Literary Terms (Poetry)

Rhythm

 The regular recurrence of sounds: is at the heart of all natural phenomena: the beating of the heart, the lapping of the waves against the shore, the croaking of the frogs on a summer's night...etc. 

What you need to know is that the repetition of words and phrases can create rhythm. 

Poetic Rhythm 

Poetic rhythm is the repetition of stresses and pauses. 

Rhythm helps establish a poem's mood and in combination with other poetic elements, it conveys the poet's emphasis and helps communicate the poem's meaning.

Poetic rhythm is created by meter which is the recurrence of regular units of stressed and unstressed syllables.  

Stress

It occurs when one syllable is emphasized more than another, unstressed syllable. 

The basic unit of a meter is a FOOT. 

Foot : a group of syllables with a fixed pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables. 

The most common types of metrical feet in English and American verse are the following: 

 Foot Stress

Pattern Example

Iamb  ~ I page 430

Trochee I ~ page 430

Anapest ~~I page 430

A metric line of poetry is measured by the number of feet it contains:     monometer : one foot

    diameter: two feet        trimeter: three feet

    tetrameter: four feet

    pentameter: five feet

The most common foot in English is the Iamb occurring in lines of three or five feet: Examples on page 431

Euphony and Cacophony

Euphony : an effect pleasing to the ear. (Soft sounds) 

"Did he who made the Lamb make thee?"

Cacophony: A jarring discordant effect "The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!"

Alliteration 

It is the repetition of consonant sounds in consecutive or neighboring words - usually at the beginning of words. 

This device is used to enhance sound in the poem. 

"So your chimney's I sweep, and in soot I sleep,"

Assonance 

Assonance is the repetition of the same or similar vowel sounds, especially in stressed syllables. This device can also enrich a poem. 

"Many a morning on the moorland did we hear the copses ring[...]"

"Fleet feet sweep by sleeping geese." 

Rhyme

In addition to alliteration and assonance, poets create sound patterns with RHYME. 

Rhyme is the use of matching sounds in two or more words : "tight" and "might"; "born" and "horn"; "sleep and "deep". 

Perfect Rhyme: final vowel and consonant sounds must be the same, as they are in each of the preceding examples. 

Imperfect Rhyme : occurs when the final consonant sounds in two words are the same but vowel sounds are different. "Learn/ barn"  /  "pads/ lids". 

Rhyme can also be classified according to the position of the rhyming syllables in a line of verse. 

End Rhyme: occurs at the end of a line "Tyger! Tyger! burning brightIn the forest of the night." 

Internal Rhyme: occurs within a line "The sun came up upon the left,Out of the sea came he!And he shone bright and on the right Went down into the sea." 

 

Beginning Rhyme: occurs at the beginning of a line:Red River, red river,Slow flow heat is silenceNo will is still as a riverStill. Will heat move. " 

Heroic Couplets

Paired iambic pentameter lines with a ryhme scheme of aa, bb, cc, dd. 

"Honour and shame from no condition rise; Act well your part, there all the honour lies." 

Form 

The form of a literary work is its structure or shape, the way its parts fit together to form a whole.

Closed form: (Fixed Form) A closed form poem has looks symmetrical; it has an identifiable, repeated pattern, with lines of similar length arranged in groups of two, three, four, or more. (Sonnet) 

Open form: (Free Verse) An open form poem has varying line length within a poem, breaking lines in unexpected places and even abandoning any semblance of formal structure. 

Blank Verse 

Blank verse is unrhymed poetry with each line written in a set pattern of five stressed and five unstressed syllables called imabic pentameter. 

Stanza

A stanza is a group of two or more lines with the same metrical pattern-- and often with a regular rhyme scheme as well-- separated by blank space from other such groups of lines. The stanza groups related thoughts into units. 

A two line stanza with rhyming lines of similar length and meter is called a COUPLET. 

A three line stanza with lines of similar length and set rhyme scheme is called a tercet. 

A four line stanza with lines of similar length and a set rhyme scheme is called quatrain. 

The Sonnet 

The sonnet is a fourteen line poem with a distictive rhyme scheme and metrical pattern. The Shakespearean sonnet which consists of fourteen lines divided by into three quatrains and a concluding couplet, is written in iambic pentameter and follows the rhyme scheme abab cdcd efef gg,  

Concrete Poetry 

Concrete poetry uses words- and, sometimes, different fonts and type sizes- to shape a picture on the page. 

The form of a concrete poem is not something that emerges from the poem's words and images, but rather something predetermined by the visual image the poet has decided to create. 

Symbol, Allegory, Allusion and Myth 

A symbol is an idea or image that suggests something else. A symbol is an image that transcends its literal,or denotative, meaning in a complex way. 

Conventional symbols are those recognized by people, who share certain cultural and social assumptions. 

Universal symbols are those likely to be recognized by people regardless of their culture. 

Archetypes: Carl Jung sought to explain the theory of archetypes, which held that certain images or ideas reside in the subconscious of all people. Archetypal or universal symbols include  water, symbolizing; spring, symbolizing growth; and winter, symbolizing death.  

Allegory 

Allegory is a form of narrative that conveys a message or doctrine by using people, places, or things to stand for abstract ideas. 

Allegorical figures, each with a strict equivalent, form an allegorical framework, a set of ideas that conveys the allegorical message or lesson. 

Allegory takes place on two levels:1  a literal level that tells a story 2 a figurative level where allegorical figures in the story stand for ideas, concepts and other qualities. 

Within an allegory everything can have meaning. Quite often an allegory invokes a journey or an adventure. 

Difference Between Allegory and Symbol Allegorical figures can always be assigned specific meaning. 

Symbols open up possibilities for interpretation. 

Allusion 

An Allusion is a brief reference to a person, place, or event (fictional or actual) that readers are expected to recognize. Like symbols and allegories, allusions enrich a work by introducing associations and attitudes from other context. 

When a poet uses allusions, they assume that they and their readers have common body of knowledge. 

Myth 

A myth is a narrative that embodies--and in some cases helps to explain --the religious, philosophical, moral and political values of a culture. 

In the broadest sense, myths are stories-- usually whole groups of stories-- that can be true or partly true as well as false; regardless of their degree of a culture. 

Myths after all, attempt to explain phenomena that human beings care about regardless of when and where they live. 

When poets use myths they are actually making allusions. They expect readers to bring to the poem the cultural, emotional and ethical context of the myths top which they are alluding. 

 Sometimes a poet will allude to a myth in a title; sometimes references to various myths will appear, throughout a poem; at other times, an entire poem will focus on a single myth. 

Poems 

"Theme for English B"   By Langston Huges "I ,Too, Sing America" By Langston Hughes 

Sonnet 29 By William Shakespeare 

"The Chimney Sweeper" By William Blake 

"The Road not Taken" By Robert Frost