Docsity
Docsity

Prepare for your exams
Prepare for your exams

Study with the several resources on Docsity


Earn points to download
Earn points to download

Earn points by helping other students or get them with a premium plan


Guidelines and tips
Guidelines and tips

Analyzing Figurative Language & Imagery for Literary Ninjas: Similes, Metaphors, Personifi, Summaries of Poetry

A comprehensive guide for literary analysis, focusing on figurative language and imagery. It covers three literary devices - similes, metaphors, and personification - and five types of imagery - touch, sight, sound, taste, and smell. Additionally, it discusses techniques such as alliteration, assonance, sibilance, onomatopoeia, sequence, subject, flow, mood, voice, tense, rhyme scheme, and rhythm/pace. The goal is to help readers understand how these elements contribute to the overall meaning of a poem.

What you will learn

  • What are the three literary devices discussed in the document?
  • What are the five types of imagery discussed in the document?
  • How do alliteration, assonance, and sibilance contribute to the meaning of a poem?

Typology: Summaries

2021/2022

Uploaded on 09/12/2022

avni
avni 🇺🇸

4.7

(3)

229 documents

1 / 4

Toggle sidebar

This page cannot be seen from the preview

Don't miss anything!

bg1
FIGURATIVE
LANGUAGE
THREE QUESTIONS
LITERARY NINJAS ASK
Figurative language is the collective term
for three literary devices:
1) Similes
2) Metaphors
3) Personification
Learn to spot, discuss and explain these
devices in the poems you read. Use the
following information as your guide:
1. What similes are there in this poem?
A simile compares one thing with
another. They are easy to spot because
words such as ‘like’ or ‘as’ are used.
The poet’s aim is usually to emphasise or
exaggerate a point. Alternatively, poets
might use a simile because there are no
adjectives powerful enough to
communicate how they feel.
For example, can you say why Christina
Rossetti, in a poem about being in love,
wrote ‘My heart is like a singing bird’
rather than ‘My heart is really, really
happy’?
2. What metaphors are there in this
poem?
A metaphor describes something as
though it is something else.
When Romeo sees Juliet through a
window, he famously declares:
‘…what light through yonder
window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.’
The rising sun has many connotations:
renewal, optimism, a fresh start, heavenly
beauty, and so on. The metaphor
therefore enables Shakespeare to pack
lots of meaning into a small number of
words.
3. Are there any examples of
personification in this poem?
Personification (which is actually a form
of metaphor) is where an object is
described as though it is behaving in a
human or animalistic way.
E.g. Sassoon describes October in the
trenches of World War One thus:
‘October’s bellowing anger
breaks and cleaves’
Personification is extremely useful to
poets in creating atmosphere or mood.
REMEMBER: LITERARY
NINJAS ALWAYS:
BACK UP their points with
evidence from the text and say
HOW figurative language
conveys the poet’s meaning.
pf3
pf4

Partial preview of the text

Download Analyzing Figurative Language & Imagery for Literary Ninjas: Similes, Metaphors, Personifi and more Summaries Poetry in PDF only on Docsity!

FIGURATIVE

LANGUAGE

THREE QUESTIONS

LITERARY NINJAS ASK

Figurative language is the collective term for three literary devices:

  1. Similes
  2. Metaphors
  3. Personification Learn to spot, discuss and explain these devices in the poems you read. Use the following information as your guide:
  1. What similes are there in this poem? A simile compares one thing with another. They are easy to spot because words such as ‘like’ or ‘as’ are used. The poet’s aim is usually to emphasise or exaggerate a point. Alternatively, poets might use a simile because there are no adjectives powerful enough to communicate how they feel. For example, can you say why Christina Rossetti, in a poem about being in love, wrote ‘My heart is like a singing bird’ rather than ‘My heart is really, really happy’?
    1. What metaphors are there in this poem? A metaphor describes something as though it is something else. When Romeo sees Juliet through a window, he famously declares:

‘…what light through yonder

window breaks?

It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.’

The rising sun has many connotations: renewal, optimism, a fresh start, heavenly beauty, and so on. The metaphor therefore enables Shakespeare to pack lots of meaning into a small number of words.

  1. Are there any examples of personification in this poem? Personification (which is actually a form of metaphor) is where an object is described as though it is behaving in a human or animalistic way. E.g. Sassoon describes October in the trenches of World War One thus:

‘October’s bellowing anger

breaks and cleaves’

Personification is extremely useful to poets in creating atmosphere or mood.

REMEMBER: LITERARY

NINJAS ALWAYS:

BACK UP their points with

evidence from the text and say

HOW figurative language

conveys the poet’s meaning.

IMAGERY

FIVE QUESTIONS

LITERARY NINJAS

ALWAYS ASK

Imagery is the name we give to elements in the poem which describe what can be sensed. Although the word ‘imagery’ suggests the idea of a picture, imagery itself is not necessarily visual:

  1. What can be touched? Can you find any images in the poem which suggest physical sensations? Here is an example from Keats:

‘A burning forehead, and a parching

tongue’

Keats uses these images to evoke human weakness.

  1. What can be seen? Visual imagery is perhaps the most common. What does the poem help you to see?

‘The sea is calm tonight.

The tide is full, the moon lies fair

Upon the straits;’

Here in ‘Dover Beach’ Matthew Arnold evokes, with simple language, a still sea at night time.

  1. What can be smelled? Does the poet evoke any smells, pleasant or unpleasant? In ‘Blackberry Picking’, Seamus Heaney writes:

‘The juice was stinking too.’

He is trying to convey the sour smell of rotting blackberries.

  1. What can be heard? Poets go to great lengths to evoke the experience of hearing different sounds. Here is Ezra Pound:

There I heard naught save the harsh

sea

And ice-cold wave…’

Pound is using sound to help him immerse the reader in the impression of being on a ship on a stormy sea.

  1. What can be tasted?

Finally, there is taste. Here is Heaney

again:

You ate that first one and its flesh was sweet Like thickened wine…

The poem from which this is taken,

‘Blackberry Picking’, is a deliberate

assault on all the senses, immersing the

reader in a vivid, if distant, memory.

REMEMBER: LITERARY NINJAS ALWAYS: BACK UP their points with evidence from the text and say HOW imagery conveys the poet’s meaning.

STRUCTURE

EIGHT QUESTIONS

LITERARY NINJAS

ALWAYS ASK

Structure is the word we use to

describe how poets arrange their ideas

in the poem. Poets tend to think

extremely carefully about the

information they convey to us and the

order in which they convey it.

The structure of a poem is very often

the key to its whole meaning.

To analyse the structure of a poem,

ask the following questions of yourself:

1) Sequence: Does the poem have

a clear beginning, middle and

end? If so, what are these?

2) Subject: Is the poem about a

single idea or is it a narrative,

moving backwards and/or

forwards through time?

3) Flow: Does the poem move

smoothly through different

stages, or are there sudden

pauses, breaks or shocks?

4) Mood: What changes are there

in mood? Mood is another

word for ‘atmosphere’. Poets

tend to create mood or

atmosphere through their use of

images.

5) Voice: What changes are there

in voice? In other words, how

does the character, outlook or

personality of the speaker

change during the poem?

6) Tense: Is the poem about the

past, present, or future? Is it a

mixture of these? Are there any

switches in tense?

7) Rhyme scheme: Is there a

rhyme scheme? If there is, is it

consistent throughout the poem

or does it change?

8) Rhythm / pace: How would you

describe the rhythm and/or the

pace of the poem? Are these

consistent throughout the poem

or do they change? If they

change, do they change

gradually or abruptly?

REMEMBER: LITERARY

NINJAS ALWAYS:

BACK UP their points with

evidence from the text and say

HOW structural techniques

convey the poet’s meaning.