Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Let us begin your journey in creative writing. I am sure you are ready and
excited to answer the Pretest. Smile and cheer up!
Example:
An excerpt from Peter Redgrove’s Lazarus and the Sea contains imagery:
The tide of my death came whispering like this
Soiling my body with its tireless voice.
I scented the antique moistures when they sharpened
The air of my room, made the rough wood of my bed, (most dear),
Standing out like roots in my tall grave.
Example:
“I prize thy love more than whole mines of gold,
Or all the riches that East doth hold.”
- Anne Bradstreet, “To My Dear and Loving Husband”
• The use of antiquated words such as “thy” instead of “your” and “doth”
instead of “do” gives the poem a formal diction.
• These antiquated words are considered grand, elevated, and sophisticated
language.
FIGURES OF SPEECH
Figures of speech are words or phrases used in a non-literal sense for
rhetorical or vivid effect.
The most common figures of speech are simile, metaphor, onomatopoeia,
personification, apostrophe, hyperbole, synecdoche, metonymy, oxymoron,
and paradox.
1. “Ebony and ivory / Live together in perfect harmony” (McCartney & Wonder)
2. “Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health,
Still-waking sleep, that is not what it is!” (Shakespeare)
43. “Pity, you ancient stones, those tender babes
Whom envy hath immured within your walls” (Shakespeare)
4. “He watches from his mountain walls, and like a thunderbolt he falls.”
(Tennyson)
5. “That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me.” (Donne)
6. “Even at night time, Mama is sunrise.” (Hunt)
7. “The western wave was all a-flame. The day was well nigh done!” (Coleridge)
8. “A day was twenty-four hours long but seemed longer. There was no hurry,
for there was nowhere to go, nothing to buy and no money to buy it with…”
(Lee)
9. “…the glish of squirting taps plus slush of foam knocked off and a faint
piddle of drops...” (e.e. cummings)
10. “Fall had barely touched the full splendor of trees…” (Knowles)
Activity 2 What is it like?
Directions: Take a very careful look at the picture below. Write a brief paragraph of
the place using imagery, diction, and figures of speech. You may incorporate an
experience related to the location to make your literary description more vivid.
Image from: https://ccsearch.creativecommons.org/photos/2e452542-ef22-402b-a3f7-8527da483e0f
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Imagery is used to signify all the objects and qualities of sense perception
referred to in works of literature.
Diction refers to the kinds of words, phrases, and sentence structures, and
sometimes also figurative language, that constitute any work of literature.
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WHAT I NEED TO
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UNDERSTANDING
THE LESSON
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WHAT I WANT TO
LEARN CONNECTED
TO THE LESSON
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