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Question
Pick out the examples of Alliteration and Repetition from the (Basketful of Moonlight) poem.
Solution
Example of Alliteration and Repetition :
“I want to sow many,
small, small moons of light.”
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RELATED QUESTIONS
In pairs, find metaphors from the story to complete the table below. Try to say what qualities are being compared. One has been done for you.
| Object | Metaphor | Quality or Feature Compared |
| Cloud | Huge mountains of clouds | The mass or ‘hugeness’ of mountains |
| Raindrops | ||
| Hailstones | ||
| Locusts | ||
| An epidemic (a disease) that spreads very rapidly and leaves many people dead | ||
| An ox of a man. |
An oxymoron is a figure of speech that combines normally-contradictory terms. The most common form of oxymoron involves an adjective-noun combination of two words like- failed success
Writers often use an oxymoron to call attention to an apparent contradiction. For example, Wilfred Owen's poem The Send-off refers to soldiers leaving for the front line, who "lined the train with faces grimly gay." The oxymoron 'grimly gay' highlights the
contradiction between how the soldiers feel and how they act: though they put on a brave face and act cheerful, they feel grim. Some examples of oxymorons are- dark sunshine, cold sun, living dead, dark light, almost exactly etc. The story Mrs. Packletide's Tiger has a number of oxymorons. Can you identify them and write them down in your notebooks?
The poet uses alliteration to heighten the musical quality of the sonnet. Working in pairs, underline the examples of alliteration in the poem.
Like part one, the second part also has a number of literary devices. List them out in the same way as you had done in question number seven and explain them.
The poet has also used both repetition and similes in the poem. For example-- 'must wait, must stand and wait' (repetition) and 'looked at me vaguely as cattle do' (simile).Pick out examples of both and make a list of them in your notebooks. Give reasons why the poet uses these literary devices.
Although this text speaks of factual events and situations of misery it transforms these situations with an almost poetical prose into a literary experience. How does it do so? Here are some literary devices:
• Hyperbole is a way of speaking or writing that makes something sound better or more exciting than it really is. For example: Garbage to them is gold.
• A Metaphor, as you may know, compares two things or ideas that are not very similar. A metaphor describes a thing in terms of a single quality or feature of some other thing; we can say that a metaphor “transfers” a quality of one thing to another. For example: The road was a ribbon of light.
• Simile is a word or phrase that compares one thing with another using the words “like” or “as”. For example: As white as snow.
Carefully read the following phrases and sentences taken from the text. Can you identify the literary device in each example?
1. Saheb-e-Alam which means the lord of the universe is directly in contrast to what Saheb is in reality.
2. Drowned in an air of desolation.
3. Seemapuri, a place on the periphery of Delhi yet miles away from it, metaphorically.
4. For the children it is wrapped in wonder; for the elders it is a means of survival.
5. As her hands move mechanically like the tongs of a machine, I wonder if she knows the sanctity of the bangles she helps make.
6. She still has bangles on her wrist, but not light in her eyes.
7. Few airplanes fly over Firozabad.
8. Web of poverty.
9. Scrounging for gold.
10. And survival in Seemapuri means rag-picking. Through the years, it has acquired the proportions of a fine art.
11. The steel canister seems heavier than the plastic bag he would carry so lightly over his shoulders.
Find out the examples of ‘Metaphor’ from the poem.
Match the Figures of Speech with the correct definition.
| Poetic Devices | |
| Figure | Definition |
| (1) Metaphor | (a) The use of the same sound at the beginning of words |
| (2) Alliteration | (b) An implied comparison. |
| (3) Onomatopoeia | (c) A comparison between two different things, especially a phrase, containing the words ‘like’ or ‘as’ |
| (4) Simile | (d) A word that resembles the sound it represents. |
Pick out one example of the following Figure of Speech.
Repetition:
The poem is entirely metaphorical. Pick out the comparisons from the poem.
- world - ____________
- actors - ____________
- birth and death - ____________
- school boy - ____________
- the lover's sigh - ____________
- spotted leopard - ____________
- last stage (old age) - ____________
Pick out from the poem two examples of each.
Simile
Pick out from the poem two examples of each.
Metaphor
Choose the correct Figure of speech that occurs in the following line. Justify your choice.
Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon.
Identify the Figure of Speech in the following line.
I stand and look at them long and long.
Identify the Figure of Speech in the following line.
They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God.
Pick out two lines that contain the following figures of speech.
Antithesis
- ________________
- ________________
Find out examples from the poem.
Personification
‘I hear the bright bee hum.’ The poet has used the word ‘hum’ that indicates the sound made by the bee. This is an example of Onomatopoeia. The poet has used different figures of speech like alliteration, inversion, and hyperbole in the poem. Identify them and pick out the lines accordingly.
Alliteration
In poetry, very often, there are lines in which the poet seems to talk directly to an absent person, an abstract idea, or a thing/object. Such a tactic/device used by the poet is the Figure of Speech ‘Apostrophe’.
For example,
Twinkle, twinkle little star ...
Death! Where is thy sting?
O, Caveman! I wish I could live with you.
Now, complete the following, creating an example of an Apostrophe of your own.
- O, Life! How ______
- Dear God, Please ______
- Books! You are ______
- Exams! I wish ______
- O, You beautiful sky ______
Alliteration is the occurrence of the same sound at the beginning of words in a phrase, sentence, etc. such as ‘That life is lived it's very best.’
Find out more examples of Alliteration from other poems in your book.
Pick out lines that contain:
Pun
Pick out lines that contain:
Hyperbole
Pick out lines that contain the following Figures of Speech.
Antithesis (Opposite ideas)
Pick out lines that contain the following Figure of Speech.
Metaphor
Match the lines of the poem with their Figures of speech.
| Group A | Group B | |
| (1) Whose woods these are I think I know | (a) | Alliteration |
| (2) The woods are lovely, dark and deep | (b) | Personification |
| (3) And miles to go before I sleep And miles to go before I sleep. | (c) | Inversion |
| (4) My little horse must think it queer | (d) | Repetition |
Complete the following example of Hyperbole using words from the bracket below.
The hungry man ate a ____________ of food.
Pick from the poem lines which contain the Figures of speech.
Inversion
Pick from the poem lines which contain the Figures of speech.
Interrogation
The Figure of Speech ‘ Apostrophe’ exists throughout the poem. Pick out the line where the poet directly addresses.
the sea-shore
- ____________
- ____________
Find from the poem, one example of the following.
Exclamation
