▪ Simile – comparing one thing to another using like or as.
He was
as fast as a cheetah.
▪ Metaphor – saying something is something else; a direct
comparison, not meant literally. i.e. He was a cheetah on the
racetrack.
▪ Extended Metaphor – exactly the same as a normal metaphor,
but you’ll see the same idea repeating over multiple sentences,
lines or paragraphs. Think: You’re a lion. When you speak, you
roar. You’re the king of the jungle, the bravest of the beasts.
▪ Personification – applying human characteristics to inanimate
objects, i.e. the angry sea, the pen is dancing, the sun is smiling,
the clouds are crying.
▪ Antiprosopopoeia – When a human is described as an object.
For example, he is a doormat.
▪ Zoomorphism is when you give humans animal features, i.e. he
growled with wolfish hunger. She roared loudly.
▪ Anthropomorphism – Giving animals human characteristics. For
example, the laughing cow.
▪ Pathetic fallacy – when the weather outside reflects the mood
within i.e. the “angry sky” or “the wind whispered through the
trees”. Usually done to set the tone or reflect the mood of
characters. In Gothic horror, the stormy weather may
foreshadow/predict that a murder or something dreadful will occur
later.
▪ Alliteration – When two or more words begin with the same
consonant. E.g. Magical, mesmerising, mercurial Messi. ▪
Assonance – repeating vowel sounds (at the start of middle of
consecutive words). An angry alligator or screaming teeth. ▪
Anecdote – a short story from personal experience. Like that time
you missed the bus, got soaked in the rain, then had to cycle all the
way to school. You know?
▪ Onomatopoeia – words that sound like what they are. Bang,
clap, thud, crash, click, crunch.
▪ Sibilance – a repeated ‘s’ sound – e.g. the slithering, sneaky, sly
snake.
▪ Colloquial Language – informal or slang words and phrases (i.e.
just how you’d speak everyday!). E.g. wanna rather than “want to”
or gonna instead of going to.
▪ Sensory Detail – relating to the senses (sight, sound, taste,
touch, smell).
▪ Euphemism – A polite way of saying something often taboo or
controversial. For example, passed away instead of died.
▪ Emotive Language – Powerful words, especially adjectives,
which relate to your feelings. E.g. infuriated, exasperated,
enraged.
▪ Evocative Verbs – A doing word which sounds particularly
active. The cat slinked, crawled, darted – rather than just walked. ▪
Allusion – making reference to other people, places, events,
literary work, myths, or works of art…. i.e. he alluded to the Van
Gogh painting on the wall. The Chronicles of Narnia contains
Biblical allusions.
▪ Hyperbole – Gross exaggeration. He had tonnes of homework to
do.
▪ Oxymoron – Two words with the opposite meaning next to each
other. Loving hate, awfully good, deafening silence, living dead,
educated fool.
▪ Juxtaposition – Two or more contrasting ideas but not next to
each other. For example, the juxtaposition between good and
evil.
▪ Rhetorical question – A question which is not expected to be
answered but is challenges the reader or audience to question
their beliefs.
▪ Interrogative sentence – This is basically a question. ▪ Imperative
sentence – A sentence that commands or demands. Do your
homework. Go and wash the plates now! ▪ Exclamatory sentence –
A sentence that exclaims and ends with an exclamation mark!!
▪ Rule of Three – three words or phrases that go together. E.g. A
Mars a day helps you to work, rest and play. Veni, vidi, vinci (I
came, I saw, I conquered). Citius, altius, fortius (faster, higher,
stronger).