As a poet myself, I know how hard it can be to come up with organic lines that don’t feel repetitive or overused. Recently, I started to feel like my poems all sounded the same. But then it hit me: It’s because I used the same techniques over and over! I thought to myself, What if I explored other types of wordplay instead and really stretched the limits of the English language and its linguistic sensibilities? Because, really, rules are made to be broken, right?
I love a good, well-timed rhyme or witty pun that rolls off the tongue as much as the next person. But there are a great many other literary devices to choose from that may not have surfaced on your radar. Here’s a handful I picked out to start with.
Synecdoche
The word synecdoche derives from the Greek words “syn,” meaning “together,” and “ekdoche,” meaning “interpretation.” This term is a figure of speech in which a word is used in place of a longer phrase to invoke the same meaning. Another way to think of it is when “part” of something refers to the “whole” of something. Some examples from everyday speech include “wheels” to describe vehicles, “suits” to refer to businesspeople, and “headcount,” where people’s heads represent their entire person.
These examples all fall under the most common form of synecdoche, known as a microcosm, but there’s another type called a macrocosm. A macrocosmic synecdoche uses the “entirety of something” to reference a part of it, as seen in William Wordsworth’s poem, The World Is Too Much With Us.
The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;—
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not. Great God! I’d rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.The World is Too Much with Us, William Wordsworth (1807)
In the titular first line, “the world is too much with us,” Wordsworth uses the whole world to refer to part of this world — in this case, human society — and its growing materialism and disconnect with nature. The synecdoche employed here emphasizes how it’s as if humanity has lost sight of the “whole” world and the vast expanse of nature in it, but instead, their vision has narrowed to focus on the much smaller world of material gain as a result of growing industrialization.
Polyptoton
If you’ve ever used words in a sentence that all derived from the same root before — think “rich” in “richest” or “photo” in “photogenic” — then you’ve used a polyptoton. The key to this literary device is repeating words (usually in proximity to each other in the same phrase) that all share the same word root. What is the origin of the word polyptoton itself, you ask? Well, it comes from a Greek phrase of a similar name that means “many cases.”
Try counting how many polyptotons you can find in the following lines from Rudyard Kipling’s poem If—.
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise.If—, Rudyard Kipling (1910)
If you counted three, then you are, in fact, correct! Lines one to three of this excerpt all contain polyptotons. “Wait” and “waiting,” “lied” and “lies,” and finally, “hated” and “hating” are pairs of words that share the same root word. Through the repetition of these words in their different forms, Kipling conveys the idea of remaining resilient and enduring the challenges that life constantly throws at us. A profound message urging us to persevere and, in spite of others’ deceit, not to give in and resort to lying ourselves. That in the face of hate, we shouldn’t also perpetuate a cycle of hate.
Enjambment
A popular poetic technique is enjambment, which occurs when a line of a poem ends before a phrase is complete without punctuation to indicate a pause in between. The phrase can often break in unexpected places, crossing over to a new line or stanza. It comes from the French word “enjamber”, which is defined as “stride over” or “go beyond.” See if you can spot the enjambment in Rita Dove’s American Smooth.
We were dancing—it must have
been a foxtrot or a waltz,
something romantic but
requiring restraint,
American Smooth, Rita Dove (2004)
Dove employs enjambment in the phrase split across lines one and two between “have” and “been” and lines three and four, “but” and “requiring,” creating a sense of continuity mimicking the flowing movements of the dances mentioned. The combination of enjambment and end-stopped (punctuated at the end) lines also gives the poem a set rhythm, similar to the way dancers follow the steps of a dance.
Circumlocution
I’m sure you’ve had a moment or two when you wanted to skirt around the answer to a direct question. Maybe you said something to mask your ignorance, like “oh, I’m not too sure if I have the answer you’re looking for,” instead of “I don’t know.” Well, it turns out you were circumlocuting.
Circumlocution originates from the Latin word circumlocutio, which can be broken down into “circum,” meaning “around,” and “loqui,” meaning “to speak.” It’s honestly a bit of a controversial technique since it’s a form of rhetoric used to discuss a topic in an ambiguous and roundabout way. Some critics perceive it negatively as a way of making writing too flowery or verbose. The Rape of the Lock is one such poem by Alexander Pope that features circumlocution.
Which for the neighb’ring Hampton takes its name.
Here Britain’s statesmen oft the fall foredoom
Dost sometimes counsel take—and sometimes tea.
Not louder shrieks to pitying Heav’n are cast,
When husbands or when lap-dogs breathe their last,
Or when rich China vessels, fall’n from high,
In glitt’ring dust and painted fragments lie!
The Rape of the Lock, Alexander Pope (1712)
Here, Pope circumlocutes to emphasize the sarcastic tone of this satirical poem, indirectly critiquing the aristocracy’s social priorities. In particular, with the line “when husbands or when lap dogs breathe their last,” instead of saying “die,” Pope trivialises the deaths of both the husbands and pets. This highlights how the rich class would dwell on less important issues whilst ignoring more significant ones.
Auto-antonym
I saved my favorite technique for last. The auto-antonym is a word that serves as its very own worst enemy. (Sounds like a really cool supervillain name if you ask me, which is apt given its definition.) Sporting an alias antagonym by day and contronym by night, an auto-antonym has meanings that contradict each other. It derives from the Greek words “auto” and “antonym,” which translate to “self” and “opposite name,” respectively.
Can you pinpoint the auto-antonyms in Emily Dickinson’s poem, I felt a cleaving in my mind?
I felt a cleaving in my mind
As if my brain had split;
I tried to match it, seam by seam,
But could not make them fit.
The thought behind I strove to join
Unto the thought before,
But sequence ravelled out of reach
Like balls upon a floor.
I felt a cleaving in my mind, Emily Dickinson (1890)
An auto-antonym that often appears in writing is the word “cleave,” as seen above. This is truly a brilliant example, because Dickinson uses “cleaving” here to refer to both the idea that her mind is splitting in two and simultaneously her attempts to recombine the parts. Additionally, the word “ravelled” conjures the image of thoughts becoming jumbled and tangled up whilst also falling apart like balls of yarn rolling on the floor. Other auto-antonyms exist, such as “peruse,” “table,” and “dust.” See if you can think up some more.
Did any of these poems have you marveling at the sheer creative genius behind them? Maybe you’ve even found one or two literary techniques to test out in your own writing and give Shakespeare a run for his money! In any case, I hope these lines of poetry have you feeling at least a little inspired. And if you’re just looking for a fun game of wordplay to pass the time, see if you can spot other literary devices I’ve used in this article.
Experiment with different types of wordplay by filling in the blanks to remix some classic poems.
Explore our Poetry Bookshop shelf for some more poetry recommendations.
