Lecture #6

POETIC EXPRESSIVE MEANS AND STYLISTIC DEVICES

Poetic expressive means and stylistic devices are aimed at producing a pleasant acoustic effect and arousing certain emotions of the reader or listener. They are based on the acoustic effect produced by the words and sentences.

1. EUPHONY

Euphony is a combination of sounds producing a pleasant acoustic effect. It is achieved by alliteration, assonance, rhythm, rhyme and sound symbolism. Euphony is pleasing and harmonious, while cacophony is harsh and discordant.

A. Alliteration

Alliteration is the recurrence of an initial consonant in two or more words, which either follow one another, or appear close enough to be noticeable. This device is very widely used in English – more often than in other languages – due to the fact that words in Old English were stressed on the first syllable.

We can see it in poetry and prose, very often in titles of books, in slogans and in set phrases. Consonance is the repetition of the same consonant sound anywhere in a string of words, not just the initial sound as is in alliteration.

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Alliteration

Set expressions

part and parcel, safe and sound, forgive and forget, bed and breakfast

Book Titles

Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club (Ch. Dickens), The Last Leaf (O. Henry)

B. Assonance

Assonance is repetition of vowel sounds to create internal rhyming within phrases or sentences, and together with alliteration and consonance serves as one of the building blocks of verse.

For example, in the phrase “Do you like blue?”, the [‘oo’ (ou/ue)] sound is repeated within the sentence and is assonant.

Assonance is more a feature of verse than prose.

Assonance

Pleased to meet you. Please, be seated.

I feel the need, the need for speed.

Hear the mellow wedding bells. (Edgar Allan Poe)

C. Sound Symbolism

Sound Symbolism is the use of words, the sounds of which imitate noises and sound produced in nature by machines, animals, natural phenomena.

Sound Symbolism bang, hiss, clap, drip

Qualcomm ("quality" and "communications") and Verizon ("horizon," as in forward-looking) to Intel ("intelligent" and "electronics")

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