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Poetry Glossary

*Alliteration: the repetition at close intervals of the initial consonant sounds of accented syllables or important words (for example, map- moon; kill, code). 

Anapest: A metrical foot consisting of two unaccented syllables followed by one accented syllable (for example, understand).

*Anaphora: a rhetorical device that features the repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive sentences, phrases, or clauses. 

*Antithesis: a figure of speech in which an opposition or contrast of ideas is expressed by parallelism of words that are the opposites of, or strongly contrasted with, each other, such as “hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all sins.”

*Allusion: A brief and indirect reference to a person, place, thing or idea of historical, cultural, literary or political significance. It does not describe in detail the person or thing to which it refers. It is just a passing comment and the writer expects the reader to possess enough knowledge to spot the allusion and grasp its importance in a text.

For instance, you make a literary allusion the moment you say, “I do not approve of this quixotic idea.” Quixotic means stupid and impractical. It derived from Cervantes’s “Don Quixote”, a story of a foolish knight and his misadventures.

*Apostrophe: A figure of speech in which someone absent or dead or something nonhuman is addressed as if it were alive and present and could reply.

*Assonance: The repetition at close intervals of the vowel sounds of accented syllables or important words (for example, hat-ran-amber; vein-made).

*Ballad: A form of narrative verse, either poetic or musical, typically consisting of four-line stanzas. 

*Blank verse: Unrhymed iambic pentameter. This is the rhyme and meter of Shakespeare’s plays. 

*Connotation: What a word suggests beyond its basic definition; a word’s overtones.

*Consonance: The repetition at close intervals of the final consonant sounds of accented syllables or important words (for example, book-plaque-thicker).

*Couplet: Two successive lines, usually in the same meter, linked by rhyme.

Dactyl: A metrical foot consisting of one accented syllable followed by two unaccented syllables (for example, merrily).

*Denotation: The basic definition or dictionary meaning of a word.

*Diction: the use of words in oral or written discourse ( verbal expression). There are at least four levels of usage for words: the formal, the informal, the colloquial, and the slang. 

Dramatic monologue—a poem told by one speaker that reveals his character. “Ulysses” by Tennyson is a dramatic monologue. 

Lyric poem—short poem expressing emotion. A sonnet is a type of lyric. 

*End-stopped  line: a feature in poetry in which the syntactic unit (phrase, clause, or sentence) corresponds in length to the line. Its opposite is enjambment, where the sentence runs on into the next line.

*English (or Shakespearean) sonnet: A sonnet rhyming ababcdcdefefgg. Its content or structure ideally parallels the rhyme scheme, falling into three coordinate quatrains and a concluding couplet; but it is often structured, like the Italian sonnet, into octave and sestet, the principal break in thought coming at the end of the eighth line.

*Enjambment (in verse):  the continuation of a sentence without a pause beyond the end of a line, couplet, or stanza. Also called a run-on line.

*Figurative language: Language employing figures of speech; language that cannot be taken literally or only literally.

*Figure of Speech: Broadly, any way of saying something other than the ordinary way; more narrowly, in poetry, a way of saying one thing and meaning another.

*Foot: The basic unit used in scansion or measurement of metrical verse. A foot usually contains one accented syllable and one or two unaccented syllables (the spondaic foot is a modification of this principle).

Hexameter: A metrical line containing six feet.

*Hyperbole: extravagant and obviously exaggerated language or imagery

*Iamb: A metrical foot consisting of one  unaccented syllable followed by one accented syllable (for example, rehearse).

*Imagery: The representation through language of sense experience.

*Implied metaphor: A type of metaphor that compares two unlike things without mentioning one of them. For example, “Elise finally lured Adam into her web.”

*Irony: A situation, or a use of language, involving some kind of incongruity or discrepancy. Especially:

Verbal irony: A figure of speech in which what is meant is the opposite of what is said.

Dramatic irony: A device by which the author implies a different meaning from that intended by the speaker in a literary work.

Situational irony: Refers to circumstances that turn out to be the reverse of what is expected or considered appropriate. 

*Italian or Petrarchan sonnet: A sonnet consisting of an octave rhyming abbaabba and of a sestet using any arrangement of two or three additional rhymes, such as cdcdcd or cdecde.

*Metaphor: A figure of speech in which a comparison is made between two things that are essentially unlike. In metaphor the comparison is not expressed but is created when a figurative term is substituted for or identified with the literal term. 

*Metonymy: A figure of speech in which the something closely related is used for the thing actually meant, as in commonly used phrases such as “The White House announced today…”   (the name of the building is substituted for the president or the staff members who issued the announcement), or Wall Street is in a panic.   Other examples: “The crown” for “the monarch” ; “tongues” for “languages.” Expression: “The pen is mightier than the sword.” 

*Narrative poetry—a poem that tells a story. It can be long, such as an epic, or short, such as a ballad. 

*Onomatopoeia: The use of words that supposedly mimic their meaning in their sound (for example, boom, click, plop.

*Oxymoron: A compact paradox in which two successive words seemingly contradict each other. Examples: The book had a bittersweet ending; The had a love-hate relationship. 

*Paradox: A statement or situation containing apparently contradictory or incompatible elements.

*Parallelism: A verbal arrangement in which elements of equal weight within phrases, sentences, or paragraphs are expressed in a similar grammatical order and structure. 

*Paraphrase: A restatement of the content of a poem designed to make its prose meaning as clear as possible.

*Pentameter: A poetic line containing five metrical feet.

*Personification: A figure of speech in which human attributes are given to an animal, an object, or a concept.

*Quatrain: Four-line stanza, or a four-line division of a sonnet marked off by its rhyme scheme.

*Rhyme: The repetition of the accented vowel sound and all succeeding sounds in important or importantly positioned words (for example, old-cold; vane-reign; court-report; order-reorder). Rhyming words are words that sound the same when spoken; they don't necessarily have to be spelt the same.

*Rhyming Couplet:  is two lines of the same length that rhyme and complete one thought. There is no limit to the length of the lines. 

*Rhyme scheme: Any fixed pattern of rhymes characterizing a whole poem or its stanzas

*Satire: A kind of literature that ridicules human folly or vice with the ostensible purpose of brining about reform or of keeping others from falling into similar folly or vice.

*Scansion : The process of measuring metrical verse, that is, of marking accented and unaccented syllables, dividing the lines into feet, identifying the metrical pattern, and noting significant variations from that pattern.

Sarcasm:  Bitter or cutting speech; speech intended by its speaker to give pain to the person addressed.

*Simile:  A figure of speech in which an explicit comparison is made between two things essentially unlike. The comparison is made explicit by the use of some such word or phrase as like, as, or than. It is important to distinguish simile from comparison, in which the two things joined by “like” or “as” are dissimilar.

*Sonnet:  A fixed form of fourteen lines, normally iambic pentameter, with a rhyme scheme conforming to one of two main types—the Italian, or the English.

Spondee:  A metrical foot consisting of two syllables equally or almost equally accented 

*Stanza:  A group of lines whose metrical pattern (and usually rhyme scheme as well) is repeated  throughout the poem.

*Stress:  Syllables given more prominence in pronunciation than its neighbors is said to be accented. 

*Symbol:  A figure of speech in which something (object, person, situation, or action) means more than what it is. A symbol, in other words, may be read both literally and metaphorically.

*Synecdoche: A figure of speech in which the part is used for the whole. Example: “hands” for manual workers, “redhead” for red-headed person.

Tetrameter: A metrical line containing four feet

*Theme: The central idea of a literary work.

*Tone: The writer’s or speaker’s attitude toward the subject, the audience, or herself or himself; the emotional coloring of a work. 

*Trimeter: A metrical line containing three feet. 

Trochee: A metrical foot consisting of one accented syllable followed by one unaccented syllable (for example, barter)

*Understatement: A figure of speech that consists of saying less than one means, or of saying what one means with less for than the occasion warrants.

*Verse: Metrical language, the opposite of prose. 

Note:

Literarydevices.net gives excellent definitions and examples of many of these terms.