What are literary devices

Literary devices or rhetorical figures are called those unconventional ways of using language. They are usually applied by authors in their literary works to give them greater effusiveness and/or beauty. We are talking about unusual uses in the way of constructing sentences, with phonetic, semantic or grammatical peculiarities.

Figures of speech, in themselves, are creative and different ways of writing and/or expressing ideas. They are easily identified because through them the common use of the language is altered. In fact, the authors use them to delimit their style, their imprint at the time of carrying out their work (concepto.de, 2022).

These are some of the most used literary devices

Semantic lexical resources

Comparison or simile:

draw a parallel between two concepts from a grammatical link of resemblance that is explicit.

Example:

• "He is cowardly as a mouse."

Metaphor:

This literary device identifies a real object with another with which it bears a resemblance rhetorical:

Example:

• "Her golden hair and cotton lips."

Hyperbole:

Is an exaggerated expression that seeks to make an idea notice:

Example:

• "With such a big nose you're going to gouge out anyone's eye."

Metonymy:

It is very similar to the metaphor. It consists of exchanging the name of something for something else that it resembles. How it is applied depends on its contiguity. It is usually more used in colloquial language. These are some examples:

• Container by content: “Do you want a glass of red wine?”;
• Instrument by artist: "They performed Mozart from night to dawn";
• Concrete for abstract (or vice versa): “He has as bad a hand as a bad head”;
• Place by the object it produces: "Yesterday I had a port, the best";
• Person by the object he produces: “I bought a Da Vinci for thousands of dollars. I think I was scammed."

Epithet:

It is a resource that enhances or underlines a characteristic of the noun it accompanies without altering its essence.

Example:

• "The burning flames of the bright sun."

Hyperbaton:

This rhetorical resource is usually used in the poetic context. It is about exchanging the syntax of a sentence to establish emphasis on an idea.

Examples:

• "Thank God for getting us out of trouble";

• "The dark swallows will return

their nests to hang on your balcony” (Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer).

Image:

This literary figure seeks to create mental images or symbols through words. It is intended that the reader can imagine exactly what you want to convey.

Examples:

• “I am an open book”;
• "He defends his family like a fierce dog."

Interrogation or rhetorical question:

This resource is very popular. This is a question that does not expect to be answered.

Examples:

• “How many times do I have to tell you to do your homework?”;
• How long this ordeal, Lord?

Irony:

It is used to express an idea that seeks to allude to an opposite referent.

Examples:

• “I love your punctuality! (he comes late)";
• "The bus left me again! But what good luck for me!"

litote:

It is an expression in which what is intended to be an affirmation is denied.

Example:

• “You shouldn't be too far away (it's close)”;

• “An unbroken dream,

I want a pure, happy, free day;

I don't want to see the frown

vainly severe

of whom the blood exalts or the money”.

(Fray Luis de Leon, of his Ode I)

Antithesis:

connect two opposite concepts without contradicting them in order to emphasize an idea.

Examples:

• “Love is so short and oblivion is so long” (Pablo Neruda);
• “One small step for a man, but one giant step for humanity” (Neil Armstrong).

Apostrophe:

It is about interrupting the dialogue, narrative or speech in a vehement way, in order to invoke a personification, either imaginary or real.

Example:

“Oh sad dark clouds

how strong you walk, get me out of these sadnesses

and take me to the depths

from the sea to where you are going!”

(Gil Vicente, Reuben's Comedy).

Synesthesia:

literary souvenir in which the physical senses merge to form a statement.

Examples:

• "Your sweet words made my heart happy";
• "This forgetting is bitter, as bitter is the life of the emigrant."

Phonic literary devices

Alliteration:

Construction of a sentence in which the repetition of the same sound is used in a premeditated way. It is common in riddles, rhymes and tongue twisters.

Example:

• “Three sad tigers swallow wheat in a wheat field” (popular tongue twister)”.

Onomatopoeia:

Words whose phonetics resemble what they represent. Widely used in colloquial language.

Example:

• "The tick-tock of the clock was in time with the woof-woof of the dogs."

paranomasia:

corresponds to the use of similar words with different meanings within the same sentence. It is widely used in rhymes, poems and popular sayings.

Example:

• "The hedgehog is iridescent, bristles, curls with laughter" (Octavio Paz).

morphosyntactic or grammatical literary devices

Polysyndeton:

Repeated use of conjunctions that give greater force to a sentence.

Example:

• "The soft and fresh and sweet and harmonic morning of spring, although distant, was seen to come and go through the primitive greenery of the faithful and warm and many trees of the garden."

Epanadiplosis:

It is about repeating one or several words at the beginning and at the end of the composition of a sentence.

Example:

• “Silence of the night, painful silence / nocturnal… (Rubén Darío, Nocturne).

Epiphora:

It works very similar to the previous one. The difference is that it is made up of the repetition of one or more words only at the end of the sentence.

Example:

• "Dinner was prepared by all the diners, gobbled up by all the diners, and criticized by all the diners."

Derivation:

It is a literary device is created from the derivation of words with the same root (unir.net, 2022).

Example:

• “Early the morning got up early” (Miguel Hernández).

Concatenation:

It consists of repeating one or more words that appear at the end of a sentence to join it to the beginning of the next sentence.

Example:

“And just as the cat usually says after a while,

the mouse on the rope,

the rope to the stick,

the muleteer gave to Sancho,

Sancho to the girl,

the girl to him,

the innkeeper to the girl”

(Miguel de Cervantes).

Anadiplosis:

This rhetorical device it is about starting a sentence with the same words with which the previous sentence ends (Wikipedia, 2022).

Example:

“The soul of Blancaflor;

wound floats in the river;

in the river of love

(Oscar Hahn, XNUMXth century).

Anaphora:

Repeated use of one or more words only at the beginning of a sentence or verse. It is usually used in speech, and has the purpose of emphasizing something that has already been said.

Example:

"There are silent kisses, noble kisses

there are enigmatic kisses, sincere

There are kisses that are given only by souls

there are kisses for forbidden, true”.

(Gabriela Mistral)

Other literary resources that exist are the following

• Prosthesis;
• Syncopation;
• Contraction;
• Metathesis;
• Ablaut;
• Parallelism;
• Ellipse;
• synchisis;
• Paraphrase;
• epiphoneme;
• Paradox;
• Oxymoron;
• Etopeia;
• Chronography;
• Paralipsis.