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“Literary Lenses” The Literary Devices
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Alliteration the repetition of usually initial consonant sounds in two or more neighboring words or syllables (as wild and woolly, threatening throngs) —called also initial rhyme
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Allusion an implied or indirect reference especially in literature; also : the use of such references the act of alluding to or hinting at something Ex: The lyrics contain biblical allusions.
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Apostrophe the addressing of a usually absent person or a usually personified thing rhetorically Ex:“O Liberty, what things are done in thy name!” is an example of apostrophe
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Anaphora “Some say the world will end in fire, some say in ice” ~Robert Frost “I have been one acquainted with the night. I have walked out in rain -- and back in rain. I have outwalked the furthest city light. I have looked down the saddest city lane. I have passed by the watchman on his beat And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain” ~Robert Frost
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Aside an utterance meant to be inaudible to someone; especially : an actor's speech heard by the audience but supposedly not by other characters
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Assonance repetition of vowels without repetition of consonants
Ex: (as in stony and holy)
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Catalogue A list
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Conceit An extended comparison involving unlikely metaphors, similes, imagery, hyperbole, and oxymora. One of the most famous conceits is John Donne's "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning," a poem in which Donne compares two souls in love to the points on a geometer's compass. Shakespeare also uses conceits regularly in his poetry.
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Consonance recurrence or repetition of consonants especially at the end of stressed syllables without the similar correspondence of vowels Ex: (as in the final sounds of “stroke” and “luck”)
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Dramatic Irony in literature, a plot device in which the audience’s or reader’s knowledge of events or individuals surpasses that of the characters. The words and actions of the characters therefore take on a different meaning for the audience or reader than they have for the play’s characters. This may happen when, for example, a character reacts in an inappropriate or foolish way or when a character lacks self-awareness and thus acts under false assumptions.
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Epistrophe “The moth and the fish eggs are in their place, The bright suns I see and the dark suns I cannot see are in their place, The palpable is in its place and the impalpable is in its place.” ~Walt Whitman “But the olives were not blind to Him, The little gray leaves were kind to Him: The thorn-tree had a mind to Him When into the woods He came.” ~Sidney Lanier
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Foreshadowing to represent, indicate, or typify beforehand; a hint of what is to come in the story
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Imagery Word or phrases that appeal to the five senses
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Simile: Sam is as hungry as a bear.
Metaphor: When Sam is hungry, he’s a real bear. Metaphor a figure of speech in which a word or phrase literally denoting one kind of object or idea is used in place of another to suggest a likeness or analogy between them; does not use like or as Ex:“He was drowning in paperwork” is a metaphor in which having to deal with a lot of paperwork is being compared to drowning in an ocean of water.
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Onomatopoeia the naming of a thing or action by a vocal imitation of the sound associated with it Ex: buzz, hiss
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Oxymoron a combination of contradictory or incongruous words
Ex: cruel kindness
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Parallelism Similarity of structure in a pair or series of related words, phrases, or clauses. Also called parallel structure. “O well for the fisherman's boy, That he shouts with his sister at play! O well for the sailor lad, That he sings in his boat on the bay!" (Alfred Lord Tennyson, "Break, Break, Break," 1842)
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Personification representation of a thing or abstraction as a person or by the human form Ex: The curtains batted their eyelashes.
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Pun Pun (also called paronomasia) - a play on words or the humorous use of a word emphasizing a different meaning or application. They have been called by some “the lowest form of humor.” The term comes from combining two Greek words: para, meaning “beside,” and onomasia, meaning “naming.” There is a famous pun uttered by Mercutio as he is dying in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.
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Simile A figure of speech in which two fundamentally unlike things are explicitly compared, usually in a phrase introduced by like or as Ex: She was as white as snow
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Sonnet A 14-line verse form usually having one of several conventional rhyme schemes, ends with a couplet Ex: The Prologue in Romeo and Juliet
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Soliloquy A soliloquy is a speech in which a character; alone on stage, expresses his or her thoughts to the audience.
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Monologue Similar to a soliloquy is a monologue, which is a lengthy speech. Unlike a soliloquy, however, a monologue is addressed to other characters, not to the audience.
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Mark Antony really means that Brutus is dishonourable
Verbal Irony A contradiction of expectation between what is said and what is meant Verbal irony is implied and refers to spoken words only EX: Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare "Yet Brutus says he was ambitious; And Brutus is an honourable man". Mark Antony really means that Brutus is dishonourable
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