Chhondo?
Chhondo, or metre, is the regular and pleasant arrangement of sounds in the lines of a poem. It is measured in matra (units of pronunciation time).
Terms
A dol (syllable) is a group of sounds spoken at once. Matra measures the time of pronunciation. A porbo is the smallest unit in a line in which one breath can be taken. A choron is a line, and a stobok is a stanza. An open syllable ends in a vowel and a closed syllable ends in a consonant.
The Three Metres
Okkhorbritto (also called mishrobritto, tan-pradhan) depends on a sung, flowing tone. A closed syllable at the end of a word counts as two matra; elsewhere every syllable is one matra. It is the most common metre. Examples are poyar (8 plus 6, fourteen matra), moha-poyar (8 plus 10) and tripodi. Madhusudan's blank verse (omitrakkhor chhondo) and sonnets also use it.
Matrabritto (also called kolabritto, dhoni-pradhan) counts an open syllable as one matra and a closed syllable as two. Its usual unit is six matra. It suits grave, resonant poetry.
Sworobritto (also called dolobritto, shashaghat-pradhan) counts every syllable as one matra. Each porbo usually has four matra with stress on the first. It is called the metre of nursery rhymes and is common in folk literature.
Key Facts
Michael Madhusudan Dutt introduced blank verse in Bengali, first in Tilottamasambhab Kabya. A sonnet has fourteen lines, split into an octave and a sestet, and Madhusudan wrote the first Bengali sonnets. Rabindranath Tagore started prose poetry in Bengali with his book Punashcha. In muktok metre the lines are free, without equal numbers of porbo.
Shortcut
Tone means okkhorbritto, sound means matrabritto and stress means sworobritto. Poyar is 8 plus 6.
Worked Examples
Example 1: What is the matra pattern of a poyar line?
Solution: Eight plus six, giving fourteen matra.
Example 2: Which metre is used for nursery rhymes and why?
Solution: Sworobritto, because it has four matra per porbo with an initial stress.
Quick Check
Question 1: How many types of Bengali metre are there?
Answer: Three.
Question 2: Who introduced blank verse in Bengali?
Answer: Michael Madhusudan Dutt.
Question 3: How many lines does a sonnet have?
Answer: Fourteen.