Poetic and Literary Devices

Adnomination

Repetition of words with the same root, differing by a sound or letter.
Creates euphony.
Examples:
- “Nobody loves no one.” (Chris Isaak)
- “Someone, somewhere, wants something.”

Allegory

Representation of ideas through forms like characters or events.
Conveys hidden meanings via symbolic figures, actions, and imagery.
Example: Animal Farm by George Orwell, representing the Russian Revolution.
- Characters symbolize working/upper classes, military, and political leaders.

Alliteration

Repetition of the initial consonant sound in a series of words.
Examples:
- A lazy lying lion.
- Peter picked a peck of pickled peppers.
- Sally sells seashells by the seashore.

Allusion

Reference to a myth, character, literary work, art, or event.
Example: “I feel like I’m going down the rabbit hole” (allusion to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland).

Anaphora

Repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses or sentences for emphasis.
Example: Martin Luther King's "Let freedom ring" speech.
- “Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania. Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado. Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.”
Opposite: Epiphora – repetition at the end of sentences.
- Example: “And that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.” (Abraham Lincoln)

Antithesis

Emphasizing contrast between two things or characters.
Example: “Love is an ideal thing, marriage a real thing; a confusion of the real with the ideal never goes unpunished.” (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)

Apostrophe

Directed speech to someone not present or to an object.
Example: “Work on, my medicine, work! Thus credulous fools are caught.” (William Shakespeare)

Assonance

Repetition of vowel sounds to create internal rhyming.
Example: “Hear the mellow wedding bells.” (Edgar Allan Poe)
Related: Consonance – repetition of consonant sounds.

Cataphora

Mentioning someone or something, followed by a more specific reference later in the text.
Examples:
- I met him yesterday, your boyfriend who was wearing the cool hat.
- If you want some, here's some cheese.
- After he had received his orders, the soldier left the barracks.

Climax

Arranging text to gradually increase tension.
Example: He was a not bad listener, a good speaker and an amazing performer.
Opposite: Anticlimax – tension decreases.

Charactonym (or Speaking Name)

Giving fictional characters names that describe them.
Example: Scrooge, Snow White.

Ellipsis

Omission of a word or phrase.
Example: I speak lots of languages, but you only speak two (languages).

Euphemism

Replacing offensive words with lighter equivalents.
Example: Visually challenged (blind); meet one’s maker (die).
Opposite: Dysphemism – replacing a neutral word with a harsher one.

Epigram

Memorable and brief saying, often satirical.
Example: “For most of history, Anonymous was a woman.” (Virginia Woolf)

Hyperbole

Exaggeration of a statement.
Example: If I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a thousand times.
Opposite: Litotes – understatement.

Hypophora

Asking a question and answering it immediately.
Example: Are you going to leave now? I don’t think so.

Irony

Three types:
- Verbal (Antiphrasis) – expressing something different from the literal meaning.
  - Example: ”I’m so excited to burn the midnight oil and write my academic paper all week long”.
- Situational – outcome differs from expectation.
  - Example: Bruce Robertson in Filth is a corrupt policeman.
- Dramatic – audience knows something the character doesn't.
  - Example: Audience knows characters will be killed, but characters are oblivious.

Merism

Describing something by enumerating its traits.
Example: Lock, stock, and barrel (gun); heart and soul (entirety).

Metalepsis

Referencing one thing through something related to it.
Example: “Stop judging people so strictly—you live in a glass house too.” (referencing the proverb about glass houses and throwing stones).

Metaphor

Comparing two different things with shared characteristics.
Example: “Love is clockworks and cold steel.” (U2)

Metonymy

Giving something a name associated with it.
Example: The heir to the crown was Richard. (the crown stands for authority)

Onomatopoeia

Imitating sounds in writing.
Example: oink, ticktock, tweet tweet

Oxymoron

Combining contradictory traits.
Example: Living dead; terribly good; real magic

Parallelism

Arranging a sentence with a parallel structure.
Example: “Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I may remember. Involve me and I will learn.” (Benjamin Franklin)
Opposite: Chiasmus – inverted parallelism.
- Examples: “To stop, too fearful, and too faint to go.” (Oliver Goldsmith); “My job is not to represent Washington to you but to represent you to Washington.” (Barack Obama)

Parenthesis

Interrupting a sentence with extra information in brackets, commas, or dashes.
Example: Our family (my mother, sister, and grandfather) had a barbeque this past weekend.

Personification

Giving human characteristics to nonhumans.
Example: Animals in fairy tales acting like humans.

Pun

Wordplay, including:
- Antanaclasis – repetition of a word with different meanings.
  - Example: “Cats like Felix like Felix” (“Felix” catfood slogan).
- Malapropism – using an incorrect word with a similar sound.
  - Example: “optical delusion” instead of “optical illusion”.
- Paradox – self-contradictory statement that can be partially true.
  - Example: “I can resist anything but temptation.”—Oscar Wilde.
- Paraprosdokian – sentence with an unexpected ending.
  - Example: You’re never too old to learn something stupid.
- Polyptoton – repetition of words with the same root.
  - Example: “The things you own end up owning you.”—Chuck Palahniuk.

Rhetorical Question

Questioning without expecting an answer.
Example: Why not? Are you kidding me?

Simile

Direct comparison using "like" or "as".
Example: “Your heart is like an ocean, mysterious and dark.” (Bob Dylan)

Synecdoche

Generalization or specification based on a part/trait of an object.
Example: He just got new wheels. (car)

Tautology

Saying the same thing twice in different ways.
Example: First priority; I personally; repeat again

Zeugma (or Syllepsis)

Applying a word to multiple other words in a sentence to give different meanings.
Example: Give neither counsel nor salt till you are asked for it.