Review
• Musical Devices
Repetition of Sounds
• Alliteration
• Assonance
• Onomatopoeia
Alliteration
• The repetition of a sound in the initial
position of various words, or of a
consonant sound within the words.
• In the first of the stanza just quoted from
“The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”, note
the intertwining of several alliterative
sequences involving f, b, w, and s
Alliteration
• The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew
The furrow followed free;
We were the first that ever burst
Into that silent sea
This heavy use of alliteration coincides with the
use of internal rhyme to impart great intensity to
the lines.
Assonance
• When the writer varies the surrounding
consonant sounds, but repeats vowel
sounds, the device is known as assonance
• Although assonance is used as frequently
as alliteration, its effects are more subtle.
Assonance
• The reader is likely to be immediately
aware of this additional means of
distributing emphasis or imparting
emotional tone:
Cold eyelids that hide like a jewel
Hard eyes that grow soft for an hour
Onomatopoeia
• Onomatopoeia is the imitation of natural
sounds in the sounds of words.
• Many common words, such as “hum” or
“clatter” or “moo” sound somewhat like the
sounds they name
Onomatopoeia
• Eventhough some sounds of words do not
refer to natural sounds, they may
contribute an onomatopoetic effect.
• In the following passage from Tennyson’s
“Morte d’Arthur” all of these elements
combine to imitate the sound of a knight in
armor striding over rocky ground:
Onomatopoeia
• Dry clashed his harness in the icy caves
And barren chasms, and all to left and right
The bare black cliff clanged round him, as he
based
His feet on juts of slippery crag that rang
Sharp-smitten with the dint of armed heels
Onomatopoeia
• It should be noted, of course, that this
effect, like the others we have discussed,
will operate only if the sense of the
passage reinforces and is reinforced by
the sound devices