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“We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love…these are what we stay alive for.”
-Keating- Dead Poet’s Society

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Prose: Any written text that is not in poetic form.
Poetry: A type of literature that expresses ideas, feelings, or tells a story in a specific form (usually using lines and stanzas).
Prosody: the study of the structure of poetry.
Explication: the analysis of a poem.

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There are several types of poetry. We will look at three.
Note: Many poems fit in more than one category- it is not always easy to define a poem as just one type.

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Narrative poetry: narration of an event or a story
– A form of narrative poetry would be a ballad or an epic poem.
– Example of a ballad: “Annabel Lee” and “The Raven” by Edgar
Allan Poe
– Example of an epic poem: “The Odyssey”, “Beowulf”, “Dante’s
Inferno”.

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Lyric Poetry:
– A short poem
– Usually written in first person point of view and expresses personal thoughts/feelings
– Expresses an emotion or an idea or describes a scene
– Are often musical

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A form of lyric poetry would be an elegy or an ode.
– Elegy: a poem of lamentation or sorrow.
– Ode: a song-like poem that is serious, dignified, and elaborate.

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Dramatic Poetry: usually has one or more characters who speak to other characters, to themselves, or to the reader.
– Some parts of “Romeo and Juliet” contain examples of dramatic poetry.
– We will not work with dramatic poetry that much this year.

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A poem that tells a story.
Generally longer than the lyric styles of poetry b/c the poet needs to establish characters and a plot.
Examples of Narrative
Poems
“The Raven”
“The Highwayman”
“Casey at the Bat”
“The Walrus and the
Carpenter”

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Speaker: Every poem has a speaker, or voice, that talks to the reader. Like a narrator in prose, the speaker of the poem is not necessarily the author.
The speaker can be a fictional person, an animal, or even a living thing.
POET: The poet is the author of the poem.
SPEAKER: The speaker of the poem is the “narrator” of the poem.

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Lines: a word or row of words that may or may not make up a complete sentence
Stanza: a group of words that may or may not make up a complete sentence. Stanzas are separated by a space.

Couplet
Tercet
Quatrain
= a two line stanza
= a three line stanza
= a four line stanza
Quintet = a five line stanza
Sestet = a six line stanza
Septet = a seven line stanza
Octet = an eight line stanza

 is the pattern of sound created by the arrangement of stressed and unstressed syllables
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Meter: the organization of beats in regular patterns.
The basic unit of a meter is a foot which typically is made up of at least one stressed and one unstressed syllable.

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Is the repetition of similar sounds in words that appear close to each other in a poem
LAMP
STAMP
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Share the short “a” vowel sound
Share the combined “mp” consonant sound

1. Approximate Rhyme- when two words’ sounds are very close to rhyming but not exact
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Approximate Rhyme Example:
– wire-right, mind-sign, sound-down

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2. End Rhyme- rhymes that occur at the end of a line
Ex: How statue-like I see thee stand,
The agate lamp within thy hand.
From “To Helen” by E. A. Poe

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3. Internal Rhyme: rhyming words that fall within a single line of poetry.
– Example:
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Judge tenderly of me
From “This is My Letter to the World” by Emily
Dickinson.

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The pattern of rhyme formed by the end rhyme. It is identified by assigning a different letter to the alphabet to each new rhyme. (a,a,b,b) (a,b,a,b)
– Ex: Gather ye rosebuds while ye may (a)
– Old time is still a flying (b)
– And this same flower that smiles today (a)
– Tomorrow will be dying (b)
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“To the Virgins Make Much of Time” by Robert Herrick

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A poem that contains exactly 10 syllables per line.
EX: u
To
/ swell the u / gourd, and u / plump the u ha-
/ zel u / shells

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When you are writing in Iambic
Pentameter, try sticking to ONE or
TWO syllable words. Remember this hint. We will practice this later when you write your own sonnet. 

Figurative Language:
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Is a category of literary terms that is used for descriptive effect and is not meant to be read literally. Usually, figurative language expresses meaning beyond the literal level.
– Literary Terms
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Figurative language (simile, metaphor, personification, hyperbole, symbol)
– Sound Devices (rhythm, rhyme, repetition, onomatopoeia, assonance, consonance, alliteration, anaphora, polysyndeton, euphony, cacophony)

Types of Figurative Language:
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Simile: comparing seemingly unlike things by using “like” or “as”
Example: “O, my love’s like a red, red rose,
That’s newly sprung in June-”
- Robert Burns

Types of Figurative Language:
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Metaphor – compares or equates seemingly unlike things by stating one thing IS another. Metaphors do not use like or as.
– Ex: The grass is the handkerchief of the Lord.
From “Song of Myself” by Walt Whitman
– “All the world’s a stage, and we are merely players”.
William Shakespeare.

A metaphor that goes several lines or possible the entire length of a work.
Example “O Captain, My Captain” by
Walt Whitman

Types of Figurative Language:
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Personification: is a figure of speech in which an animal, an object, or an idea is given human characteristics.
– I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers,
From the seas and the streams;
I bear light shade for the leaves when laid
In their noonday dreams.
“The Clouds” Author unknown
– “Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”
From “The Raven” by Edgar Allan Poe

Types of Figurative Language:
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Hyperbole: an exaggeration, often for a humorous effect
– EX:
My sister uses so much make-up that she has to use a sandblaster to get it off at night.
– I had so much homework that I needed a pick up truck to carry all my books home.
– "I have seen this river so wide it had only one bank."
Mark Twain

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ONOMATOPOEIA
– Words that imitate the sound they are naming
“Boom, boom, pow”
By The Black-Eyed Peas

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Consonant sounds repeated at the beginnings of words
If P eter P iper p icked a p eck of p ickled p eppers, how many p ickled p eppers did P eter P iper p ick?

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Repetition of consonant sounds at the end of words.
– Example of consonance: The man in the orange cumberbund ended his bland speech with a bow.

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Repeated VOWEL sounds in a line or lines of poetry.
(Often creates near rhyme.)
Lake Fate Base Fade
(All share the long “a” sound.)

Examples of ASSONANCE:
“Slow the low gradual moan came in the snowing.”
-
John Masefield
“Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep.”
- William Shakespeare

Understatement - basically the opposite of hyperbole. Often it is ironic.
Ex.
For example, rather than merely saying that a person is attractive (or even very attractive), one might say they are "not unattractive” .

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An expression where the literal meaning of the words is not the meaning of the expression. It means something other than what it actually says.
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Ex. It’s raining cats and dogs.

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The repetition of a word or expression at the beginning of successive phrases
– Example: It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair…” A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

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The repetition of a word or expression at the beginning of successive phrases
– Example: It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair…” A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

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Another example of anaphora…
And do you now put on your best attire?
And do you now cull out a holiday?
And do you now strew flowers in his way
That comes in triumph over Pompey’s blood? Be gone!” from Julius Caesar - Shakespeare

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Repetition of a conjunction throughout a piece.
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Example: We all lived and laughed and loved and left.
– What are conjunctions?
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Remember BOYSFAN

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A play on words often meant to be humorous
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Ex: I work as a baker because I knead dough.

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An adjective modifying a noun when the two seem contradictory.
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Ex: Hell’s Angels, jumbo shrimp, act naturally, pretty ugly