CREATIVE WRITINGUnit One-25 Common Literary Terms

Session 3

REVIEW

• Give an example of

• Consonance

• Denotation

• Hyperbole

• Imagery

• Internal Rhyme

METAPHOR

• Metaphor-a figure of speech in which a word or phrase is applied to an object or action to which it is not literally applicable, Or a thing regarded as representative or symbolic of something else, especially something abstract.

Example-My brother was boiling mad. 

The skies of his future began to darken

Her voice is music to his ears.

METAPHOR

• "I can mingle with the stars, and throw a party on Mars;I am a prisoner locked up behind Xanax bars."(Lil Wayne, "I Feel Like Dying")

• "If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away."(Henry David Thoreau, Walden, 1854)

• "A man may break a word with you, sir, and words are but wind."(William Shakespeare, The Comedy of Errors)

METAPHOR

• Examples-

• "Under neon signs A girl was in bloomAnd a woman was fadingIn a suburban room."(Joni Mitchell, "In France They Kiss on Main Street." The Hissing of Summer Lawns, 1975)

• "There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction; the moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you."(J.K. Rowling, "The Fringe Benefits of Failure, and the Importance of Imagination," June 2008)

NOW YOU TRY

•Write 2-4 lines of a metaphor

• Share

METER

• Meter-Is the regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables that make up a line of poetry. Meter gives rhythm and regularity to poetry.

• ExamplesThe Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

• Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green,That host with their banners at sunset were seen:Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown,….

• For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast…And their hearts but once heaved, and forever grew still!

• (The Destruction of Sennacherib by Lord Byron)

METER

• ‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the houseNot a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,…While visions of sugar plums danced in their heads…had just settled our brains for a long winter‘s nap….As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,when they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky…with the sleigh full of toys, and St. Nicholas too.

• (‘Twas the Night before Christmas by Clement Clarke Moore)

METER

•Using meter write 4 lines that have a specific meter

• Share

MOOD

• Mood- literary element that evokes certain feelings or vibes in readers through words and descriptions.

• Examples

• “The river, reflecting the clear blue of the sky, glistened and sparkled as it flowed noiselessly on.”

• There was no moon, and everything beneath lay in misty darkness: not a light gleamed from any house, far or near all had been extinguished long ago: and those at Wuthering Heights were never visible…”

MOOD

• Examples

• “I shall be telling this with a sighSomewhere ages and ages hence:Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,I took the one less traveled by,And that has made all the difference.”-Robert Frost in his poem “The Road Not Taken

• “And being no stranger to the art of war, I have him a description of cannons, culverins, muskets, carabines, pistols, bullets, powder, swords, bayonets, battles, sieges, retreats, attacks, undermines, countermines, bombardments, sea-fights…”

NOW YOU TRY

• Create 2-4 lines of something that contains mood

• Share

ONOMATOPOEIAONOMATOPOEIA-THE FORMATION OF A WORD FROM A SOUND ASSOCIATED WITH WHAT IS NAMED (E.G., CUCKOO,SIZZLE ).

buzz

splish-splash

flitter-twitters

hushes

cuckoo

ring-ring

achoo

bang

fizz

hiss

ticktock

click

quacked

tap

zip

beep

boink

slurp

boom

vroom

whinny

sizzle

whisper

ONOMOTPOIEA

• Examples-“I heard the ripple washing in the reeds / And the wild water lapping on the crag” provides a rather stark visual of the rocky shores of Great Britain, the “ripple” washing and “lapping” carries much more vivid detail than simply saying “the waves rolled.”

• The snow softly falling as it “hushes” and “shushes” the cars that drive in the street.

• The snow “flitter-twitters” around in the girl’s mind, before it “whitely whirs away.”

ONOMATOPOEIA

Hear the sledges with the bells-Silver bells! What a world of merriment their melody foretells! How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, In the icy air of night! While the stars that oversprinkle All the heavens, seem to twinkle With a crystalline delight; Keeping time, time, time, In a sort of Runic rhyme, To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells From the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells-- From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells. _The Bells-Edgar Allen Poe

NOW YOU TRY

•Write 2-3 lines that include onomatopoeia

• Share

OXYMORON

• Oxymoron-a figure of speech in which apparently contradictory terms appear in conjunction 

• "absent presence"(Astrophil and Stella by Sir Philip Sidney)

• alone together

• awful good

• "beggarly riches"(Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions by John Donne)

• bitter sweet

• "brisk vacancy"("Self Portrait in a Convex Mirror" by John Ashbery)

• cheerful pessimist

OXYMORON

civil war

clearly misunderstood

"comfortable misery"(One Door Away From Heaven by Dean Koontz)

conspicuous absence

cool passion

crash landing

cruel kindnes

"darkness visible"(Paradise Lost by John Milton)

deafening silence

deceptively honest

definite maybe

deliberate speed

devout atheist

dull roar

genuine imitation

good grief

growing smaller

guest host

historical present

humane slaughter

icy hot

OXYMORON

• “Why, then, O brawling love! O loving hate!

• O anything, of nothing first create!

• O heavy lightness! Serious vanity!

• Misshapen chaos of well-seeming forms!

• Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health!

• Still-waking sleep, that is not what it is!

• This love feel I, that feel no love in this.

• Dost thou not laugh?” –Shakespeare-Romeo and Juliet

NOW YOU TRY

• Write 2-3 lines of an oxymoronic poem or concept

• Share

NOW YOU TRY

• Create something including all five examples.