Literary devices and their definition

Simile-simple comparison between two different things by using words 'like 'And 'as'

For example: she is as innocent as an angel.

She is like an angel.

Metaphor

Implied or indirect comparison

For example: she is an angel.

Alliteration: a series of words that begin with same consonant sound

For example: terribly transient

Clean clothes

Personification: giving an object or animal human characteristics.

For example: trees sprinting

Earth can teach us

Justice is blind

The sun smiled

Hyperbole: extreme exaggeration to make a point or show emphasis .

for example: I have told you 1 million times

I had a ton of homework.

I'm so hungry, I could eat a horse.

Synecdoche: A word or a phrase that refers to part of something that stands for the whole or vice
versa.

For example: terrified hands ,show fear of aunt Jennifer

Lend me your ears

Keep the change

Have a nice day

I am at the peak of my career – peak is a small part of the speakers job experience as a whole

Imagery – language used to create an image in the mind of readers

Irony – a literary device used to show contrast between what is expected to happen and what
actually happens.

Three types of irony

Dramatic irony – when audience knows more about what is going on than the characters.

For example

The Tiger king- king was not aware that the hundredth tiger was not killed by him but by his servant

Situational irony-when something happens that is completely different from what was expected.

For example

The Tale of Melon City-King's declaration to punish somebody resulted into his own execution.

Verbal irony – when a character says one thing but means another .
A person finishes a huge meal and then his friends shows up with a pizza and the person says ,"wow
perfect timing."

Pun : It's a play on words. A word or phrase has more than one meaning.

Pun involves words with similar or identical sounds but with different meaning.

The wedding cake had me in tiers.

I have a graph paper, it's time to plot something .

If you stand by the window, I will help
LITERARY DEVICES

An Elementary School Classroom

Simile:

a) Like rootless weeds – Children compared to weeds or unwanted section of society.

b) Like bottle bits - The spectacles frame their stony eyed expression /hard faces.
c) Windows that shut open their lives like catacombs …the classroom and homes in which the
slum children live have been compared to underground burial chambers.

Metaphor:

a) Paper seeming boy

b) Rat’s eyes
c) Gusty waves – the privileged children compared to gusty waves – energetic and active.
d) Future ‘s painted with the fog – uncertain and unclear future.
e) Sealed in with a lead sky - depressing future( dull grey colour of sky ).
f) Stars of words - words or literature written by writers like Shakespeare that create images
which are bright, beautiful and inspiring like stars .
g) From fog to endless night - future from birth till death without any hope.
h) Wear skins peeped through by bones- thin, weak body is reduced to mere skin and bones
due to poverty.
i) Let their tongues run naked into books
(to allow children to taste/experience the variety life as described in books… to give them
an experience of beautiful bright world outside the miserable life of slum)
j) ‘ Whose language is the sun…’( good education to change their lives… lives full of hope,
energy, joy)
Imagery:
‘ weighed down’ – refers to burden of poverty and hopelessness.
visual imagery:
…And show the children to green fields and make their world
Run azure on gold sands, and let their tongues
Run naked into books the white and green leaves open
History theirs whose language is the sun.
Tone of the poem –Sombre
-Profound expressing a serious problem
Literary Devices

A Thing of beauty

Metaphor

a )a thing of beauty -compared to joy

b) ‘bower quiet ‘– quiet shady part in the garden

c)sweet dreams – happy dreams

d)wreathing a flowery band – connecting to nature

e)Pall-a covering like a shroud

f)endless fountain of immortal drink (beautiful objects of nature are forever like a never ending
drink)

g)List of beautiful things is metaphors and symbols of nature

Alliteration:
a)Noble natures

b)cooling covert

c)band to bind

d)sprouting shady

e)simple sheep

f)have heard

Imagery :
a)flowery bands –image of beautiful things lined up in a string

b)shady boon
Literary Devices

Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers

symbols :
*Aunt Jennifer

*Tigers

*Wedding band

*Aunt Jennifer’s hand

Synecdoche and Transferred Epithet:

*Terrified Hands

Pun:
*Ringed

Irony:
– a weak woman ...strong tigers

-Brutal tigers-chivalric-

-Cultured man-oppressor

-Creator dies – her work will continue

Hyperbole:
– exaggeration of the weight of her husband’s wedding ring to show his dominance

Contrast :
-Aunt Jennifer and Tigers

-strong yellow and green colours – words ‘prancing ‘and ‘fluttering’

Alliteration:
Literary Devices

My Mother at Sixty Six

Simile

a face ashen like a corpse – face dull, pale and colourless ...lost all vitality grey colour of ash usually
associated with a dead body.

b) as a late winter’s moon – face pale and lifeless like that of fading winter moon… fog and mist in
winter, face and misted by wrinkles, poor health winter...Last cycle of the season...

Personification :

a)trees sprinting –humans run

–attribute of human given to trees

Repetition :

– smile and smile and smile (desperate attempt to cover her guilt, pain, anxiety )

Metaphor :

Merry children spilling

Imagery :

Merry children spilling out of their homes: youthful, energetic, happy, full of life (life outside
compared /contrasted to the morbid atmosphere inside the car – the old mother is weak, pale, frail
and inactive)

Anaphora:

Repetition of a word/phrase

smile and smile and smile

Alliteration:

my mother
LITERARY DEVICES

Keeping Quiet
1.Alliteration - * we will

* we would

*once on

* his hurt hands * wars with

* clean clothes

* we were

* so single-minded

2 Anti-thesis – * count to twelve and we will all keep still

3. Repetition – * without rush , without engines

*use of war

*Let’s - to create a bond with the reader

4. Imagery- *fishermen in the cold sea ……… hurt hands

(Man ruthlessly destroying nature, killing fish ...sore hands...how man is harming himself by his
mindless activities)

5. Metaphor:

a )In the shade- just as shade protects from harsh sun, we will protect and shelter each other as
brothers, thus live in peace and harmony.

b) Put on clean clothes:

Man will shed blood... soiled clothes ...cleanse

you out