This document provides an outline for exploring poetry. It discusses the main types of poetry including narrative, lyric, epigram, ode, aubade, and sonnet. It also covers poetic devices such as voice, tone, diction, imagery, figurative language, and symbolism. Figurative language discussed includes simile, metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, personification, and hyperbole. Cultural and literary symbols are also defined. Students are assigned to analyze a poem in a written report with a specified format and deadline.

1. Exploring poetry
Universitas Singaperbangsa Karawang
Anisa Risatyah,S.Pd

2. Outline
• Review :
1. types of poetry
2. Voice
3. Diction
4. Imagery
5. Figurative language
6. Symbolism
• First assignment

3. 1. Types of poetry
• Poetry can be grouped into narrative and lyric poetry
• Narrative poetry: tell stories and describe actions
e.g.
- Epics (long narrative poems that record the adventures
of a hero whose exploits are important to the history of a
nation
- ballads
- romance

4. 1. Types of poetry (cont.)
• Lyric poetry focuses more on the emotion.
• Lyrics an be defined as subjective poems, often brief,
expresses the feelings and thoughts of a single speaker
(who may or may not represent the poet).
• E.g.
- Epigram (a brief witty poem that is often satirical)
- Ode (a long stately poem in stanzas of varied
length, meter, and form)
- Aubade (a love lyric expressing complaint that the
speaker must part from his lover)
- Sonnet

5. 2. Voice and tone
• The speaker’s voice conveys tone
• Tone is an abstraction we make from the
datails of a poem’s language: meter,
diction, imagery, figures of speech.
• Listen to a poem’s language, hear the
voice of its speaker -> we catch the tone
and feeling and meaning
• What is the tone in Wordsworth’s
I wandered lonely as a cloud?

6. 3. Diction
• Words choice
• To understand not only the words’ meaning but
also understand what the words imply or
suggest.
• Words have both denotation (dictionary
meaning) and connotation (association
meaning, implied meaning).
• William Wordsworth’s I wandered lonely as a
cloud.

7. William Wordsworth’s I wandered lonely as
a cloud
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
*Golden (adj) : made of gold, the colour of gold
connotation meaning: light (it shines and glitters),
wealth (money and fortune)

8. 4. Imagery
• Images are words or phrases that appeal to our senses.
• Imagery refers to the combinations or clusters of images
that are used to create a dominant impression.
• Imagery may be
visual (something seen)
aural (something heard)
tactile (something felt)
Olfactory (something smelled)
Gustatory (something tasted)

9. Thomas Hardy’s Neutral Tones
We stood by a pond that winter day,
And the sun was white, as though chidden of God,
And a few leaves lay on the starving sod;
-- They had fallen from an ash, and were gray

10. 5. Figurative Language
Any use of language which deviates from
the obvious or common usage in order to
achieve a special meaning or effect.
e.g. simile, metaphor, metonymy,
synecdoche, personification, hyperbole,
euphemism, etc.

11. Simile
• Figure of speech in which
a comparison between
two distinctly different
things is indicated by the
words ‘like’ , ‘as’, or ‘than’
• 3 elements: tenor,
vehicle, ground
Life is like a rollercoaster
Tenor (subject) : life
Vehicle (comparison):
rollercoaster
Ground (tenor + vehicle
have in common) : it has
its ups and downs
Metaphor
• Implied comparison which
creates a total
identification between the
two things being
compared.
• 3 elements: tenor,
vehicle, ground.
e.g. Life is a rollercoaster
Tenor?
Vehicle?
Ground?

12. Metonymy
Synecdoche
• Greek: a change of name
• Term for one thing is
applied to another which
it has become closely
associated.
e.g. crown refers to a king
the White House refers
to official Washington
home for the President/
the American government
itself
• Greek: taking together
• A part of something is
used to signify the whole,
or vice versa.
e.g. Many hands make light
work (proverb)
I am reading Dickens

13. Personification
Hyperbole
• A form of comparison in
which human
characteristics, such as
emotion, personality,
behaviour, and so on, are
attributed to animal,
object, or idea.
• Is intended to make ideas
clearer to the readers by
comparing the object to
everyday human
experience.
e.g.?
• A figure of speech which
employ exaggeration,
extreme, or excessive.
• E.g. ?

14. 6. Symbolism
A symbol is any object or action that means
more than itself, any object or action that
represents something beyond itself.
e.g. rose : beauty, love
tree : family’s root and branches
soaring bird : freedom
light : hope, knowledge, life

15. Cultural or shared
symbols
• are widely recognized
and accepted
• are needed careful
examination
e.g. Dawn = hope
white = innocence
dark = ignorance
light = knowledge
Literary or personal
symbols
• Authors’ own original
symbols
• Do not have preestablished associations :
the meaning emerges
from the context

16. First assignment
• Format
- Times New Roman, 12, double space, A4, normal margin.
- Tittle : First Assignment – Exploring Poetry
An analysis on (poem’s tittle)
by: (names of group)
• Due date and time
- Submit the assignment via e-mail before or on the
agreed due date and time
- Late submission will not be accepted
- Any plagiarism/ copy-pasted assignment results on zero
score. No revision.