E2 GT Poetry Terms for Annotation

Front

anaphora

Back

the repetition of a word or phrase, usually at the beginning of a line.

Front

alliteration

Back

the repetition of sounds in a sequence of words. (See also consonance and assonance.)

Front

allegory

Back

narrative with two levels of meaning, one stated and one unstated.

Front

apostrophe

Back

direct address to an absent or otherwise unresponsive entity (someone or something dead, imaginary, abstract, or inanimate).

Front

assonance

Back

the repetition of vowel-sounds.

Front

beat

Back

a stressed (or accented) syllable.

Front

blank verse

Back

unrhymed iambic pentameter.

Front

caesura

Back

an audible pause internal to a line, usually in the middle. (An audible pause at the end of a line is called an end-stop.) The French alexandrine, Anglo-Saxon alliterative meter, and Latin dactylic hexameter are all verse forms that call for a caesura.

Front

chiasmus

Back

from the Greek letter Chi ( Χ ), a "crossed" rhetorical parallel. That is, the parallel form a:b::a:b changes to a:b::b:a to become a chiasmus.

Front

climax

Back

the high point; the moment of greatest tension or intensity. The climax can occur at any point in a poem, and can register on different levels, e.g. narrative, rhetorical, or formal.