Poetry Terms Vocabulary 4

test on friday

antithesis

a figure of speech characterized by strongly contrasting words, clauses, sentences, or ideas, as in "Man proposes; God disposes." [Term] is a balancing of one term against another for emphasis or stylistic effectiveness. The second line of the following couplet by Alexander Pope is an example of antithesis:
The hungry judges soon the sentence sign,
And wretches hang that jury-men may dine.

blank verse

unrhymed iambic pentameter. [Term] is the meter of most of Shakespeare's plays, as well as that of Milton's Paradise Lost.

caesura

a pause, usually near the middle of a line of verse, usually indicated by the sense of the line, and often greater than the normal pause. For example, one would naturally pause after "human" in the following line from Alexander Pope:
To err is human, to forgive divine.

catharsis

the use of strong feelings, created by the style selections of the poet, intended to engage the reader in a type of emotional release/purification.

diction

the use of words in a literary work. [Term] may be described as formal (the level of usage common in serious books and formal discourse), informal (the level of usage found in the relaxed but polite conversation of cultivated people), colloquial (the everyday usage of a group, possibly including terms and constructions accepted in that group but not universally acceptable), or slang (a group of newly coined words which are not acceptable for formal usage just yet).

didactic poem

a poem which is intended primarily to teach a lesson. The distinction between [term] and non-[term] is difficult to make and usually involves a subjective judgment of the author's purpose on the part of the critic or the reader. Alexander Pope's Essay on Criticism is a good example of didactic poetry.

dramatic poem

a poem which employs a dramatic form or some element or elements of dramatic techniques as a means of achieving poetic ends. The dramatic monologue is an example.

elegy

a sustained and formal poem setting forth the poet's meditations upon death or another solemn theme. Examples include Thomas Gray's "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard"; Alfred, Lord Tennyson's “In Memoriam”; and Walt Whitman's "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd."

end-stopped

a line with a pause at the end. Lines that end with a period, a comma, a colon, a semicolon, an exclamation point, or a question mark are [term] lines.
True ease in writing comes from Art, not Chance,
As those move easiest who have learn'd to dance.

enjambment

the continuation of the sense and grammatical construction from one line of poetry to the next.
Milton's Paradise Lost is notable for its use of [term], as see in the following lines:
…Or if Sion hill
Delight thee more, and Siloa's brook that flow'd
Fast by the oracle of God…

free verse

poetry which is not written in a traditional meter but is still rhythmical. The poetry of Walt Whitman is perhaps the best known example of [term].

hyperbole

a deliberate, extravagant, and often outrageous exaggeration. It may be used for either serious or comic effect. Macbeth is using [term] in the following lines:
No; this my hand will rather
The multitudinous seas incarnadine,
Making the green one red.

idyll

a short poem that describes a peaceful rural life.

imagery

the images of a literary work; the sensory details of a work; the figurative language of a work. [Term] has several definitions, but the two that are paramount are the visual, auditory, or tactile images evoked by the words of a literary work or the images that figurative language evokes.

irony

the contrast between actual meaning and the suggestion of another meaning. Verbal [term] is a figure of speech in which the actual intent is expressed in words which carry the opposite meaning. [Term] is likely to be confused with sarcasm, but it differs from sarcasm in that it is usually lighter, less harsh in its wording, though in effect probably more cutting because of its indirectness. The ability to recognize [term] is one of the surer tests of intelligence and sophistication. Among the devices by which [term] is achieved are hyperbole and understatement.

lyric poem

any short poem that presents a single speaker who expresses thoughts and feelings. Love lyrics are common, but [term] have also been written on subjects as different as religion and reading. Sonnets and odes are [term].

malapropism

a literary device that involves using a word that sounds similar to the intended word but is incorrect in context. For example: "for all intensive purposes" instead of "for all intents and purposes."

narrative poem

a non-dramatic poem which tells a story or presents a narrative, whether simple or complex, long or short. Epics and ballads are examples of [term].

oxymoron

a form of paradox or juxtaposition that combines a pair of contrary terms into a single expression. This combination usually serves the purpose of shocking the reader into awareness. Examples include "wise fool," "jumbo shrimp," and "eloquent silence."

paradox

a situation or feeling that appears to be contradictory but on inspection turns out to be true or at least make sense. The following lines from one of John Donne's Holy Sonnets include [term]:
Take me to you, imprison me, for I
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

parallelism

a similar grammatical structure within a line or lines of poetry. [Term] is characteristic of Asian poetry, being notably present in the Psalms, and it seems to be the controlling principle of the poetry of Walt Whitman:
…Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them.
Till the bridge you will need be form'd, till the ductile anchor hold,
Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul.

parody

a creative work that imitates the style and manner of another work, often for comic effect.

pastoral poetry

a genre of poetry that focuses on the idealized life of shepherds and the connection between nature and human life.

pun

a play on words that are identical or similar in sound but have sharply diverse meanings. [Term] can have serious as well as humorous uses. An example is Thomas Hood's: "They went and told the sexton and the sexton tolled the bell."

sarcasm

a type of irony in which a person appears to be praising something but is actually insulting it. Its purpose is to hurt or injure.

satire

writing that seeks to arouse a reader's disapproval of an object by ridicule. [Term] is usually comedy that exposes errors with an eye to correct vice and folly. [Term] is often found in the poetry of Alexander Pope.

style

the mode of expression in language; the characteristic manner of expression of an author. Many elements contribute to [term], and if a question calls for a discussion of [term] or of "stylistic techniques," you can discuss diction, syntax, figurative language, imagery, selection of detail, sound effects, and tone, using the ones that are appropriate.

symbol

something that is simultaneously itself and a sign of something else. For example, winter, darkness, and cold are real things, but in literature they are also likely to be used as [term] of death.

syntax

the ordering of words into patterns or sentences. If a poet shifts words from the usual word order, you know you are dealing with an older style of poetry or a poet who wants to shift emphasis onto a particular word.

tercet

a stanza of three lines in which each line ends with the same rhyme.

terza rima

a three-line stanza rhymed ABA, BCB, CDC, etc. Dante's Divine Comedy is written in [term].