Literary Devices

Allegory

A story, poem, or picture that can be interpreted to reveal a hidden meaning, typically a moral or political one.

Allusion

An implied or indirect reference to a person, event, or thing or to a part of another text.

Alliteration

The occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words.

Anaphora

The repetition of short phrases or single words at the beginning of clauses or sentences to enhance rhythm and evoke audience emotional participation.

Anastrophe

A literary device where the writer rearranges the normal word order to create a new effect with the sentence.

Apostrophe (not the punctuation mark)

A speech or address to a person who is not present or to a personified object.

Assonance

The repetition of vowel sounds in words that are close to each other in a sentence or phrase.

Blank Verse

Poetry that does not rhyme but follows a regular meter, most commonly iambic pentameter.

Cacophony

Harsh and inharmonious sounds in words, primarily through consonants, that achieve a desired effect on the reader.

Caesura

A poetic device in which there is a pause between a line of poetry, following natural speech patterns.

Carpe Diem

A genre of poetry that seeks to 'seize the day' and inspires readers to live as well as possible.

Characterization

The process by which the writer reveals the personality of a character.

Chiasmus

A literary device in which words, grammatical constructions, or concepts are repeated in reverse order.

Closed Poetic Form

A poem's structure or pattern defined by a set of rules that the poet follows.

Conceit

An elaborate metaphor or simile that compares two seemingly unrelated things.

Connotation

The use of a word to suggest a different association than its literal meaning.

Consonance

A literary device that occurs when two words have the same consonant sound following different vowel sounds.

Couplet

Two consecutive lines of poetry that typically rhyme and have the same meter.

Denotation

The literal dictionary definition of a word, without any emotional or implied meaning.

Diction

A writer's unique style of expression, especially their choice and arrangement of words.

Elegy

A form of poetry in which the poet expresses grief, sadness, or loss.

Ellipsis

The narrative device of omitting a portion of the sequence of events.

End Rhyme

Rhyme that occurs at the end of lines of poetry.

Enjambment

The continuation of a sentence or phrase from one line of poetry to the next without a pause.

Euphony

A sound that is pleasing to the ear, often referring to melodious words or phrases.