TeRmInOLoGy1
PoEtRy
Poetry is … the best words in their best order. -- Coleridge
Poetry is to prose as dancing is to walking. – John Wain
Poetry is nothing but healthy speech. – Thoreau
Between what I see and what I say,
between what I say and what I keep silent,
between what I keep silent and what I dream,
between what I dream and what I forget:
poetry
--Octavio Paz
1. Allegory: description usually restricted to a single meaning because its events,
actions, characters, settings, and objects represent specific abstractions or ideas.
The emphasis tends to be on what they ultimately mean. For example, characters
named Hope, Pride, Peace, etc. are allegorical figures.
2. Alliteration: the repetition of the same consonant sounds at the beginnings of
nearby words. Based on sound rather than spelling. For example, "luscious
lemons" or "keen and capable." Sometimes the term is used to describe the
consonant sounds within words as well. For example, "wedded lady" or
"trespasser’s reproach."
3. Allusion: a brief reference to a person, place, thing, event, or idea in history or
literature. Allusive words are suggestive and economical. Used to conjure up
biblical authority, scenes from Shakespeare’s plays, historic figures, wars, great
love stories, and anything else that might deepen and enrich their own works.
4. Ambiguity: allows for two or more simultaneous interpretations of a word,
phrase, action, or situation, all of which can be supported by the context of a
work. Deliberate ambiguity can contribute to the effectiveness and richness of a
work.
5. Apostrophe: an address either to someone who is absent and therefore cannot
hear the speaker or to something non-human that cannot comprehend. For
example, Edgar Allen Poe writes "O Helen!" when Helen is a mythological
character.
6. Assonance: repetition of the same vowel sound in nearby words. For example,
"asleep under a tree," "each evening," or "time and tide."
7. Cacophony or dissonance: "bad sound." Language that is discordant and
difficult to pronounce. For example: "never my numb plunker fumbles." It may be
unintentional or used for deliberate effect.
1
adapted from online and other sources including:
http://faculty.winthrop.edu/reynoldsm/engl200/poetry%20genre%20terminology.htm
2
8. Colloquialism: informal diction that reflects casual, conversational language and
often includes slang expressions.
9. Connotations: associations and implications that go beyond a word’s literal
meanings. Derive resonance and power from a person’s experiences with a word.
For example, take the word "bird":
denotation—a feathered animal with wings
connotation—fragility, vulnerability, altitude, the sky, freedom, etc., depending
on the context of the word and the experiences of the reader.
10. Denotations: the literal, dictionary meanings of words.
11. Dialect: spoken by definable groups of people from a particular geographic
region, economic group, or social class. Used to contrast and express differences
in educational, class, social, and regional backgrounds.
12. Diction: a writer’s choice of words, phrases, sentence structures, and figurative
language.
13. Euphony: "good sound." Refers to language that is smooth and musically
pleasant to the ear.
Extended metaphor: a sustained comparison in which part or all of the poem
consists of a series of related metaphors.
14. Imagery/image: a word, phrase, or figure of speech (especially a simile or
metaphor) that addresses the senses, suggesting mental pictures of sights, sounds,
smells, tastes, and textures. Images offer sensory impressions to the reader and
also convey emotions and moods through their verbal pictures.
15. Irony: literary device that uses contradictory statements or situations to reveal a
reality different from what appears to be true.
a. Verbal irony: when you say one thing and mean the opposite.
b. Sarcasm: strong form of verbal irony calculated to hurt someone.
c. Dramatic irony: the difference between what a character says or believes
and what a reader knows to be true.
d. Situation irony: A discrepancy exists between what appears to be and
what actually happens in reality; the opposite of what should, ought,
would be expected.
16. Jargon: category of language defined by a trade or profession.
17. Metaphor: a figure of speech that makes a comparison between two unlike
things, without using "like" or "as."
18. Metonymy: when something closely associated with a subject or object is
substituted for it. For example, people refer to the king as "the crown" or to
motion pictures as "the silver screen.
19. Onomatopoeia: the use of a word that resembles the sound it denotes. For
example, "hiss," "buzz," "choo-choo." In a broader sense, the term refers to lines
or passages in which sounds help to convey meanings. For example: John Updike
"Player Piano." My stick fingers click with a snicker/ And, chuckling, they
knuckle the keys.
20. Overstatement/hyperbole: a boldly exaggerated statement that adds emphasis
without intending to be literally true. It can be used for serious, comic, or ironic
effect. For example, "He ate everything in the house" is obviously exaggerated,
but it is also effective use of hyperbole.
3
21. Oxymoron: condensed form of paradox in which two contradictory words are
used together. For example, "silent scream" or "Microsoft Works," etc.
22. Paradox: statement that initially appears to be contradictory but then, on closer
inspection, turns out to make sense. Useful in poetry because it arrests the reader
with its seemingly stubborn refusal to make sense. For example, "The pen is
mightier than the sword." It seems contradictory, until you think that, sometimes,
as in the case of persuading people or getting an idea across, the pen (the written
word) does work better than the sword (brute force).
23. Personification: when human characteristics are attributed to non-human things.
For example, "the cat wept with joy"—cats cannot weep with joy; that’s a human
embodiment.
24. Poetic diction: refers to the way poets sometimes employ an elevated diction that
deviates significantly from the common speech and writing of their time.
25. POETIC FORMS -- Form: a poem’s overall structure or shape.
26. Poetic Forms -- Fixed Form: a poem that can be categorized by the patterns of
its lines, meter, rhymes, and stanzas (follows a prescribed model, though
variations on traditional forms are allowed).
a. Stanza: The shape is often determined by the ways the lines are
grouped/organised into stanzas: a grouping of lines, set off by a space,
that usually has a set pattern of metre and rhyme. This pattern is ordinarily
repeated in other stanzas throughout the poem. Traditionally, stanzas share
a common rhyme scheme: pattern of end rhymes. Designated with
lowercase letters. For example:
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.
a
a
b
b
Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.
c
c
d
d
b. Couplet: consists of two lines that usually rhyme and have the same
meter.
c. Heroic Couplet: two lines of rhymed iambic pentameter.
d. Tercet: three-line stanza.
e. Triplet: three lines that rhyme.
f. Terza Rima: an interlocking three-line rhyme scheme. For example: aba,
bcb, cdc, ded, etc.
g. Quatrain: four-line stanza (the most common stanzaic form in the English
language). The most common rhyme schemes: aabb, abba, aaba, or abcb.
h. Ballad stanza: consists of alternating eight and six syllable lines (it
usually has an abcb rhyme scheme).
4
i. Sonnet: consists of fourteen lines, usually iambic pentameter. Two basic
types:
1. Italian/Petrarchan: poem divides into two parts. First eight
lines (octave) usually rhyme abba abba. The final six lines
(sestet) may rhyme cdecde, cdcdcd, or cdccdc. Often, the octave
presents a situation, attitude, or problem that the sestet comments
upon or resolves.
2. English/Shakespearean: organised into three quatrains and a
couplet. Usually rhymes abab cdcd efef gg. It has more
flexibility about where thematic breaks can occur. Sometimes the
three quatrains set up the situation and the couplet reverses the
situation.
j. Villanelle: nineteen lines of any length divided into six stanzas—five
tercets and a concluding quatrain. Rhyme scheme: aba aba aba aba aba aba
abaa.
k. Sestina: consists of 39 lines of any length divided into six six-line stanzas
and a three-line concluding stanza (the envoy). The six words at the ends
of the first stanza’s six lines must then appear at the ends of the lines of
each of the other five stanzas (though the order of those six words may
change). Those six words must also appear in the envoy.
l. Epigram: a brief, pointed, and witty poem. Often (but not required to)
appear in couplets.
m. Dramatic Monologue: usually a conversation, speech or monologue
given by a solitary character or speaker to a silent audience (it’s roots are
in the soliloquy). No fixed pattern of lines and stanzas, but the subject
matter makes it a fixed form.
n. Limerick: always light and humorous. The usual form—five
predominantly anapestic lines rhyming aabba. Lines 1, 2, and 5 contain
three feet. Lines 3 and 4 contain two feet.
o. Lyric Poems: personal poem expressing thoughts and feelings of a single
speaker (usually short, first person, subjective and full of emotion and
imagination)
p. Haiku: usually consists of seventeen syllables organized into three
unrhymed lines of 5, 7, 5 syllables. Typically involves an intense emotion
or vivid image of Nature.
q. Elegy: a lyric poem written to commemorate someone who is dead or a
serious meditative poem produced to express the speaker’s melancholy
thoughts. No fixed pattern of lines and stanzas, but the subject matter
makes it a fixed form.
r. Ode: characterized by a serious topic and formal tone, but no prescribed
formal pattern. Lengthy lyrics that often include lofty emotions conveyed
by a dignified style often praising someone or something (topics usually
include truth, art, freedom, justice, the meaning of life). Speakers often
employ apostrophe.
s. Narrative poem: a poem that tells a story. May be short or long, and the
story can be simple or complex.
5
t. Epic: a long narrative poem, told in a formal, elevated style, that focuses
on a serious subject and chronicles heroic deeds and events important to a
culture or nation.
u. Literary Ballad: narrative poem written in deliberate imitation of the
language, form, and spirit of the traditional ballad (dramatic, repetitive,
condensed, and impersonal narratives, little commentary or moralizing
about feelings).
27. POETIC FORM – Open Form or Free Verse. It does not conform to established
patterns of meter, rhyme, and stanza. Derives its rhythmic qualities from the
repetition of words, phrases, or grammatical structures, the arrangement of words
on the printed page, or by some other means.
a. Concrete Poetry or Picture Poem: the lines of the poem are arranged to
create a particular shape on the page; the shape of the poem embodies its
subject. The poem becomes a picture of what the poem is describing.
b. Disc Poetry or Songs– lyrical poetic songs on radio, CDs, records,
cassettes, etc.
c. Imagist Poetry or Imagism: a literary movement of early 20th-century
U.S. (led by Ezra Pound and William Carlos Williams) and English poets
that sought to modernise poetic language by the use of ordinary language,
free verse, and precise everyday imagery.
d. Parody: a humorous imitation of another, usually serious, work. It can
take any fixed or open form because it imitates the tone, language, and
shape of the original.
e. Found Poem: an unintentional poem found in a non-poetic context, like
conversation, news stories, or advertisement.
f. Prose Poem: printed as prose and represents the most clear opposite of
fixed form poetry. Densely compact and often makes use of striking
imagery and figures of speech.
28. Prosody: the study of the mechanics of versification of poetry (stanza, metre and
rhyme patterns)
29. Puns: play on words that relies on a word having more than one meaning or
sounding like another word. For example, "a fad is in one era, out the other."
30. RHYME: Rhyme is the way of creating sound patterns. Consists of two or more
words or phrases that repeat the same sounds.
a. Eye Rhyme: the spellings of words are similar, but the words do not
rhyme. For example, "bough" and "cough" or "brow" and "blow."
b. Perfect or Exact Rhyme: rhymes that share the same stressed vowel
sounds as well as any sounds that follow the vowel.
c. End Rhyme: rhyme that comes at the end of lines. For example:
It runs through the reeds,
And away it proceeds,
Through meadow and glade,
In sun and in shade.
d. internal rhyme: places at least one of the rhymed words within the line.
For example: "Dividing and gliding and sliding" or "In mist or cloud, on
mast or shroud."
6
e. Masculine Rhyme: describes the rhyming of single-syllable words. For
example, "grade" and "shade." It also occurs with rhyming words of more
than one syllable, when the same sound occurs in the final stressed
syllable. For example, "defend" and "contend" or "betray and convey."
f. Feminine Rhyme: consists of a rhymed stressed syllable followed by one
or more identical unstressed syllables. For example, "butter" and "clutter,"
"gratitude" and "attitude," or "quivering" and "shivering."
g. Slant (Approximate or Imperfect) Rhyme: where the wounds are almost
alike, but not exactly alike.
h. Consonance: identical consonant sound preceded by a different vowel
sound. For example, "home" and "some," "worth" and "breath," or
"trophy" and "daffy." It also means using different vowel sounds with
identical consonant sounds. For example, "sound" and "sand," "kind" and
"conned," or "fellow" and "fallow."
Example:
31. RHYTHM: Rhythm refers to the beat sounds of words, or, more specifically,
the recurrence of stressed and unstressed sounds. Depending on how the sounds
are arranged, this can result in a pace that is fast or slow, choppy or smooth. Poets
use rhythm to create pleasurable sound patterns and to reinforce meaning. Some
rhythm can be created through repetition of words and phrases, but typically,
rhythm is created through the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables.
a. Scansion: the process of dividing poetry into metric feet.
b. Stress/Accent: places more emphasis on one syllable of a word than on
another. For example, we say "syllable" rather than "syllable," or
"emphasis" rather than "emphasis."
c. Metre: when rhythmic patterns of stresses occur in a poem.
d. Rising Metre: refers to metrical feet which move from unstressed to
stressed sounds. For example, iambic and anapestic.
e. Falling Metre: refers to metrical feet which move from stressed to
unstressed sounds. For example, trochaic and dactylic.
f. Foot: the metrical unit by which a line of poetry is measured. A foot
usually consists of one stressed and one or two unstressed syllables. Can
occur in a number of patterns: Iamb (- /) – away, Trochee (/ -) – lovely,
Anapest (- - /) – understand, Dactyl (/ - -) – desperate, Spondee (/ /) – dead
set, Pyrric (- -) – for the. Lines can then be made of these feet: Iambic:
What kept his eyes from giving back the gaze.
Trochaic: H e w a s l o u d e r t h a n t h e p r e a c h e r . Anapestic: I
a m c a l l e d t o t h e f r o n t o f t h e r o o m . Dactylic: S i n g
i t a l l m e r r i l y . The spondee ( ⁄ ⁄ ) is not used regularly. It appears
for variety or emphasis. Spondee: D e a d s e t a g a i n s t t h e p l a n
he went away.
g. Line: Measured by the number of feet it contains.
1. Monometer: 1 foot
2. Dimeter: 2 feet
3. Trimeter: 3 feet
4. Tetrameter: 4 feet
7
5. Pentameter: 5 feet
6. Hexameter: 6 feet
7. Heptameter: 7 feet
8. Octameter: 8 feet
h. You combine the name of a line length with the name of a foot to describe
a line’s metrical qualities. I d i d n ’ t w a n t t h e b o y t o h i t t h e
d o g . The stresses are iambic and there are 5 feet, so the line is "iambic
pentameter."
i. Iambic Pentameter is the most common pattern in English poetry
because it is believed to be the natural rhythm of the English language.
Shakespeare’s plays and sonnets are written predominantly in this metre.
j. Blank Verse: unrhymed iambic pentameter (again the form which
Shakespeare used most often).
k. Masculine Ending: a line that ends with stressed syllable. For example:
The damp air chill and spread.
l. Feminine Ending: a line that ends with an extra unstressed syllable. For
example: T h e s a n d a t m y f e e t g r e w c o l d e r .
m. Caesura: a pause within a line that disrupts the speed (does not have to
include punctuation). For example: C a m e r a d o , I g i v e y o u m y
hand!
32. R un-on line/Enjambment: a line that ends without pause and continues into the
next line.
33. Satire: ridiculing a folly or vice in order to expose or correct it. The object is
usually some human frailty. Evokes attitudes of amusement, contempt, scorn, or
indignation toward the subject in the hope of somehow improving it.
34. Simile: a comparison between two things by using words—like, as, than,
appears, seems. Effectiveness is created by the differences between the two things
compared. For example, saying "my coffee is as strong as the English
Department’s coffee" is too literal and thus ineffective; "My coffee is like a kick
in the teeth," on the other hand, is a more effective simile.
35. Speaker: the narrator in poetry. The voice used by the author in the poem, often
a created identity rather than the author’s actual self.
36. Symbol: a person, object, image, word, or event that represents something else.
It evokes a range of additional meanings beyond the literal that are usually more
abstract than its literal significance.
a. Conventional or universal symbols: meanings widely recognized by a
society or culture. For example, the Christian cross or the Star of David.
b. Literary/contextual symbols: can be a setting, character, action, object,
name, or anything else in a work that maintains its literal significance
while suggesting other meanings. It gains symbolic meaning within the
context of a specific story.
37. Synecdoche (siNECKdukee): when part of something is used to signify the
whole or the whole signifies the part. For example, if someone is a gossip, he may
be referred to as "a wagging tongue"; or, someone could say, "St. Louis won the
football game" when we know darn well all of St. Louis wasn’t in the game.
8
38. Syntax: the ordering of words into meaningful verbal patterns such as phrases,
clauses, and sentences. Poets often manipulate syntax, changing conventional
word order, to place certain emphasis on particular words.
39. Theme: the central meaning or dominant idea in a poem.
40. Tone: the writer’s attitude toward the subject; the mood created by all the
elements in the poem.
41. Understatement/litotes (LIEtoeteez): opposite of hyperbole. Says less than
is intended. Usually has an ironic effect. For example, saying "He was not
pleased" when we know he was displaying rage.
42. Verse: a line of poetry or all poetry written in rhythmic patterns.