Figurative Language and Poetry Terms

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What is an allusion?

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An allusion is a reference to another character, place, thing, or literary work.

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What is onomatopoeia?

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Onomatopoeia refers to words whose sounds suggest their meaning, like 'buzz' or 'sizzle'.

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What is hyperbole?

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Hyperbole is an exaggerated statement not meant to be taken literally, such as 'I'm so hungry I could eat a horse.'

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What is a simile?

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A simile is a figure of speech that compares two different things using 'like' or 'as', such as 'as brave as a lion'.

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What is personification?

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Personification is giving human traits or characteristics to non-human things, like 'the wind whispered through the trees'.

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What is symbolism?

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Symbolism is the use of symbols to represent ideas or qualities, like a dove representing peace.

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What is alliteration?

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Alliteration is the repetition of the same initial consonant sound in a series of words, like 'Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers'.

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What is a metaphor?

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A metaphor is a figure of speech that makes a direct comparison between two unlike things, saying one is the other, like 'time is a thief'.

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What is an idiom?

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An idiom is a phrase or expression that has a figurative meaning different from its literal meaning, like 'it's raining cats and dogs'.

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What is a stanza?

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A stanza is a grouped set of lines in a poem, often separated by a space from other stanzas.