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Poetic Devices

This document defines and provides examples of various literary devices and poetic techniques including simile, metaphor, personification, irony, oxymoron, onomatopoeia, allusion, imagery, repetition, refrain, synecdoche, metonymy, pun, antithesis, paradox, assonance, consonance, apostrophe, anaphora and more. Each term is concisely defined and an example is given to illustrate how the device or technique is used.

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Komal Madhwani
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872 views7 pages

Poetic Devices

This document defines and provides examples of various literary devices and poetic techniques including simile, metaphor, personification, irony, oxymoron, onomatopoeia, allusion, imagery, repetition, refrain, synecdoche, metonymy, pun, antithesis, paradox, assonance, consonance, apostrophe, anaphora and more. Each term is concisely defined and an example is given to illustrate how the device or technique is used.

Uploaded by

Komal Madhwani
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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1.

Simile
2. Metaphor
3. Alliteration
4. Repetition
5. Personification
6. Pun
7. Antithesis
8. Onomatopoeia
9. Assonance
10. Oxymoron
11. Synecdoche
12. Apostrophe
13. Metonymy
14. Imagery
15. Hyperbole/overstatement
16. Consonance
17. Paradox
18. Allusion
19. Refrain
20. Anaphora
21.
22. Transfer Epithet
23. Symbolism
24. Irony
25. Allegory
26. Enjambment

Hyperbole

Hyperbole is an exaggerated statement that is we can use to stress some


strong feeling but not literally. For example,

I was so cold I saw polar bears dancing in the night sky.

Metaphor
The metaphor is used to describe a thing by mentioning some other
thing. Also, a metaphor is used when something is directly related to

the another, without drawing any line of distinction between them. For
example: She is a star.

Simile
One major difference between a simile and a metaphor is that in a
simile we describe two things as similar to each other. Whereas, in a
metaphor, two things are presented exactly as one. For example,

 His anger burnt like an insatiable fire.

Irony

One of the most commonly used poetic devices is irony. An ironical


statement induces a sarcastic effect. In other words, we can detect irony
when we write something that is contradictory to what is expected. For
example, A fire station burns down.

Oxymoron

An oxymoron is present if two completely opposite words are used in


conjunction. For example: Both the worlds have the same difference.

Onomatopoeia

Here, we take help of words to imitate sounds. For example, ‘tik-tok’ is


the sound of a clock, ‘the cow goes moo’ and so on.

Personification

In case of a personification, we give human-like abilities to an object.


Here non-living things are related to human attributes. For
example, The sky wept tears all night.
Allusion

We use an allusion to state a circumstance or object in order to


represent a given idea. For example, Abraham Lincoln is known for his
great leadership skills. This fact is used in the following allusive
statement- He is the Abraham Lincoln of our campaign.

 Enjambment: 
When a sentence continues into two or more lines in a poem
Examples of Enjambment are as follows –
1. Poem- ‘A legend of the Northland’
“They tell them a curious story
I don’t believe ‘tis true;
And yet you may learn a lesson
If I tell the tale to you.”
The sentence continues in the last two lines (And yet…… tale to you)
Imagery:

The creation of any sensory effect like visual, auditory, olfactory,


gustatory, tactile, kinesthetic, organic.( to create scenes in the poem)
Examples of imagery are as follows –

 Visual: appeals to sense of sight through description of color,


light, size, pattern, etc.
 Auditory: appeals to sense of hearing or sound by including
melodic sounds, silence, harsh noises, and even onomatopoeia.
 Gustatory: appeals to sense of taste through describing whether
something is sweet, salty, savoury, spicy, or sour.
 Tactile: appeals to sense of touch by describing how something
physically feels, such as its temperature, texture, or other
sensation.
 Olfactory: appeals to sense of smell by describing something’s
fragrance.
 Kinesthetics: appeals to a reader’s sense of motion or
movement through describing the sensations of moving or the
movements of an object.
 Organic: appeals to and communicates internal sensations,
feelings, and emotions, such as fatigue, thirst, fear, love,
loneliness, despair, etc.

 Repetition: Repetition involves repetition of words, phrases, syllables, or even


sounds in a full piece.

Example-
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion;
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

Refrain-  Refrain is repetition of usually a line, a phrase, two or three lines, or even
words in a poem. 
Examples of repetition are as follows –

And miles to go before I sleep,


And miles to go before I sleep.

 Synecdoc
he: It is a word or phrase in which a part of something is used to refer
to the whole of it.
Examples of synecdoche are as follows –
 Poem- Ozymandias
“The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed”
Here the word hand is used to refer to the sculptor who made the
statue of Ozymandias and heart is used to refer to King Ozymandias
who gave the right expression for the statue.

Transferred epithet: It is an adjective used with a noun refers to


another noun.

Example: "I had a wonderful day." The day is not in itself wonderful.
The speaker had a wonderful day. The epithet "wonderful" describes
the kind of day the speaker experienced.

Alliteration is the repetition of the same letter, or sound, at the


beginning of a string of connected words.
EXAMPLE
Though the winter was cold, a number of crafty crimson cats cuddled
on the covered porch.

Metonymy is a figure of speech in which an object or idea is


referred to by the name of something closely associated with it, as
opposed to by its own name. Metonymy involves a word or phrase
substituting or standing in for another word or phrase.

('Synecdoche' is when a part of something is used to refer to


the whole. 'Metonymy' is when something is used to represent
something related to it.)

Example: refers to the use of the name of one thing to represent


something related to it, such as crown to represent “king or
queen” or White House or Oval Office to represent “President.”

Pun

A pun is a literary device that is also known as a “play on words.”


Puns involve words with similar or identical sounds but with different
meanings. Their play on words also relies on a word or phrase having
more than one meaning. Puns are generally intended to be humorous.

Example: “Corduroy pillows are making headlines.” The word


“headlines” usually refers to something that is new and popular, but
this pun changes the meaning in that after having slept on a corduroy
pillow, a person would wake up with lines on their heads. 

Antithesis

Indicating when something or someone is in direct contrast or the


obverse of another thing or person.

Example: Spicy food is heaven on the tongue but hell in the tummy.

Paradox
A paradox is a rhetorical device that is made up of two opposite things and
seems impossible or untrue but is actually possible or true. A paradox can
also mean a person who does two things that seem to be opposite each
other, or who has opposite qualities. Finally, a paradox can be a statement
that seems to say two opposite things and yet is still true.

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

Assonance

Assonance most often refers to the repetition of vowel sounds in


words. For example,

 assonance within a word - crackerjack


 assonance within a phrase – friends until the end
 assonance within a sentence – "Hear the mellow wedding bells”
Consonance is defined as a pleasing sound caused by the repetition
of similar consonant sounds within groups of words or a literary
work. This repetition often occurs at the end of words, but may also
be found within words. When consonant sounds are repeated only at
the beginning of words, that is called alliteration rather than
consonance.

Example: Mike likes his new bike.

Apostrophe

As a literary device, an apostrophe is a poetic phrase or speech made


by a character that is addressed to a subject that is not literally present
in the literary work. The subject may be dead, absent, an
inanimate object, or even an abstract idea. 

For example, in John Donne’s poem “Death, be not proud,” the poet


addresses Death as if it is a living, present person:
Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou are not so;

By using apostrophe, the poet is able to share their thoughts and


feelings about death as an abstract idea by “speaking” to Death as if it
could hear or understand. In turn, this literary device also allows the
poet to share their innermost emotions and ideas about death with the
reader to create a greater impact.

Anaphora

Anaphora is a figure of speech in which words repeat at the


beginning of successive clauses, phrases, or sentences. For example,

In every cry of every Man,


In every infant's cry of fear,
In every voice, in every ban,

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