Ovi (poetry)

"Ovee" redirects here. For the former railway in Liverpool, see Liverpool Overhead Railway.

Ovee (ovee, literally "strung together"[1]), also spelled owi or owee, is a poetic metre used in Marathi poems for "rhythmic prose", generally used in narrative poems.[2] A poem using this metre is also called an ovee. Ovee is one of the "oldest Marathi song genres still performed today".[3] It has been in use since the 13th century in written poetry; however, oral traditions of women's ovee pre-date the literary ovee. While literary ovee is used by the Varkari saints in bhakti (devotional) literature, women's ovee is passed via the oral tradition through generations of women, who sing them while working or for pleasure.

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference Novetzke2013 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ Sujit Mukherjee (1998). A Dictionary of Indian Literature: Beginnings-1850. Orient Blackswan. p. 270. ISBN 978-81-250-1453-9.
  3. ^ Anna Schultz (2013). Singing a Hindu Nation: Marathi Devotional Performance and Nationalism. Oxford University Press. p. 152. ISBN 978-0-19-973083-4.