Scribd
Upload
774 views3 pages

Literary Devices, Techniques and Figures of Speech

The document discusses 25 common literary techniques and figures of speech that authors use to convey meaning and add depth to their writing. Some of the most useful techniques underlined include metaphor, simile, imagery, irony, motif, personification, and allusion. Metaphors directly compare two things without using "like" or "as", similes use "like" or "as" to compare two things, imagery uses language to create sensory impressions, irony emphasizes contrasts between expectations and realities, motifs are recurring themes, personification gives human traits to non-humans, and allusions reference other works. Understanding these techniques can help when analyzing authors' uses of language.

Uploaded by

Joice Dela cruz
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
774 views3 pages

Literary Devices, Techniques and Figures of Speech

The document discusses 25 common literary techniques and figures of speech that authors use to convey meaning and add depth to their writing. Some of the most useful techniques underlined include metaphor, simile, imagery, irony, motif, personification, and allusion. Metaphors directly compare two things without using "like" or "as", similes use "like" or "as" to compare two things, imagery uses language to create sensory impressions, irony emphasizes contrasts between expectations and realities, motifs are recurring themes, personification gives human traits to non-humans, and allusions reference other works. Understanding these techniques can help when analyzing authors' uses of language.

Uploaded by

Joice Dela cruz
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 3

Literary Devices, Techniques and Figures of Speech

Reading passages (both long and short) include questions about the authors’ use of literary
techniques and figures of speech—tools authors use to convey meaning or to lend depth and
richness to their writing.

The following list contains 25 common literary techniques and figures of speech. The most useful
ones have been underlined:

Alliteration: The repetition of similar sounds, usually consonants, at the beginning of words. For
example, Robert Frost’s poem “Out, out—” contains the alliterative phrase “sweet-scented stuff.”

Allusion: A reference within a literary work to a


historical, literary, or biblical character, place, or
event. For example, the title of William Faulkner’s
novel The Sound and the Fury alludes to a line
from Shakespeare’s Macbeth.

Assonance: The repetition of vowel sounds in a sequence of nearby words. For example, the line
“The monster spoke in a low mellow tone” (from Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s poem “The Lotos-
Eaters”) contains assonance in its repetition of the “o” sound.

Caricature: A description or characterization that exaggerates or distorts a character’s prominent


features, usually for purposes of mockery. For example, a cartoon of a gaunt Abraham Lincoln
with a giant top hat, a very scraggly beard, and sunken eyes could be considered a caricature.

Cliché: An expression, such as “turn over a new leaf,” that has been used and reused so many
times that it has lost its expressive power.

Epiphany [ih-pif-uh-nee]: A sudden, powerful, and often spiritual or life changing realization that a
character experiences in an otherwise ordinary moment. For example, the main character in
James Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man has an
epiphany during a walk by the sea.

Foreshadowing: An author’s deliberate use of hints or suggestions to


give a preview of events or themes that do not develop until later in
the narrative. Images such as a storm brewing or a crow landing on a
fence post often foreshadow ominous developments in a story.

Hyperbole [hi-pur-buh-lee]: An excessive overstatement or conscious exaggeration of fact. “I’ve


told you that a million times already” is a hyperbolic statement.

Idiom: A common expression that has acquired a meaning that differs from its literal meaning,
such as “It’s raining cats and dogs” or “That cost me an arm and a leg.”

1
Imagery: Language that brings to mind sensory impressions. For example, in the Odyssey, Homer
creates a powerful image with his description of “rosy-fingered dawn.”

Irony: Broadly speaking, irony is a device that emphasizes the contrast between the way things are
expected to be and the way they actually are. A historical example of irony might be the fact that
people in medieval Europe believed bathing would harm them when in fact not bathing led to the
unsanitary conditions that caused the bubonic plague.

Metaphor: The comparison of one thing to another


that does not use the terms “like” or “as.” A
metaphor from Shakespeare’s Macbeth: “Life is but
a walking shadow.”

Simile [sim-uh-lee]: A comparison of two things


through the use of the words like or as. The title of
Robert Burns’s poem “My Love Is Like a Red, Red
Rose” is a simile.

Motif: A recurring structure, contrast, or other device that develops a literary work’s major
themes (see below). For example, shadows and darkness are a motif in Charles Dickens’s A Tale of
Two Cities, a novel that contains many gloomy scenes and settings.

Onomatopoeia: The use of words like pop, hiss, or boing, in which the
spoken sound resembles the actual sound.

Oxymoron: The association of two terms that seem to contradict each


other, such as “same difference” or “wise fool.”

Paradox: A statement that seems contradictory on the surface but


often expresses a deeper truth. One example is the line “All men
destroy the things they love” from Oscar Wilde’s “The Ballad
of Reading Gaol.”

Personification: The use of human characteristics to describe


animals, things, or ideas. Carl Sandburg’s poem “Chicago”
describes the city as “Stormy, husky, brawling / City of the Big
Shoulders.”

Pun: A play on words that uses the similarity in sound between two words with distinctly different
meanings. For example, the title of Oscar Wilde’s play The Importance of Being Earnest is a pun on
the word earnest, which means serious or sober, and the name “Ernest.”
Thank you for using www.freepdfconvert.com service!

Only two pages are converted. Please Sign Up to convert all pages.

https://www.freepdfconvert.com/membership

You might also like

pFad - Phonifier reborn

Pfad - The Proxy pFad of © 2024 Garber Painting. All rights reserved.

Note: This service is not intended for secure transactions such as banking, social media, email, or purchasing. Use at your own risk. We assume no liability whatsoever for broken pages.


Alternative Proxies:

Alternative Proxy

pFad Proxy

pFad v3 Proxy

pFad v4 Proxy