Elements of poetry2.ppt

8/14/2019 Elements of poetry2.ppt

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INTRODUCTION TO POETRY

Elements of Poetry


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Literary Devices or Elements of a poetry techniques used in

representing concepts, persons or ideas in poems.

One of the elements is persona.

Persona referring to the narrator / voice of the poem who is telling

the story in the poem.

Not to be confused with the author.

Derived from the Greek term mask.

Sometimes, the poet is also the persona.

Personification : giving human traits to non-human things orunanimated objects

PERSONA & PERSONIFICATION


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Theres Been A Death in the Opposite House

There's been a death in the opposite house

As lately as today.

I know it by the numb lookSuch houses have always.

The neighbours rustle in and out,

The doctor drives away.

A window opens like a pod,

Abrupt, mechanically;

Somebody flings a mattress out, -

The children hurry by;

They wonder if It died on that, -

I used to when a boy.

The minister goes stiffly in

As if the house were his,

And he owned all the mourners now,

And little boys besides;

And then the milliner, and the man

Of the appalling trade,

To take the measure of the house.

There'll be that dark parade

Of tassels and of coaches soon;

It's easy as a sign, -

The intuition of the news

In just a country town.


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Personification Poem

I'd love to take a poem to lunch

or treat it to a wholesome brunch

of fresh cut fruit and apple crunch.

I'd spread it neatly on the clothbeside a bowl of chicken broth

and watch a mug of root beer froth.

I'd feel the words collect the mood,

the taste and feel of tempting food

popped in the mouth and slowly chewed,and get the smell of fresh baked bread

that sniffs inside and fills our head

with thoughts that no word ever said.

And as the words rest on the page

beside the cumin, salt and sage,

and every slowly starts to age,like soup that simmers as it's stirred,

ingredients get mixed and blurred

and blends in taste with every word

until the poet gets it right,

the taste and smell

and sound and sight,the words that make it fit.

Just write.

Take a Poem to Lunch

by Denise Rodgers


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Repetition of the words with the same consonantal soundseither at the beginning of the words or in between words.

The words have to be close together

Alliteration provides rhythm to poetry

Poems with alliteration are easier to memorise andremember.

Provides poems with unique structure, flow and beauty.

Initial alliteration : at the beginning of the words

Internal alliteration : found within words.

Alliteration


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Alliteration

Betty Botterby Mother GooseBetty Botter bought some butter, but, she said, the butters bitter; if I put

it in my batter it will make my batter bitter, but a bit of better butter will

make my batter better.

So she bought a bit of butter better than her bitter butter, and she put it

in her batter and the batter was not bitter. So twas better Betty Botter

bought a bit of better butter.

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,

Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,

While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,As of some one gently rapping, rappingat my chamber door.

"'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door-

Only this, and nothing more."

excerpt from The Raven by Edgar Allen Poe


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Assonance

The repetition of vowel sounds in a phrase or line in poetry

Provides sense of fluidity to the verse(http://bcs.bedfordstmartins.com/virtualit/poetry/assonance_def.html)

Effective when rhyming scheme is not there.

Example :

I wandered lonelyas a cloud

That floatson high o'er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Daffodils by William Wordsworth
http://bcs.bedfordstmartins.com/virtualit/poetry/assonance_def.htmlhttp://bcs.bedfordstmartins.com/virtualit/poetry/assonance_def.html


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Metaphor

Onomatopaiea - Poetic structure to illustrate how certain things sound.

Figure of speech where words imitate sounds

Example :

I heard the ripple washing in the reeds/ And the wild water lapping

on the crag

From Morte D'Arthur by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Similecomparisons of two things which appear to be dissimilar, areusually signified by the words like and as

E.g. My love is like a red, red roseRobert Burns

"Guiltless forever, like a tree" from Men and Women by Robert Browning

One object is concrete and the other one is abstract

Onomatopaeia and Simile


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Identification of one idea with another.

Comparing two unlikely objects

Implied comparison as opposed to direct comparison as in simile.

The comparison is usually obscured and implicit

Example :

Metaphor

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer's lease hath all too short a date:

Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare


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Rhythm

Sound patterns in poems which are created by stresses andpauses)

Stresses : emphasis on certain syllables, words or phrases

Pauses : breaks in a verse, usually at the end of each line

Cadence : Rising and falling intonation of the spoken language

Caesura : a pronounced pause

Scansion : Analysis of the number and type of feet in a line.

Source :http://sparkcharts.sparknotes.com/lit/literaryterms/section3.php#RhythmandMeter


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Rhythm

Foot : Two or more syllables that together make up the smallest unit of

rhythm in a poem, one of those syllables is stressed. Also known as therhythmic unit

Common types of feet in English poetry

a. Iambic : unstressed syllable followed by stressed syllable

: e.g : go ingb. Trochee : stressed syllable followed by unstressed syllable

: e.g : sor ry

c. Dactyl : a stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables

: e.g. govern ment

d. Anapest : 2 unstressed syllables followed by a stressed syllable: e.g. There are many who say

e. Spondee : 2 stressed syllables successively

: e.g. get in

f. Pyrrhic : 2 unstressed syllables

: e.g. He is up to nothing


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Meter

A line with one or more feet. Also, a rhythmic pattern created in

a line of verse (http://sparkcharts.sparknotes.com/lit/literaryterms/section3.php#Rhythm%20and%20Meter)

Types of meter:

a. accentual : strong, number of stressed syllables in a lineis fixed , number of total syllables is not fixed (e.g.Beowulf)

b. syllabic : fixed number of total syllables , number ofstressed syllables is not fixed

c. accentualsyllabic : number of stressed syllables andnumber of total syllables are fixed (e.g. Chaucers poems)

d. quantitative : duration of each sound of the syllabledetermines the meter
http://sparkcharts.sparknotes.com/lit/literaryterms/section3.phphttp://sparkcharts.sparknotes.com/lit/literaryterms/section3.php


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Meter

a. One footmonometer

b. Two feetdimeterc. Three feettrimeter

d. Four feettetrameter

e. Five feetpentameter

f. Six feethexameterg. Seven feetheptameter

h. Eight feet - octameter

Iambic pentameter : Each line of verse has five feet that

consists of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressedsyllable. Most popular rhyming scheme in English poetry.

e.g. To swellthe gourdand plumpthe hazel shells (Ode to Autumn by John Keats)


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Symbols

Based on association- established through repetition throughout the poem

- how to identify : look for repetitionsobjects or ideas

Based on literary tradition

- drawn from mythology, religious books or works of other poets

- quite difficult to identify, look for reference to other worksbeing mentioned by the poet

Based on cliches- easiest to identify as they have been used profusely

- very obvious and transparent,

- e.g. rose as the symbol for love

Source : http://www.ehow.com/info_8662753_definition-symbols-poetry.html


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Tone & Irony

Refers to the mood or the voice of the poem. It means the attitude andfeeling of a poet towards his readers (Bah & Robinson, 1990).

Can be set through the conventions of the poem such as the meter orrepetitions.

Irony : refers to a difference between the way something appears and what isactually true (source : http://bcs.bedfordstmartins.com/virtualit/poetry/irony_def.html).

Allows poet to say something but means something else. Difficult to detect inpoetry

Can be achieved through the use of sarcasm

Ironic point of view : discrepancies between writer and personas point ofview

Dramatic Irony : what the reader knows but the persona does not
http://bcs.bedfordstmartins.com/virtualit/poetry/irony_def.htmlhttp://bcs.bedfordstmartins.com/virtualit/poetry/irony_def.html


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Themes

Refer to the central idea of the poem. They include what the poetfeels, thinks and perceives.

Themes are derived from experiences in real life and they varied.

Types of themes found in poems:

i) Identity : social and cultural identities like in Monsoon History

ii) De colonisation / assimilation : from the colonised perspectives ;

iii) Feminism

iv) Lovev) War

vi) Nature

vii) Death

viiii) Other unconventional themes


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