Poetry Key Terms

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1. _____________ is a genre of literature that uses rhythmic, compressed language, figures of speech, and imagery to appeal to the reader’s emotions. It is written in lines and stanzas.

2. ______________ poetry does not tell a story but aims at expressing the poet’s thoughts or emotions.

3. ______________ poetry tells a story. Two types are ____________, which are songs that tell a story, and _______________, which are long, narrative poems that describe the deeds of an epic hero.

4. _____________ poetry is either from another perspective that the poet or has more than one speaker.

5. Fixed form poems must follow a particular pattern. Examples include __________, Japanese poems with three lines with five, seven, and five syllables; _____________, normally love poems with 14-lined and structured rhyme schemes; and ___________ poems that are written in the shape of their subjects.

6. ______________ sonnets have an end rhyme scheme of abab cdcd efef gg, while __________ sonnets have an end rhyme scheme of abba abba cdecde.

7. ___________ poems are written in unrhymed iambic pentameter.

8. ___________ poems do not have a regular meter or rhyme scheme.

9. ___________ is used for poetic effect and is a repetition of the initial sounds of several words in a group

10. _________ is the repetition of vowel sounds in a literary work.

11. _________ is the repetition of consonant sounds with differing vowel sounds in words near each other in a line or lines of poetry. Consider the following example from Theodore Roethke's "Night Journey”:

We rush into a rain

That rattles double

glass.

12. _______________ is the sound of a word echoes the sound it represents. The words "splash." "knock," and "roar" are examples.

13.  ______________ is the recurrences of stressed and unstressed syllables at equal intervals, similar to meter. However, though two lines may be of the same meter, the rhythms of the lines may be different.

14. _____________ is regular pattern of unstressed and stressed syllables in a line or lines of poetry. Iamb is a pattern of unstressed/stressed. Shakespeare wrote in iambic pentameter.

15. _____________ is a pattern of repeated sounds. In end rhyme, the rhyme is at the end of the line. When one of the rhyming words occurs in a place in the line other than at the end, it is called internal rhyme. 

16. _____________ is the repetition of lines using the same structure.

17. ________________ is a way of saying one thing and meaning something else, while with ____________ you mean exactly what you say.

18. ______________ is giving human qualities to something not human.

19. ______________ is a figure of speech wherein a comparison is made between two unlike quantities without the use of the words "like" or "as. A _____________ is a comparison using “like” or “as.”

20. A _____________________ is a figure of speech in which an overstatement or exaggeration occurs.

21. The ___________ of a word is its dictionary definition. The word wall, therefore, denotes an upright structure which encloses something or serves as a boundary. The _________________of a word is its emotional content. In this sense, the word wall can also mean an attitude or actions which prevent becoming emotionally close to a person.

22. ____________ is a word or group of words in a literary work which appeal to one or more of the senses: sight, taste, touch, hearing, and smell.

23. _________ is the atmosphere or feeling created by a literary work, partly by a description of the objects or by the style of the descriptions.

24. ___________ is the poet’s attitude toward the subject.

25. ___________ means the poet’s word choice.

26. ___________ is how a writer reveals his/her personality (voice). It includes sentences length, diction (word choice), use of figurative language and sound devices, point of view, and more.

27. ___________ is the political, social, cultural, and economic setting when a literary work was written.

28. ___________ is an expression means something other than the literal meanings of its individual words, like “It’s raining cats and dogs.”

29. _______________ means an apparent contradiction that actually expresses a truth, War is peace,” "Freedom is slavery,” "Ignorance is strength." (George Orwell, 1984)