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Poetic Devices Explained with Examples

This document defines and provides examples of various literary devices including: alliteration, allusion, assonance, imagery, metaphor, onomatopoeia, personification, refrain, simile, symbol, and synecdoche. Alliteration is the repetition of consonant sounds, allusion references other works, and assonance repeats vowel sounds. Imagery uses descriptive words to convey impressions. A metaphor is a comparison using "as" or "like." Onomatopoeia mimics sounds, and personification gives human traits to non-human things. A refrain repeats lines in a poem. Symbols represent additional meanings. Synecdoche substitutes a part for the whole. Examples are provided for each term.

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192 views1 page

Poetic Devices Explained with Examples

This document defines and provides examples of various literary devices including: alliteration, allusion, assonance, imagery, metaphor, onomatopoeia, personification, refrain, simile, symbol, and synecdoche. Alliteration is the repetition of consonant sounds, allusion references other works, and assonance repeats vowel sounds. Imagery uses descriptive words to convey impressions. A metaphor is a comparison using "as" or "like." Onomatopoeia mimics sounds, and personification gives human traits to non-human things. A refrain repeats lines in a poem. Symbols represent additional meanings. Synecdoche substitutes a part for the whole. Examples are provided for each term.

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Alliteration- -repetition of consonant sounds in consecutive neighboring words to

enhance the sound in a poem.


Example: Wooing wind
Allusion- -references to familiar historical or literary persons or events that readers are
expected to recognize and which enrich a work by introducing associations from
another context.
Example: Mariana in the moated grange [Measure for Measure]
Assonance- -the repetition of the same or similar vowel sounds, especially in stressed
syllables.
Example: crusted/ rusted
Imagery- -words and phrases that describe what is seen, heard, smelled, tasted, or
touched which when repeated in a pattern can help to convey a particular
impression about a character or situation.
Example: Crusted flower pots, rusted nails, broken sheds
Metaphor- -a figure of speech containing a comparison of two things on the basis of a
shared quality as if one thing were the other.
Example: Not used in the poem.
Onomatopoeia- -when the sound of a word echoes its meaning.
Examples: creaked/ shrieked
Personification- -endowing inanimate objects or abstract ideas with life or human
characteristics.
Example: gray-eyed morn, dreamy house
Refrain- -a phrase or verse that is repeated at intervals in a song or poem.
Example: She said, My life is dreary,
He cometh not, she said
She said, I am aweary, aweary,
I would that I were dead.
Simile- -a figure of speech stating a comparison using like or as.
Example: Not present in the poem
Symbol- -a person, object, action, place or event that, in addition to its literal meaning,
suggests a more complex meaning or range of meaning.
Example: poplar tree
Synecdoche- -the substitution of a part of the whole.
Example: old footsteps trod the upper floors.

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