Introduction To Poetry

1
Introduction To Poetry

• Two-Column Notes

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Types of Poetry

• Poetry is often best experienced when read aloud
• Two kinds lyric and narrative
• Lyric Poetry expresses the emotions of the
  poems speaker usually focuses on a single
  moment, image, or idea
• Narrative Poetry tells a story
• Epics long narrative poems that describe the
  deeds of heroes, gods, or goddesses
• Offer insights into the culture from which
  they originate

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Forms of Poetry

• Sonnet a fourteen-line poem that usually
  explores the theme of romantic love
• Usually are rhymed and use a regular rhythm
• Haiku short, three-line poems that describe a
  single image or scene from nature
• First and third lines have five syllables,
  while the second line is made up of seven
• Concrete Poem poem that is shaped like the
  thing it describes
• Blank Verse does not rhyme, but each line has
  five stressed syllables, or beats
• Most commonly used by Shakespeare
• Free Verse does not use consistent rhymes or
  rhythms can take any shape and address any
  subject

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Elements of Poetry

• Line a single row of words in poetry poets
  work with both the sentence and the line
• Stanzas groups of lines in poetry separated by
  a space
• Three types of stanzas couplet, tercet,
  and quatrain
• Sound Devices make poetry more exciting, more
  musical, and can affect its meaning
• Rhyme the repetition of sounds at the ends
  of words
• Slant Rhyme rhyme that is not completely
  exact
• Rhythm pattern of beats, or stressed
  syllables, in a line
• Meter a regular pattern of beats
• Alliteration the repetition of consonant
  sounds at the beginnings of words

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Elements of Poetry (Cont.)

• Figurative Language anything written or spoken
  that is not meant to be taken literally
• Metaphor a figure of speech in which one
  thing is spoken or written about as if it were
  another
• Simile compares one thing to another, but
  uses the words like or as
• Hyperbole an exaggeration used for effect
  or to make a point
• Personification a figure of speech in
  which something not human is described as if it
  were human

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The Meaning of Poetry

• Poets express their ideas, experiences, and
  feelings with imagery, figurative language, and
  symbols
• Symbol a thing that stands for itself and
  something else

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Imagery in Poetry

• Definition in literature, language that creates
  a concrete representation of an object or an
  experience
• Writers use imagery to create a setting or a
  character, to express an idea or emotion, or to
  affect the mood.

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More Sound Devices

• Rhyme Scheme the consistent pattern of end
  rhyme in a poem
• Consonance when a consonant sound is repeated
  at the end or in the middles of words
• Assonance when a writer repeats vowel sounds
• Onomatopoeia using a word or phrase that sounds
  like the thing it names
• Examples pow, crash, and meow
• Adds excitement and an additional layer of
  sensory experience

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Speaker

• Definition the voice that narrates the poem
• Sometimes participates in the action of the poem,
  using first-person point of view or third-person
  point of view
• Never assume that a poems speaker is the same as
  the poet
• A speaker can be a person, animal, object, or
  idea
• Sometimes explicitly states the theme, or central
  idea of the poem
• Must be inferred by examining the tone,
  mood, description, or use of figurative language