Poetry Literary Terms Flashcards
Alliteration
The repetition of an initial consonant sound
Assonance
The repetition of a vowel sound in a line or verse of poetry
Connotation
What a word suggests beyond its basic definition; the thoughts and emotions that are associated with a word
Consonance
The repetition of consonant sounds (doesn’t have to be the initial consonant sound)
Couplet
A pair of successive rhyming lines, usually of the same length.
Denotation
The dictionary definition of a word
Diction
Word choice of the author
Enjambment
When a sentence within a poem runs from line to line
Extended metaphor
A version of metaphor that extends over the course of multiple lines, paragraphs, or stanzas of prose or poetry
Free verse
Nonmetrical, non-rhyming lines that closely follow the natural rhythms of speech
Imagery
language that appeals to the senses
Metaphor
A comparison of two dissimilar things not using “like” or “as”
Meter
The rhythmical pattern of a piece of verse
Mood
The feeling created in the reader by a literary work or passage object, or a concept
Onomatopoeia
A word like pop or thump that sounds like what it means
Personification
A figure of speech in which human attributes are given to an animal, an
object, or a concept
Quatrain
A four-line stanza, often with various rhyme schemes
Repetition
The use of any element of language—a sound, a word, a phrase, a clause, a sentence—more than once
Rhyme
Repetition of sounds at the ends of words
Simile
A comparison of two dissimilar things using “like” or “as”
Stanza
A group of lines of verse. The stanza is the unit of structure in a poem
Symbol
An object, animate or inanimate, which represents or “stands for” something else
Theme
The message the author is trying to show in the literary work
Tone
The writer’s or speaker’s attitude toward a subject
