poetry 101. allusion reference to history, culture, mythology, etc. that the author expects you to...
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POETRY 101
Allusion
reference to history, culture, mythology, etc. that the author expects you to recognize and understand
Example: Garden of Eden
Alliteration
repetition of consonant sounds in words close to one another
Example: Careless cars cutting corners create confusion.
Crossing centrelines.Countless collisions cost coffins.Collect conscious change.Copy?Continue cautiously.Comply?Cool.
Assonance
repetition of vowel sounds in words that are close together
Example: all the night tide I lay down by my side
Consonance
the repetition of the same consonant two or more times in short succession
Example: pitter patter
Sonnet
lyric poem of fourteen lines and strict meter
Shakespearean/English sonnet: follows rhyme
scheme abab cdcd efef gg
Petrarchan/Italian Sonnets: follows rhyme scheme abba abba ccde ed (or something similar)
Metaphor
comparison between two unlike things without using like or as
Example: I was a lonely cloud.
EXTENDED metaphor: a metaphor that continues into the following lines (sometimes referred to as a conceit)
Simile
comparison of two unlike things typically using like or as
Example: I was lonely like a cloud.
Personification
attributing human qualities to non human things
Example: Misery loves company.
Onomatopoeia
the use of a word whose sound imitates its meaning
Example: a thin whine of wires,a rattling and flapping of leaves
Hyperbole
extreme exaggeration
Example: his words pounded like the hooves
of a thousand horses
Understatement
expression of less strength than what would be expected
Example: “It isn’t very serious. I have this tiny
little tumor on the brain.” (from The Catcher in the Rye)
Paradox
A statement that appears to contradict itself
Example: “The swiftest traveler is he that goes
afoot."(Henry David Thoreau, Walden)
“Some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again.“ C.S.Lewis
Rhythm
alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables in language;
can also be created by rhyme, repetition, pauses, variations in line length, and balancing of long and short words and phrase
Free verse — no regular rhythm or rhyme schemes
Cadence
Balanced, rhythmic flow of poetry
Example: So strong you thump, O terrible
drums—so loud you bugles blow.
Rhyme scheme
pattern of rhymed lines determined by assigning a letter to each new soundExample: Once upon a midnight dreary, a while I pondered, weak and weary, a
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore— bWhile I nodded, nearly napping, c
suddenly there came a tapping, cAs of some one gently rapping, c
rapping at my chamber door. b“’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, d
“tapping at my chamber door— b Only this and nothing more.” b
Foot
A pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables
believe (iamb stressed/unstressed) mercy (trochee unstressed/stressed) understand (anapest 2 <short>
unstressed/ 1 <long> stressed) meter –pattern determined by type and
number of feet in the line
Internal rhyme
rhyme occurs within a line
Example: the grains beyond age, the dark
veins of her mother
End Rhyme
Rhyme that occurs in the last syllables of verses
Example: Under my window, a clean rasping
soundWhen the spade sinks into gravelly
ground(from Seamus Heaney’s “Digging”)
Slant or Approximate rhyme
words sound similar but do not rhyme exactly
Example: …with madman’s flash famishing for flesh
Imagery
descriptive words that appeal to the five senses
When all aloud the wind doth blowAnd coughing drowns the parson’s sawAnd birds sit brooding in the snowAnd Marian’s nose looks red and raw,When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl,Then nightly sings the staring owl, “Tu Whit, Tu Who!” a merry note,While greasy Joan doth keep the pot.
--Love’s Labours Lost
Parallel Structure
similar grammatical structure within a line or lines of poetry.
Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them.
Catalog
A list of items, people, places, or things in poetry
In Song of Myself, Whitman uses a catalog of all that he sees — people of all ages, all walks of life, in the city and in the country, by the mountain and by the sea. Even animals are included. And the poet not only loves them all, he is part of them all.
& of course . . . don’t forget
Tone Diction Syntax Repetition
(and all of the other literary terms we have discussed!)