Metaphor -Week One
Allusion = an indirect reference to a person, event, statement, or theme found in literature, the other
arts, history, myths, religion, or popular culture
Allegory = presentation of an abstract idea through more concrete means; narrative or description that
has a second meaning beneath the surface
Epithet = an adjective or phrase applied to a noun to accentuate a certain characteristic EX. Magic
Johnson
Extended metaphor = is a sustained comparison in which part or all of the poem consists of a series of
related metaphors
Implied metaphor = mentions only the vehicle of comparison. EX. She sliced through traffic.
Metaphor = A figure of speech that associates two distinct things; the representation of one thing by
another. (There is no connective word.)
Conceit = an elaborate and often surprising comparison between two apparently highly dissimilar things.
(Extended metaphor)
Personification = a figure of speech that bestows human characteristics upon anything nonhuman.
Simile = A figure of speech that compares two distinct things by using a connective word such as like, as,
than, and resembles.
Pauses
Caesura = a pause in a line of poetry dictated by the natural speaking rhythm (and not the meter.)
End-stopped line = a line of poetry in which a grammatical pause (in the form of punctuation) and the
physical end of the line coincide. (Opposite of enjambment)
Enjambment / run-on line = poetic expression that spans more than one line; does not end with
grammatical breaks, and is not complete without the following lines.
Stanza = a group of set lines in a poem, usually physically set off from others such clusters by a blank
line.
Rhymes- Week Two
Approximate rhyme/Slant rhyme (near rhyme) = similar sounding words, but do not rhyme exactly EX.
Care and Core
Couplet = two successive lines of rhyming verse, often of the same meter
End rhyme = rhyme that occurs at the end of lines in verse
Exact rhyme = (Perfect rhyme) sound preceding the first accented vowel in the rhyming sounds differ EX.
Lard, shard, marred, and thinking, drinking, shrinking
Feminine rhyme = (a perfect rhyme) rhyming stressed syllables are followed by identical unstressed
syllables. EX. Slaughter and Daughter
Masculine rhyme = rhyme with one stressed syllable EX. Care/Ware
Internal rhyme = rhyme that occurs within a line of verse
Speaker
Rhyme scheme = pattern of end rhymes
Speaker
Apostrophe = a figure of speech in which the speaker directly and often emotionally addresses a person
who is dead or otherwise not physically present, an imaginary person or entity, something inhuman.
Connotation = the emotional association(s) evoked by a word
Denotation = a word’s literal and primary meaning
Diction = word choice (formal vs. informal)
Dramatic monologue = a lyric poem where the speaker addresses a silent listener, revealing himself in
the context of a dramatic situation
Dramatic situation = the time, setting, key events, and other characters involved in the situation at hand
Imagery = refers to the actual language that a writer uses to convey a visual picture/represent the
sensory experience AND figures of speech used to express abstract ideas in a vivid and innovative way.
Metonymy = a figure of speech where one thing is represented by another that is commonly and often
physically associated with it. EX. calling a monarch “the crown.”
Speaker = persona presenting the poem (POV)
Synaesthesia/synesthesia = the association of two or more different senses in the same image. EX. The
coal was red hot. Sight – color and Touch – hot
Synecdoche = a figure of speech in which a part of something is used to represent the whole, or when
the whole is used to represent a part. EX. Saying a car is your “wheels.”
Syntax = arrangement of words within a phrase, clause, or sentence. (Complexity vs. simplicity)
Theme = the statement the text makes about the subject of the poem
Tone = the attitude of the author toward the reader or the subject matter of a literary work
Sounds-Week Three
Alliteration = the repetition of initial consonant sounds.
Assonance = repetition of identical or similar vowel sounds, followed by different consonant sounds. EX.
Fate and Cave (note—not perfect rhyme!)
Cacophony = a mixture of harsh, unpleasant, or discordant sounds.
Consonance = the repetition of final consonant sounds or sounds following different vowel sounds in
proximate words. EX. Made and Wood
Euphony = pleasing, harmonious sounds. (Opposite of cacophony)
Onomatopoeia = words that signify meaning through their sound effects - EX. Hiss and Sizzle
Phonetic intensives = a word whose sound, by an obscure process, to some degree suggests its meaning
EX. Initial “fl” sound = light (flame, flicker, and flash) Short “i” sound = small (inch, imp, thin, slim, little,
bit, chip, sliver, etc.)
Similarities and Differences
Antithesis = a rhetorical figure in which two ideas are directly opposed. EX. “I long and dread to close.”
Hyperbole/overstatement = a figure of speech that uses deliberate exaggeration to achieve an effect,
whether serious, comic, or ironic
Understatement = opposite of hyperbole where one says less than one means
Irony = a contradiction or incongruity between appearance or expectation and reality.
Oxymoron = a figure of speech that has two opposite or contradictory words to present an emphatic
and dramatic paradox. EX. Bittersweet, Eloquent Silence
Paradox = a statement that seems self-contradictory or nonsensical on the surface, but upon closer
examination, contains an underlying truth.
Parallelism = rhetorical device used to accentuate or emphasize ideas or images by using grammatically
similar constructions
Meter
Free verse = vers libre—poetry that lacks regular meter, does not rhyme, and uses irregular line lengths.
Meter = regular pattern of accented and unaccented syllables in poetry (related to rhythm)
Foot = a rhythmic unit into which a line of metrical verse is divided. (See meter handout)
Scansion = the analysis of poetic meter (uses symbols to mark stressed and unstressed syllables)