Literary Terms
In Poetry
Alliteration
Definition: The
__________________of
initial consonant sounds
Alliteration
Examples:
1. The deep churned. Something had
happened down in the dim, foggygreen depths.
--Paul Annixter,"Battle in the Depths"
2. Touch each object you want to
touch as if tomorrow your tactile
sense would fail.
--Helen Keller, "The Seeing See Little"
Simile
Definition: A figure of
speech that uses like or as
to make a
_____________________
between two unlike ideas
Simile
Examples:
1. Concrete mixers move
like elephants
2.As precise as a surgeon
3.He fights like a lion
Metaphor
Definition: A figure of
speech in which something
is _____________ as
though it were something
else- does not use like or as
Metaphor
Examples:
1.Even a child could carry my
dog. He’s such a feather.
2.We would have had more
pizza to eat if Tammy hadn’t
been such a pig.
Personification
Definition: A type of figurative
language in which a
_________________ is given
human characteristics
Personification
Example:
The wind stood up and gave a shout.
He whistled on his fingers and
Kicked the withered leaves about
And thumped the branches with his hand
And said he'd kill and kill and kill,
And so he will and so he will.
-James Stephens, "The Wind"
Onomatopoeia
Definition: Use of words
that ___________sounds
Onomatopoeia
Example:
It SHUSHES, It hushes, The loudness in the
road. It flitter-twitters, And laughs away
from me.
It laughs a lovely whiteness,
And whitely whirs away, To be,
Some otherwhere, Still white as milk or
shirts, So beautiful it hurts.
-Cynthia in the Snow, Gwendolyn Brooks
Rhyme
Definition: The
______________of sounds
at the ends of wordssometimes used to
emphasize words or ideas
or give the poem a song-
Rhyme
Example:
Three blind mice, three blind mice,
See how they run, see how they run,
They all ran after the farmer's wife,
Who cut off their tails with a carving
knife,
Did you ever see such a thing in your
life,
As three blind mice?
End Rhyme
Definition: Rhyming words
at the _______of lines
End Rhyme
Example:
Do you like green eggs and ham?
I do not like them, Sam-I-am.
I do not like green eggs and ham.
From“Green Eggs and Ham” by
Dr. Seuss
Internal Rhyme
Definition: Rhyming words
__________the lines
Internal Rhyme
Example:
Deep into that darkness peering,
long I stood there wondering,
fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no
mortal ever dared to dream before
From “The Raven” by Edgar Allan Poe
Rhyming Couplet
Definition: Two
_____________ lines of
poetry that rhyme and
have the same meter
Rhyming Couplet
Example:
Singing he was, or fluting all
the day;
He was as fresh as is the
month of May.
From “The Canterbury Tales” by
Geoffrey Chaucer
Rhyme Scheme
Definition: A ________
___________of rhyming
words in a poem
Rhyme Scheme
Example:
There once was a big brown cat
That liked to eat a lot of mice.
He got all round and fat
Because they tasted so nice.
a
b
a
b
Multiple Meanings
Definition: Words or
phrases that have
_____than one meaning
Multiple Meanings
Examples:
1. Bank- The side of a river or a
place for money?
2. Sole- Part of the foot, a fish, or
only?
3. Wind- A current of air or to
turn round and round?
Imagery
Definition: The use of vivid
language to appeal to one
or more of the
_____senses
Imagery
Examples:
Taste: a tall frosted glass of
lemonade, pink sweetness of the
watermelon
Sound: crackling underbrush
Touch: tepid water, damp jeans
Smell: sweaty clothes
Allusion
Definition: A brief reference
to a person, place, thing,
idea, or _______in history
or literature
Allusion
Example:
"Christy didn't like to spend money.
She was no Scrooge, but she
seldom purchased anything
except the bare necessities".
The allusion is to Ebeneezer
Scrooge from Charles Dickens’
A Christmas Carol.
Meter
Definition: Rhythmical
Pattern
Meter
Examples:
1.And the sound of a voice that
is still
2.Tell me not in mournful
numbers
Symbol
Definition: Anything that
stands for or represents
___________else
Symbol
Example:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by, And
that has made all the difference.
From “The Road Not Taken” By Robert Frost
The forked road is a symbol
representing choices in life.
Shakespearean Sonnet
Definition: A sonnet which
has ________lines, iambic
pentameter, and follows
the ababcdcdefefgg pattern
Shakespearean Sonnet
Example: SONNET 12
When I do count the clock that tells the time,
And see the brave day sunk in hideous night;
When I behold the violet past prime,
And sable curls all silver'd o'er with white;
When lofty trees I see barren of leaves
Which erst from heat did canopy the herd,
And summer's green all girded up in sheaves
Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard,
Then of thy beauty do I question make,
That thou among the wastes of time must go,
Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake
And die as fast as they see others grow;
And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence
Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.
Iambic Pentameter
Definition: an
____________line with five
feet or accents, each foot
containing an unaccented
syllable and an accented
syllable
Iambic Pentameter
Example: From Sonnet 6
SONNET 6
Then let not winter's ragged hand
deface
In thee thy summer, ere thou be
distill'd:
Make sweet some vial; treasure thou
some place
ababcdcdefefgg
Definition: Rhyme scheme
Shakespearean sonnet’s
follow
ababcdcdefefgg
Example: Sonnet 18
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.
A
B
A
B
C
D
C
D
E
F
E
F
G
G