Poetic Devices Used in the Poem

1) Repetition
ü Far far from
ü This map becomes their window and these windows
ü Break, o break
2) Alliteration—
ü Far far from (line 1) & ( Line 16)
ü Street sealed in with lead sky-(line 15)
ü Surely Shakespeare - (line 17)
ü Ships, and sun-(line 1
3) Personification
ü Gusty waves- the waves have been given the human quality of being gusty.
ü Their tongues ran naked- Given human quality opportunity
4) Simile
ü Like rootless weeds
ü Like bottle bits of stone
ü As big as doom
ü Their lives like catacombs
5) Metaphor
ü The paper seeming boy
ü With rat’s eyes
ü A narrow street
ü Language is the sun
ü Future painted with fog
6) Antithesis—
ü Cloudless at dawn- as ‘cloudless’ and ‘dawn’ are two opposing ideas
ü From fog to endless night-- as ‘fog’ and ‘endless night’ are opposing ideas
ü Narrow street …..far far from….rivers, capes and stars…--as ‘narrow street’ and ‘rivers,
capes, stars’ are opposing ideas
7) Climax- as the words are written in ascending order.
ü Belled, flowery, Tyrolese valley
ü Rivers, capes, stars of the world
ü Ships, and sun and love
[Climax refers to a figure of speech in which words, phrases, or clauses are arranged in order of
increasing importance.
For e.g.
Beauty is but a vain and doubtful good;
A shining gloss that vadeth suddenly;
A flower that dies when first it gins to bud;
A brittle glass that's broken presently:
A doubtful good, a gloss, a glass, a flower,
Lost, vaded, broken, dead within an hour.(From: Shakespeare, The Passionate Pilgrim)
"There are three things that will endure: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is
love."(From: Corinthians 13:13)
This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be
guaranteed the "unalienable Rights" of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."(From:
Martin Luther King, I Have a Dream)
8) Anticlimax- The words are written in a descending order.
ü Unless governor, inspector, visitor
[Anticlimax refers to a figure of speech in which statements or the arrangement of a series of
words, phrases, or clauses is in the order of decreasing importance.]
ü She is a great writer, a mother and a good humorist.
ü He lost his family, his car and his cell phone.
9) Asyndeton
ü On sour cream walls, donations. Shakespeare’s head,
ü Cloudless at dawn, civilized dome riding all cities.
ü Belled, flowery Tyrolese valley. Open-handed map
ü Awarding the world its world.
[Asyndeton
· Asyndeton refers to a practice in literature whereby the author purposely leaves out
conjunctions, coordinate phrases or words in the sentence, while maintaining the
grammatical accuracy of the phrase.
· As a literary tool it helps in shortening up the implied meaning of the entire phrase and
presenting it in a succinct form. This compact version helps in creating an immediate impact
whereby the reader is instantly attuned to what the writer is trying to convey.
E.g.
· He received applause, prizes, money, fame.
· He provided her education, allowance, dignity.
· I could have gone to war, I didn't.
· Smile, talk, bye-bye.
· We met, we got engaged, we married.
Aristotle once mentioned that this kind of rhetoric device was the most effective in spoken
oratories than in written prose
· "I came, I saw, I conquered".
Translated from the Latin saying 'Veni, Vidi, Vici' these are words by Julius Caesar
describing one of his greatest victories.
· "...and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from
the earth."
Quoted by Abraham Lincoln at the Gettysburg Address
· "...that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend,
oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty."
From John F. Kennedys Inaugural Address of 1961
· "We must... hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace
Friends."
The US Declaration Of Independence referring to the British
· "An empty stream, a great silence, an impenetrable forest. The air was thick, warm,
heavy, sluggish."
From Joseph Conrad's, 'Heart of Darkness'