Transcript Preparing for Poetry
Preparing for Poetry
What are your thoughts on Poetry?
Why do people read and write poetry?
What are your personal experiences with poetry?
Do you enjoy it or dislike it? Why?
Strategies for Reading Poetry
1. Read the lines according to punctuation 2. Paraphrase 3. Identify the speaker 4. Draw inferences 5. Use your senses
Poetic Form
The structure of the poem; how it appears
Stanza- a group of lines that are meant to be read as a unit; paragraph within a poem
Couplet- pair of rhyming lines
Hippopotamus The giant city bus Looks like a hippopotamus That lumbers down the busy street With rounded nose and rubber feet.
It swallows people whole While charging them a toll, Then carries them about Until it stops and spits them out.
Couplet Stanza By Douglas Florian
Elements of Poetry
Rhyme
Repeated sounds at the end of the words The cat sat on a mat – cat, sat and mat rhyme because the –at sound is repeated at the end of the words.
Rhyme Scheme A pattern of regular rhyming words in a poem. It is indicated by lower case letters. Each rhyme has a different letter. You have seen this written as: aabb or abab
Hector the Collector Collected bits of
string
.
Collected dolls with broken heads And rusty bells that would not
ring
.
What is the rhyme scheme of the above stanza?
What is the rhyme scheme of the poem below?
The Germ by Ogden Nash A mighty creature is the g
erm
, Though smaller than the pachyd
erm
.
His customary dwelling pl
ace
Is deep within the human r
ace
.
His childish pride he often pl
eases
By giving people strange dis
eases
.
Do you, my poppet, feel inf
irm
?
You probably contain a g
erm
.
Alliteration
The repeating of beginning sounds in several words in a line of poetry.
Alliteration
Science has spoiled my supper.
Mickey is a mighty mouse “but the big man must have been blessed”
Metaphor
A figure of speech in which something is described as though it were something else – compares two unlike things without using ‘like’ or ‘as’. It is a direct comparison of two unlike things.
Metaphor
“All the world’s a stage, and we are merely players.” My father is a hurricane Life is a journey Love is the wildcard of existence.
Simile
A figure of speech that uses “like” or “as” to make a direct comparison between two unlike objects.
Simile
Jessica is as sour as vinegar.
A sapphire shines as blue as heaven Hatred is as dark as a thundercloud Your love flows through my veins like the Nile River flows through the sands of Eygpt.
Personification
The type of figurative language in which a nonhuman subject is given human characteristics The flowers danced in the gentle breeze The fire swallowed the entire forest The first rays of morning tiptoed through the meadow
Personification
The wind yells at the night sky
The ocean danced in the moonlight The candle flame danced in the dark
Hyperbole
The deliberate exaggeration or overstatement
Hyperbole
"I'm so hungry I could eat a horse." "If I've told you once, I've told you a million times." "She is one-hundred feet tall."
Onomatopoeia
The use of a word whose sound makes you think of its meaning
swish splash drip
Onomatopoeia
SYMBOLISM
When a person, place, thing, or event that has meaning in itself also represents, or stands for, something else.
= Innocence = America = the path you take or follow through life = Peace
Sara Teasdale in her poem Wild Asters develops a number of striking symbols: “In the spring, I asked the daisies If his words were true, And the clever, clear-eyed daisies Always knew.
Now the fields are brown and barren, Bitter autumn blows, And of all the stupid asters Not one knows.” In the above lines, “spring” and “daisies” are symbols of youth. “Brown and barren” are symbols of transition from youth to old age. Moreover, “Bitter autumn” symbolizes death.
Theme:
An ingredient of a literary work, which
gives the work unity
. The theme provides an answer to the question "What is the work about?" Each literary work carries its own theme(s). Unlike plot, which deals with the action of a work,
theme concerns itself with a work's message
or contains the general idea of a work.
Love and friendship are frequently occurring themes in literature.
Acquainted with the Night I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have walked out in rain—and back in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.
I have looked down the saddest city lane.
I have passed by the watchman on his beat And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.
I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet When far away an interrupted cry Came over houses from another street,
The theme of Robert Frost's "Acquainted with the Night" is loneliness.
But not to call me back or say good-bye; And further still at an unearthly height, One luminary clock against the sky Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right. I have been one acquainted with the night.