Literary Devices/Techniques
Student Name: _________________________Date: ___________ Period: ________
What we have learned so far:
Metaphor
Definition
A comparison between unlike items
Simile
A comparison between unlike items
using like or as
Personification
When an inanimate object is endowed
with human-like characteristics
Symbolism
A physical object that represents an idea
Imagery
Language that appeals to one of the five
senses
(visual, auditory, kinesthetic, olfactory,
gustatory)
A small, seemingly insignificant, detail
purposefully included by the author
Selection of
Detail
Allusion
Example
A references to a literary work, a famous
person, an historical event that is
outside of the text
(classical, biblical, pop-cultural)
Purposes of literary devices:
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


to emphasize a certain _______________________________ of a character or aspect of the ________________
to create a certain____________________
to create a certain _________________________
reveal a truth or a deeper level of __________________________________
Why do we have to know these? Well . . .
AP Prompt: The following selection is the opening of Ann Petry’s 1946 novel, The Street. Read the selection carefully and
then write an essay analyzing how Petry establishes Lutie Johnson’s relationship to the urban setting through the use of
such literary devices as imagery, personification, selection of detail, and figurative language.
Directions:
1) Read through the poem “The Pomegranate” by Eavan Boland and fill in the big question.
2) Then, use the poem “The Pomegranate” to fill in the chart below.
Evidence
“The Pomegranate”
The title itself!
Analysis:
The author utilizes/employs/includes ____________________ in order to/to convey a sense
of/to create/to emphasize . . . .
“As a child in exile in/
a city of fogs and
strange consonants” (89)
“I climb the stairs and
stand where I can see
my child asleep beside
her teen magazines,/
her can of Coke, her
plate of uncut fruit”
(26-28)
The rain is cold. The
road is flint-coloured./
The suburb has cars
and cable television.
(43-44).
“She will hold
the papery flushed skin
in her hand” (52-53).
Choose your own
evidence!
What literary device or devices does by Eavan Boland use repeatedly? In other words, if you had to settle on one literary
device to write a WHOLE essay on from the poem above, what would you choose and why?
The Pomegranate
by Eavan Boland
The only legend I have ever loved is
the story of a daughter lost in hell.
And found and rescued there.
Love and blackmail are the gist of it.
Ceres and Persephone the names. (5)
And the best thing about the legend is
I can enter it anywhere. And have.
As a child in exile in
a city of fogs and strange consonants,
I read it first and at first I was (10)
an exiled child in the crackling dusk of
the underworld, the stars blighted. Later
I walked out in a summer twilight
searching for my daughter at bed-time.
When she came running I was ready (15)
to make any bargain to keep her.
I carried her back past whitebeams
and wasps and honey-scented buddleias.
But I was Ceres then and I knew
winter was in store for every leaf (20)
on every tree on that road.
Was inescapable for each one we passed.
And for me.
It is winter
and the stars are hidden. (25)
I climb the stairs and stand where I can see
my child asleep beside her teen magazines,
her can of Coke, her plate of uncut fruit.
The pomegranate! How did I forget it?
She could have come home and been safe (30)
and ended the story and all
our heart-broken searching but she reached
out a hand and plucked a pomegranate.
She put out her hand and pulled down
the French sound for apple and (35)
the noise of stone and the proof
that even in the place of death,
at the heart of legend, in the midst
of rocks full of unshed tears
ready to be diamonds by the time (40)
the story was told, a child can be
hungry. I could warn her. There is still a chance.
The rain is cold. The road is flint-coloured.
The suburb has cars and cable television.
1
2
an opening made by splitting, cleaving; a crack
to postpone or put off
The veiled stars are above ground. (45)
It is another world. But what else
can a mother give her daughter but such
beautiful rifts1 in time?
If I defer2 the grief I will diminish the gift.
The legend will be hers as well as mine. (50)
She will enter it. As I have.
She will wake up. She will hold
the papery flushed skin in her hand.
And to her lips. I will say nothing.