Poetry and drama have a few key features that emphasize their per formative nature. One is the use of rhyme, rhythm, meter, alliteration, and other types of sound symbolism. For example, in Gwendolyn Brooks' "We real cool", the poet uses a strong rhyme scheme, a consistent meter, and an almost sing-song tone to demonstrate the lack of education of the narrator and his or her youthfulness. It also emphasizes the last line "We die soon.". Another is in "unity of action".
Details and Delivery: An Examination of Rhetorical Devices in Whitman’s “Hours Continuing Long” The power of the spoken word often goes underestimated in the fast-paced lifestyle that characterizes the modern era in which we live today. Although essentially one may absorb the same ideas and interpretations by reading a certain work of literature from the page and then hearing that same work read aloud, these two separate means of reaching one similar conclusion are radically different experiences in their own. From history we may discern the prevalence and effectiveness of oral tradition before written poetry, and even today it is apparent that aural memory is stronger than any other type of sensory memory. The slight discrepancies of sound within poetry are each significant to the meanings one can gather from it and also the final, vocal delivery of the poem. The gravity of this spoken word is demonstrated in the work of Walt Whitman, who is frequently lauded as the all-American advocate of “democratic” poetry or the use of common language to join individual readers and evoke a sympathetic exchange of experiences.
In the poems To Helen, by Edgar Allan Poe and Helen, by Hilda DooLittle Helen is seen as a woman of power but portrayed differently in each. In the first poem To Helen the tone used to develop her character is very positive and adoring and sweet. In the second, Helen the tone is more degrading and dark. The authors support the tones in both poems with descriptive imagery and precise diction. The diction alone automatically sets the two poems apart.
Comparative Essay In her poems Ariel, Whiteness I Remember and Daddy, Sylvia Plath explores a variety of issues and conveys various themes in some very interesting ways. And while some of the themes and tones used throughout the poem are similar, others are very starkly contrasted. I will explore these two opposing degrees in the following essay. One theme consistent throughout all three poems is despondency. Whilst poems like Ariel begin with release, and Daddy ends with hopefulness, wholly their content is rather dejected and joyless.
Even before one reads this book they cannot understand what it truly means to break away from hardship and into love without reading and comprehending the passion and love in each and every line of this poetry. Thus, I will explain to you why exactly I feel this form of poetry is good if not the best way to express ones experience with falling in love! For instance, the very first page of Street Love says it all. It explains where Junice comes from, where she has grown up, and how this life has made her who she is today! Page one (1), line thirteen, states “Harlem is not an easy place to grow old” – and this is very much backed up throughout the story in her case.
They both explore the theme of love or rather painful love. the poet revels the link between the two poems’s through a verity of techniques which is done very effectively but also shows the difference between the obsessive love in “Havisham” and the possessive love of “Valentine”. The pain of love is evident from the beginning in both poems. “Carol Ann Duffy” uses the tone in the first couple of stanzas to show the unorthodox nature of the love. “Not a day since then I haven’t whished him dead”-Havisham This is very effective as the aggressive tone shows “Havisham” has been rejected and her love is causing her pain.
In Wild Oats It explains that a person, over the course of time, comes to realise that his greatest desires of love, are unattainable, and second best things will have to suffice. The central purpose of this poem is to show that love is one of these great desires and despite flashes of promise it contains scarcely anything that is more than fragmentary. Larkin reveals this through tone and diction. Both poets seem to focus a lot on the physical side of love where lust and desire are involved however Abse makes it sound more sensual and even spiritual when he speaks of Eros in his poem. Larkin portrays this sense of objectification in his poem with regards to woman as he describes a woman as a ‘bosomy English rose’ and then follows on to call her ‘beautiful’ throughout the poem portraying the sexual lust involved with love.
She used mostly slant rhyme, which are words that look like they rhyme but they do not, such as can’t and want. Examples of this are in several poems but specifically, The Soul selects her own Society when it goes, “I’ve known her- from an ample nation- Choose One- Then- close the Valves of her attention- Like Stone” The way she rhymes stone and one is her use of slant rhyme. Whitman wrote in distinctive use of language called ‘voice’. This type of language shows the author’s or speaker’s personality to the reader. Voice is determined by several elements, including word choice and
The irony of the title is mirrored by the irony that the form that this epic work takes is the sonnet; traditionally (in accord with Dante and Petrarch) a love poem and often presented as a gift. Each sixteen-line sonnet can be read individually as well as seen as part of a whole. Like any upstanding Victorian marriage, the meter is controlled and well mannered. Meredith opts for an ABBA rhyme scheme, with a different set of rhymes for each quatrain. The usual octet-sestet form would be too limiting for the narrative to move freely.
Critical Response to Since Feeling is First In his poem Since Feeling is First, Cummings throws out all punctuation, grammar and conventions and writes in a very unusual way in order to emphasise the importance of logic versus emotion. Cummings feels a very strong connection to emotion and his beliefs are laid out within the poem as he expresses that the power of love and emotion is worth the greater attention. The poem is addressed to a lady that is left as an unknown source, Cummings feelings a very strong connection emotionally to this particular lady and states that “his blood approves.” This statement shows that Cummings is making a particular connection to the fact that there is no logic being used but rather the decision that if your emotions approve that is all that is needed. In the quote “Kisses are a better fate than wisdom,” Cummings suggests that although wisdom will generally guide decisions, when the heart is followed a road is travelled on that may be one of happiness and joy. Cummings repeatedly informs the lady that in order to really experience life one but not notice all the other things and just concentrate on the feelings within.