pages 29-33 Lit terms

Euphony

Opposite of cacophony; pleasing sounds. Generally, the vowels, the semi-vowels (e. g. l. m. n. r. y )

Closed Poetry

poetry including predictable patterns in the structure of lines, stanzas, meter, and ryhme. Develops relationships among ideas in the poem

Open poetry

May not follow expected or predictable patterns in the structure of thier lines or stanzas. May still have structures that develop relationships between ideas in the poem.

Meter

Generally regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in poetry.

Rhythm

The arrangement of stressed and unstressed syllables into a pattern.

• Anapest: “but of course

• Dactyl: “honestly

• Lamb: “Above

• Trochee: “Pizza

Feet

The individual building blocks of meter. To build a line of verse, poets string together repetitions of one of these

• 1 foot: monometer

• 2 feet: dimeter

• 3 feet: trimeter

• 4 feet: tetramter

• 5 feet: Pentameter

• 6 feet: hexameter

Scansion

Distinguishing the line length and type of feet; veretical lines make the end of the feet; metrical pattern is determined by scanning; the pattern is named by prevailing type of foot.

Examples:

Trochaic: / U / U / U - “teach me/ half the/ gladness

Lambic: U /. U / U / U / - “whoose woods/these are/I know/ I know

Rhyme

The repetition of sounds in two or more words or phrases that appear close to each other in a poem

Aproximate slant rhyme

Two words are alike in some sounds, but do not rhyme exactly (now and know)

End rhyme

Occurring at the ends of lines (most common)

Internal rhyme

Occurring within the line

Eye rhyme

rhymes only when spelled, not when pronounced (through and rough)

Rhyme scheme

The pattern of end rhymes, labeled with capital letters for the purpose of analysis

They glide like phantoms, into the wide hall. A

like phantoms, to the iron porch, they glide. B

Ballad

A popular narrative song passed down orally. Folk ____are anonymous and recount tragic, comic or heroic stories with emphasis on a central dramatic event.

Complaint

A poem of lament, often declared at an ill-fated love. A complaint may also be a satiric attack on social injustice and immortality

Concrete poetry

Verse that emphasizes nonlinguistic elements in its meaning, such as a typeface that creates a visual image of the topic.

Dramatic monologue

A poem in which an imagined speaker addresses a silent listener, usually not the reader

Elegy or Lament

In traditional English poetry, it is often a melancholy poem that laments its subject’s death but ends in consolation

Epic

A long narrative poem in which a heroic protagonist engages in an action of great mythic or historical significance. Notable English ___ nclude Beowulf.

Epitaph

An inscription on a gravestone or a commemorative poem written as if it were for that purpose

Haiku

A Japanese verse form most often composed, in English versions, of three unrhymed lines of five, seven, and five syllables. Often features an image or pair of images. Meant to depict the essence of a specific moment in time.

Hymn

A poem praising God or the divine, often sung, in English, the most popular hymns were written between in the 17th and 19th centuries.

Limerick

A humorous, rhyming five-line poem with a specific meter and rhyme scheme.

Lyric Poem

Verse that expresses the personal observations and feelings of a single speaker. The term refers to a short poem in which the poet, the poet’s persona, or another speaker expresses personal feelings

Narrative Poem

A poem that tells a story

Ode

A formal, often ceremonious lyric poem that addresses and often celebrities a person, place, thing or idea.

Pastoral

Verse in the tradition of Theocritus who wrote idealized accounts of shepherds and their loves living simple, virtuous lives in Arcadia.

Poets writing in English drew on the___ tradition by retreating from the trappings of modernity to the imagined virtues and romance of rural life.

Sonnet

A fourteen-line lyric poem usually written in rhymed lambic pentameter

Shakesperean Sonnet

A sonnet which consists of three quatrains and couplet. The most common rhyme scheme is abab cdcd efef gg

Petrarchan/Italian sonnet

A sonnet which consists of an octave and a sestet with the rhyme scheme being abbaabba. Usually a pronounced tonal shift between of the octave and sestet as well.

Blank verse

verse written in unrhymed, iambic pentameter. This 10 syllable line is the predominant rhythym of traditional English dramatic and epic poetry, as it is considered the closest to English speech patterns.

Couplet

Two consecutive lines of poetry that rhyme. Heroic ___, additionally, is in iambic pentameter

End Stopped lines

A metrical line ending at a grammatical boundary or break - such as a dash or closing parenthesis - or with punctuation such as a colon, a semicolon, or a period. A line is considered this, too, if it contains a complete phrase

Enjambment

The running-over of a sentence or phrase from one poetic line to the next, without terminal punctuation, the opposite of end-stopped.

Free verse

Nonmetrical, non-rhyming lines that closely follow the natural rhythms of speech. A regular pattern of sound or rhythym may emerge in these lines, but the poet does not adhere to a metrical plan in their composition.

Refrain

A word, phrase, line or group of lines repeated regularly in a poem, usually at the end of each stanza.

Stanza

A grouping of lines separated from others in a poem. in modern works the ___, like a prose of paragraph, can be used to mark a shift in mood, time, or thought