"Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty."

-- John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Address

Parallelism

Figure of balance identified by a similarity in the syntactical structure of a set of words in successive phrases, clauses, sentences; successive words, phrases, clauses with the same or very similar grammatical structure.

"I've tried to offer leadership to the Democratic Party and the Nation. If, in my high moments, I have done some good, offered some service, shed some light, healed some wounds, rekindled some hope, or stirred someone from apathy and indifference, or in any way along the way helped somebody, then this campaign has not been in vain."

-- Jesse Jackson, 1984 Democratic National Convention Address

Parallelism

Figure of balance identified by a similarity in the syntactical structure of a set of words in successive phrases, clauses, sentences; successive words, phrases, clauses with the same or very similar grammatical structure.

"We have seen the state of our Union in the endurance of rescuers, working past exhaustion. We've seen the unfurling of flags, the lighting of candles, the giving of blood, the saying of prayers in English, Hebrew, and Arabic. "

--George W. Bush, 9-20-01, Address to the Nation on Terrorism

Parallelism

Figure of balance identified by a similarity in the syntactical structure of a set of words in successive phrases, clauses, sentences; successive words, phrases, clauses with the same or very similar grammatical structure.

"...and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."

-- Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg Address

Parallelism

Figure of balance identified by a similarity in the syntactical structure of a set of words in successive phrases, clauses, sentences; successive words, phrases, clauses with the same or very similar grammatical structure.

"We have petitioned and our petitions have been scorned. We have entreated and our entreaties have been disregarded. We have begged and they have mocked when our calamity came. We beg no longer. We entreat no more. We petition no more. We defy them."

-- William Jennings Bryan

Parallelism

Figure of balance identified by a similarity in the syntactical structure of a set of words in successive phrases, clauses, sentences; successive words, phrases, clauses with the same or very similar grammatical structure.

"It is certain that if you were to behold the whole woman, there is that dignity in her aspect, that composure in her motion, that complacency in her manner, that if her form makes you hope, her merit makes you fear."

--Richard Steele, Spectator, No. 113

Parallelism

Figure of balance identified by a similarity in the syntactical structure of a set of words in successive phrases, clauses, sentences; successive words, phrases, clauses with the same or very similar grammatical structure.

(also Antithesis)

"The louder he talked of his honor, the faster we counted our spoons."

--Ralph Waldo Emerson

Parallelism

Figure of balance identified by a similarity in the syntactical structure of a set of words in successive phrases, clauses, sentences; successive words, phrases, clauses with the same or very similar grammatical structure.

"Never in the history of mankind have so many owed so much to so few."

-- Winston Churchill

Parallelism

Figure of balance identified by a similarity in the syntactical structure of a set of words in successive phrases, clauses, sentences; successive words, phrases, clauses with the same or very similar grammatical structure.

Parallelism

Figure of balance identified by a similarity in the syntactical structure of a set of words in successive phrases, clauses, sentences; successive words, phrases, clauses with the same or very similar grammatical structure.

"I came, I saw, I conquered."

--Julius Caesar

Tricolon

Three parallel elements of the same length occurring together in a series.

(also Asyndeton)

"I am the way, the truth, and the life."

--John, 14:4 King James Bible

Tricolon

Three parallel elements of the same length occurring together in a series.

(also Climax)

"Nothing has been left undone to cripple their minds, debase their moral stature, obliterate all traces of their relationship to mankind."

--Lloyd Garrison, Narrative of the Life of an American Slave by Frederick Douglass

Tricolon

Three parallel elements of the same length occurring together in a series.

Antithesis

(an-TIH-theh-sis)

"Love is an ideal thing, marriage a real thing."

--Goethe

Antithesis

Figure of balance in which two contrasting ideas are intentionally juxtaposed, usually through parallel structure; a contrasting of opposing ideas in adjacent phrases, clauses, or sentences.

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way."

--Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

Antithesis

Figure of balance in which two contrasting ideas are intentionally juxtaposed, usually through parallel structure; a contrasting of opposing ideas in adjacent phrases, clauses, or sentences.

(also Anaphora)

"We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools."

-- Martin Luther King Jr.

Antithesis

Figure of balance in which two contrasting ideas are intentionally juxtaposed, usually through parallel structure; a contrasting of opposing ideas in adjacent phrases, clauses, or sentences.

"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. I have a dream today!"

-- Martin Luther King, Jr., I Have a Dream speech

Antithesis

Figure of balance in which two contrasting ideas are intentionally juxtaposed, usually through parallel structure; a contrasting of opposing ideas in adjacent phrases, clauses, or sentences.

"The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here."

-- Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg Address

Antithesis

Figure of balance in which two contrasting ideas are intentionally juxtaposed, usually through parallel structure; a contrasting of opposing ideas in adjacent phrases, clauses, or sentences.

"That's one small step for [a] man; one giant leap for mankind."

-- Neil Armstrong, Apollo 11 Moon Landing Speech

Antithesis

Figure of balance in which two contrasting ideas are intentionally juxtaposed, usually through parallel structure; a contrasting of opposing ideas in adjacent phrases, clauses, or sentences.

"Some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say why not.'"

-- Robert F. Kennedy

Antithesis

Figure of balance in which two contrasting ideas are intentionally juxtaposed, usually through parallel structure; a contrasting of opposing ideas in adjacent phrases, clauses, or sentences.

"We observe today not a victory of party but a celebration of freedom, symbolizing an end as well as a beginning, signifying renewal as well as change."

-- John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Address

Antithesis

Figure of balance in which two contrasting ideas are intentionally juxtaposed, usually through parallel structure; a contrasting of opposing ideas in adjacent phrases, clauses, or sentences.

"We are not destined to be adversaries, but it is not guaranteed that we will be allies."

-- Bill Clinton, Address to the Russian Duma

Antithesis

Figure of balance in which two contrasting ideas are intentionally juxtaposed, usually through parallel structure; a contrasting of opposing ideas in adjacent phrases, clauses, or sentences.

"We find ourselves rich in goods but ragged in spirit, reaching with magnificent precision for the moon but falling into raucous discord on earth. We are caught in war, wanting peace. We're torn by division, wanting unity."

-- Richard M. Nixon, Inaugural Address

Antithesis

Figure of balance in which two contrasting ideas are intentionally juxtaposed, usually through parallel structure; a contrasting of opposing ideas in adjacent phrases, clauses, or sentences.

Climax

Figure of repetition in which words or phrases or sentences are arranged in order of increasing intensity or importance, often in parallel construction; words or phrases arranged by degrees of increasing significance.

(also Parallelism)

"Nothing has been left undone to cripple their minds, debase their moral stature, obliterate all traces of their relationship to mankind."

-- Lloyd Garrison, Narrative of the Life of an American Slave

Climax

Figure of repetition in which words or phrases or sentences are arranged in order of increasing intensity or importance, often in parallel construction; words or phrases arranged by degrees of increasing significance.

(also Parallelism)

"And from the crew of Apollo 8, we close with good night, good luck, a merry Christmas, and God bless all of you, all of you on the good earth."

-- Frank Borman, Astronaut

Climax

Figure of repetition in which words or phrases or sentences are arranged in order of increasing intensity or importance, often in parallel construction; words or phrases arranged by degrees of increasing significance.

Anastrophe

"This is the forest primeval."

--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Anastrophe

Figure of speech involving an inversion of the natural order of words

"The moral flabbiness born of the exclusive worship of the bitch-goddess success. That--with the squalid cash interpretation put on the word success--is our national anthem."

--William James, Letter to H.G. Wells

Parenthesis

Insertion of a verbal unit that interrupts normal syntactical flow.

"I, Barbara Jordan, am a keynote speaker."

-- Barbara Jordan, 1976 Democratic Convention Keynote Address

Apposition

Figure of addition in which words are placed side by side each other with one describing or clarifying the other; adjacent nouns or noun substitutes with one elaborating the other.

"I am elated by the knowledge that for the first time in our history a woman, Geraldine Ferraro, will be recommended to share our ticket."

-- Jesse Jackson, 1984 Democratic National Convention Address

Apposition

Figure of addition in which words are placed side by side each other with one describing or clarifying the other; adjacent nouns or noun substitutes with one elaborating the other.

"And I will carry this: It is the police shield of a man named George Howard, who died at the World Trade Center trying to save others. It was given to me by his mom, Arlene, as a proud memorial to her son."

-- George W. Bush, 9-20-01, Address to Congress and the Nation

Apposition

Figure of addition in which words are placed side by side each other with one describing or clarifying the other; adjacent nouns or noun substitutes with one elaborating the other.

"Here, in the great, liberal state of Massachusetts, the cradle of liberty and abolitionism, a woman was arrested on a minor criminal charge."

-- Pauli Murray

Apposition

Figure of addition in which words are placed side by side each other with one describing or clarifying the other; adjacent nouns or noun substitutes with one elaborating the other.

"And so I ask you tonight, the people of Massachusetts, to think this through with me. In facing this decision, I seek your advice and opinion. In making it, I seek your prayers."

-- Edward M. Kennedy

Apposition

Figure of addition in which words are placed side by side each other with one describing or clarifying the other; adjacent nouns or noun substitutes with one elaborating the other.

"John Fitzgerald Kennedy, a great and good President, a friend of all people of goodwill, a believer in the dignity and equality of all human beings, a fighter for justice, an apostle of peace, has been snatched from our midst by the bullet of an assassin."

-- Justice Earl Warren, Eulogy for John F. Kennedy

Apposition

Figure of addition in which words are placed side by side each other with one describing or clarifying the other; adjacent nouns or noun substitutes with one elaborating the other.

"Lolita, light of my fire, fire of my loins."

--Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita

Apposition

Figure of addition in which words are placed side by side each other with one describing or clarifying the other; adjacent nouns or noun substitutes with one elaborating the other.

“O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?"

--1 Corinthians 15:55

Apostrophe

An exclamatory rhetorical figure of speech, when a speaker or writer breaks off and directs speech to an imaginary person or abstract quality or idea.

"O, pardon me, thou bleeding piece of earth, / That I am meek and gentle with these butchers! / Thou art the ruins of the noblest man / That ever lived in the tide of times."

--William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar

Apostrophe

An exclamatory rhetorical figure of speech, when a speaker or writer breaks off and directs speech to an imaginary person or abstract quality or idea.

"To what green altar, O mysterious priest, / Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies, / And all her silken flanks with garlands drest?"

--John Keats, "Ode on a Grecian Urn"

Apostrophe

An exclamatory rhetorical figure of speech, when a speaker or writer breaks off and directs speech to an imaginary person or abstract quality or idea.

"O eloquent, just, and mighty Death!"

--Sir Walter Raleigh, A Historie of the World

Apostrophe

An exclamatory rhetorical figure of speech, when a speaker or writer breaks off and directs speech to an imaginary person or abstract quality or idea.

"Roll on thou dark and deep blue ocean."

--Lord Byron, "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage"

Apostrophe

An exclamatory rhetorical figure of speech, when a speaker or writer breaks off and directs speech to an imaginary person or abstract quality or idea.

"Science! True daughter of Old Time thou art!"

--Edgar Allan Poe, "To Science"

Apostrophe

An exclamatory rhetorical figure of speech, when a speaker or writer breaks off and directs speech to an imaginary person or abstract quality or idea.

“O Captain! My Captain!”

--title of poem by Walt Whitman

Apostrophe

An exclamatory rhetorical figure of speech, when a speaker or writer breaks off and directs speech to an imaginary person, thing, abstract quality or idea.

“Oh, brave new world that has such people in't!”

-- Shakespeare, The Tempest, Act 5, Scene 1.

Apostrophe

An exclamatory rhetorical figure of speech, when a speaker or writer breaks off and directs speech to an imaginary person or abstract quality or idea.

“Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion's paws”

-- from Sonnet 19 by William Shakespeare

Apostrophe

An exclamatory rhetorical figure of speech, when a speaker or writer breaks off and directs speech to an imaginary person or abstract quality or idea.

“O cunning Love!”

-- from Sonnet 148 by William Shakespeare

Apostrophe

An exclamatory rhetorical figure of speech, when a speaker or writer breaks off and directs speech to an imaginary person or abstract quality or idea.

“Death, be not proud, though some have called thee so.“

-- John Donne, "Death be not Proud"

Apostrophe

An exclamatory rhetorical figure of speech, when a speaker or writer breaks off and directs speech to an imaginary person or abstract quality or idea.

“If youth knew, if age could."

--Henri Estienne

Ellipsis

Omission of a word or words readily implied by context.

"True stories deal with hunger, imaginary ones with love."

--Raymond Queneau

Ellipsis

Omission of a word or words readily implied by context.

"Twenty-two years old, weak, hot, frightened, not daring to acknowledge the fact that he didn't know who or what he was. . . . with no past, no language, no tribe, no source, no address book, no comb, no pencil, no clock, no pocket handkerchief, no rug, no bed, no can opener, no faded postcard, no soap, no key, no tobacco pouch, no soiled underwear and nothing nothing nothing to do . . . "

--Toni Morrison, Sula

Ellipsis

Omission of a word or words readily implied by context.

(also Asyndeton and Anaphora)

Asyndeton

(a-SIN-deh-tawn)

"Dogs, undistinguishable in mire. Horses, scarcely better -- splashed to their very blinkers. Foot passengers, jostling one another's umbrellas, in a general inflection of ill temper..."

--Charles Dickens, Bleak House

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

"In some ways, he was this town at its best--strong, hard-driving, working feverishly, pushing, building, driven by ambitions so big they seemed Texas-boastful."

--Mike Royko

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

"Duty, Honor, Country: Those three hallowed words reverently dictate what you ought to be, what you can be, what you will be."

-- General Douglas MacArthur, Thayer Award Acceptance Address

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

"There is and will be rousing language to keep citizens armed and arming; slaughtered and slaughtering in the malls, courthouses, post offices, playgrounds, bedrooms and boulevards; stirring, memorializing language to mask the pity and waste of needless death. There will be more diplomatic language to countenance rape, torture, assassination.“

--Toni Morrison, Nobel Lecture

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

"We use words like honor, code, loyalty. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punch line."

-- delivered by Jack Nicholson, from the movie A Few Good Men

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

"The union survival, its very existence, sent out a signal to all Hispanics that we were fighting for our dignity, that we were challenging and overcoming injustice, that we were empowering the least educated among us, the poorest among us. The message was clear. If it could happen in the fields, it could happen anywhere: in the cities, in the courts, in the city councils, in the state legislatures."

-- Cesar Chavez, Commonwealth Club Address

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

"I speak here as a politician and also as a Catholic -- a layperson baptized and raised in the pre-Vatican II Church, educated in Catholic schools, attached to the Church first by birth, then by choice, now by love."

-- Mario Cuomo, Religious Belief and Public Morality

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

"From now on we are enemies, you and I -- because you choose for your instrument a boastful, lustful, smutty, infantile boy."

-- delivered by F. Murray Abraham, from the movie Amadeus

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

"Now as an engineer, a planner, a businessman, I see clearly the value to our nation of a strong system of free enterprise based on increased productivity and adequate wages."

-- Jimmy Carter, 1976 Democratic National Convention Address

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

"Be one of the few, the proud, the Marines."

-- Marine Corps Advertisement

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

"When we listen to the better angels of our nature, we find that they celebrate the simple things, the basic things -- such as goodness, decency, love, kindness."

-- Richard Nixon, Inaugural Address

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

"Now the only way to provide for our posterity is to follow the counsel of Micah: to do justly, to love mercy, to walk humbly with our God."

-- Sandra Day O'Connor, Reading of Winthrop at the Funeral for Ronald Reagan

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

(also a Tricolon)

"Check this out. So you meet this person. Boy, are they fine, kind, sensitive, loving, witty, charming, intelligent...."

-- Stevie Wonder

Asyndeton

Figure of omission in which normally occurring conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) are intentionally omitted in successive phrases, or clauses.

 " 'Here, No. 924, take your fare, and take yourself off-respectable gentleman-know him well-none of your nonsense-this way, sir-where's your friends?-all a mistake, I see-never mind-accidents will happen-best regulated families-never say die-down upon your luck-Pull him UP-Put that in his pipe-like the flavour-damned rascals.' And with a lengthened string of similar broken sentences, delivered with extraordinary volubility, the stranger led the way to the traveller's waiting-room, whither he was closely followed by Mr. Pickwick and his disciples.

--Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers

Parataxis

A literary technique, in writing or speaking, that favors short, simple sentences, often without the use of conjunctions.

"No one standing in this house today can pass a puritanical test of purity that some are demanding that our elected leaders take."

-- Richard Gephardt

Alliteration

Figure of emphasis that occurs through the repetition of initial consonant letters (or sounds) in two or more different words across successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

"Was he not unmistakably a little man? A creature of the petty rake-off, pocketed with a petty joke in private and denied with the stainless platitudes in his public utterances."

-- C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

Alliteration

Figure of emphasis that occurs through the repetition of initial consonant letters (or sounds) in two or more different words across successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

 (also includes a Rhetorical Question)

"Well, sir, I'm Jordan Rivers. And these here are the Soggy Bottom Boys out of Cottonelia, Mississippi -- songs of salvation to salve the soul."

-- delivered by George Clooney, from the movie 'O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Alliteration

Figure of emphasis that occurs through the repetition of initial consonant letters (or sounds) in two or more different words across successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

(also Ellipsis)

"Isn't that what being an international man of mystery is all about?"

-- delivered by Mike Myers, from the movie Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery

Alliteration

Figure of emphasis that occurs through the repetition of initial consonant letters (or sounds) in two or more different words across successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

"Have you forgotten you're facing the single finest fighting force ever assembled?"

-- delivered by Dan Ackroyd, from the movie Dragnet

Alliteration

Figure of emphasis that occurs through the repetition of initial consonant letters (or sounds) in two or more different words across successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

"Step forward, Tin Man. You dare to come to me for a heart, do you? You clinking, clanking, clattering collection of caliginous junk...And you, Scarecrow, have the effrontery to ask for a brain! You billowing bale of bovine fodder!"

-- delivered by Frank Morgan, from the movie The Wizard of Oz

Alliteration (also includes a Rhetorical Question)

Figure of emphasis that occurs through the repetition of initial consonant letters (or sounds) in two or more different words across successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

"Somewhere at this very moment a child is being born in America. Let it be our cause to give that child a happy home, a healthy family, and a hopeful future."

-- Bill Clinton, 1992 Democratic National Convention Acceptance Address

Alliteration

Figure of emphasis that occurs through the repetition of initial consonant letters (or sounds) in two or more different words across successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

"And our nation itself is testimony to the love our veterans have had for it and for us. All for which America stands is safe today because brave men and women have been ready to face the fire at freedom's front."

-- Ronald Reagan, Vietnam Veterans Memorial Address

Alliteration

Figure of emphasis that occurs through the repetition of initial consonant letters (or sounds) in two or more different words across successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

"The gloves didn't fit. If it doesn't fit, you must acquit."

-- Johnny Cochran, closing arguments from the O.J. Simpson trial

Assonance

Figure of repetition in which different words with the same or similar vowel sounds occur successively in words with different consonants; two or more words with similar vowel sounds sandwiched between different consonants.

"I feel the need, the need for speed."

-- delivered by Tom Cruise and Anthony Edwards, from the movie Top Gun

Assonance

Figure of repetition in which different words with the same or similar vowel sounds occur successively in words with different consonants; two or more words with similar vowel sounds sandwiched between different consonants.

“The Greeks are strong, and skillful to their strength,/Fierce to their skill, and to their fierceness valiant;"

--William Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida

Polyptoton

Repetition of words derived from the same root.

"With eager feeding food doth choke the feeder."

--William Shakespeare, Richard II

Polyptoton

Repetition of words derived from the same root.

"Not as a call to battle, though embattled we are."

--John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Address, January 20, 1961

Polyptoton

Repetition of words derived from the same root.

"Thou art of blood, joy not to make things bleed."

--Sir Philip Sidney

Polyptoton

Repetition of words derived from the same root.

--Dave Matthews Band, So Much to Say, 1996

Polyptoton

Repetition of words derived from the same root.

“Your argument is sound - all sound."

--Benjamin Franklin

Antanaclasis

Repetition of a word in two different senses.

Antanaclasis

Repetition of a word in two different senses.

Antanaclasis

Repetition of a word in two different senses.

--Vince Lombardi

Antanaclasis

Repetition of a word in two different senses.

Anaphora

(a-NAF-or-uh)

--Winston Churchill

Anaphora

Figure of repetition that occurs when the first word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases; repetition of the initial word(s) over successive phrases or clauses.

-- Pat Buchanan, radio interview with Rush Limbaugh

Anaphora

Figure of repetition that occurs when the first word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases; repetition of the initial word(s) over successive phrases or clauses.

-- Hillary Clinton, 1996 Democratic National Convention Address

Anaphora

Figure of repetition that occurs when the first word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases; repetition of the initial word(s) over successive phrases or clauses.

(Can you spot the Alliteration?)

-- Mario Cuomo, 1984 Democratic National Convention Address

Anaphora

Figure of repetition that occurs when the first word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases; repetition of the initial word(s) over successive phrases or clauses.

-- Barbara Jordan, 1976 Democratic Convention Keynote Address

Anaphora

Figure of repetition that occurs when the first word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases; repetition of the initial word(s) over successive phrases or clauses.

-- Robert F. Kennedy, Announcing the death of Martin Luther King

Anaphora

Figure of repetition that occurs when the first word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases; repetition of the initial word(s) over successive phrases or clauses.

-- Senator Joseph McCarthy

Anaphora

Figure of repetition that occurs when the first word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases; repetition of the initial word(s) over successive phrases or clauses.

-- Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Pearl Harbor Address

Anaphora

Figure of repetition that occurs when the first word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases; repetition of the initial word(s) over successive phrases or clauses.

Epistrophe

(eh-PIS-troe-FEE)

-- First Corinthians 13:11, King James Bible

Epistrophe

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is repeated one or more times at the end of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

"There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America."

--Bill Clinton

Epistrophe

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is repeated one or more times at the end of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

"...and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth."

-- Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg Address

Epistrophe

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is repeated one or more times at the end of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

"I said you're afraid to bleed. [As] long as the white man sent you to Korea, you bled. He sent you to Germany, you bled. He sent you to the South Pacific to fight the Japanese, you bled. You bleed for white people. But when it comes time to seeing your own churches being bombed and little black girls be[ing] murdered, you haven't got no blood."

-- Malcolm X, Message to the Grassroots

Epistrophe

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is repeated one or more times at the end of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

"The time for the healing of the wounds has come. The moment to bridge the chasms that divides us has come."

-- Nelson Mandela, Inaugural Address

Epistrophe

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is repeated one or more times at the end of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

"Now I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country."

-- General George S. Patton

Epistrophe

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is repeated one or more times at the end of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

"The minister who has been called by God, ordained by God, appointed by God, and anointed by God, is assumed guilty until proven innocent."

-- Ravi Zacharias

Epistrophe

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or set of words in one sentence, clause, or phrase is repeated one or more times at the end of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases.

Symploce

(SIM-plo-see)

--Aeschines

Symploce

The combination of anaphora and epistrophe: beginning a series of lines, clauses, or sentences with the same word or phrase while simultaneously repeating a different word or phrase at the end of each element in this series.

Epanalepsis

(eh-puh-nuh-LEAP-sis)

"Possessing what we still were unpossessed by, Possessed by what we now no more possessed."

--Robert Frost, "The Gift Outright"

Epanalepsis

Figure of emphasis in which the same word or words both begin and end a phrase, clause, or sentence; beginning and ending a phrase or clause with the same word or words.

-- delivered by Will Smith, from the movie Ali

Epanalepsis

Figure of emphasis in which the same word or words both begin and end a phrase, clause, or sentence; beginning and ending a phrase or clause with the same word or words.

"Control, control, you must learn control."

-- from the movie The Empire Strikes Back

Epanalepsis

Figure of emphasis in which the same word or words both begin and end a phrase, clause, or sentence; beginning and ending a phrase or clause with the same word or words.

"In the world, ye shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer for I have overcome the world."

-- John 16:33, King James Bible

Epanalepsis

Figure of emphasis in which the same word or words both begin and end a phrase, clause, or sentence; beginning and ending a phrase or clause with the same word or words.

"Inflation is down since 1980, but not because of the supply-side miracle promised to us by the President. Inflation was reduced the old-fashioned way -- with a recession; two years of massive unemployment; more hungry, in this world of enormous affluence, the United States of America, more hungry."

-- Mario Cuomo, 1984 Democratic National Convention Keynote Address

Epanalepsis

Figure of emphasis in which the same word or words both begin and end a phrase, clause, or sentence; beginning and ending a phrase or clause with the same word or words.

"A minimum wage that is not a livable wage can never be a minimum wage."

-- Ralph Nader

Epanalepsis

Figure of emphasis in which the same word or words both begin and end a phrase, clause, or sentence; beginning and ending a phrase or clause with the same word or words.

"Justice -- that's all I ask -- justice."

-- delivered by Denzel Washington, from the movie The Hurricane

Epanalepsis

Figure of emphasis in which the same word or words both begin and end a phrase, clause, or sentence; beginning and ending a phrase or clause with the same word or words.

Anadiplosis

 (an-uh-dih-PLO-sis)

"When I give I give myself"

-- Walt Whitman

Anadiplosis

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or terms in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of the next sentence, clause, or phrase.

"The land of my fathers. My fathers can have it."

--Dylan Thomas

Anadiplosis

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or terms in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of the next sentence, clause, or phrase.

"They call for you: The general who became a slave; the slave who became a gladiator; the gladiator who defied an Emperor."

-- delivered by Joaquin Phoenix, from the movie Gladiator

Anadiplosis

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or terms in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of the next sentence, clause, or phrase.

"Tonight, we are a country awakened to danger and called to defend freedom. Our grief has turned to anger, and anger to resolution."

-- George W. Bush, 9-20-01, Address to Congress and the Nation

Anadiplosis

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or terms in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of the next sentence, clause, or phrase.

"Don't you surrender! Suffering breeds character; character breeds faith; in the end faith will not disappoint. You must not surrender."

-- Jesse Jackson, 1988 Democratic National Convention Address

Anadiplosis

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or terms in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of the next sentence, clause, or phrase.

"America's al-Qaida policy wasn't working because our Afghanistan policy wasn't working. And our Afghanistan policy wasn't working because our Pakistan policy wasn't working."

-- Condoleezza Rice, Statement to the 9/11 Commission

Anadiplosis

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or terms in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of the next sentence, clause, or phrase.

"The process of being turned from a creature into a son would not have been difficult or painful if the human race had not turned away from God centuries ago. They were able to do this because He gave them free will. He gave them free will because a world of mere automata could never love and therefore never know infinite happiness."

-- C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

Anadiplosis

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or terms in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of the next sentence, clause, or phrase.

"Once you change your philosophy, you change your thought pattern. Once you change your thought pattern, you change your attitude. Once you change your attitude, it changes your behavior pattern and then you go on into some action."

-- Malcolm X, The Ballot or the Bullet

Anadiplosis

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or terms in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of the next sentence, clause, or phrase.

"Somehow, with the benefit of little formal education, my grandparents recognized the inexorable downward spiral of conduct outside the guardrails: If you lie, you will cheat; if you cheat, you will steal; if you steal, you will kill."

-- USSC Justice Clarence Thomas, 1993 Mercer Law School Address

Anadiplosis

Figure of repetition that occurs when the last word or terms in one sentence, clause, or phrase is/are repeated at or very near the beginning of the next sentence, clause, or phrase.

Antimetabole

(an-tee-meh-TA-boe-lee)

"The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence."

-- Carl Sagan

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"Therefore the treasures of the Gospel are nets with which they formerly were wont to fish for men of riches. The treasures of the indulgences are nets with which they now fish for the riches of men."

-- Martin Luther, Ninety-Five Theses

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"We do not stop playing because we are old; we grow old because we stop playing."

-- George Bernard Shaw

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"I flee who chases me, and chase who flees me."

--Ovid

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"Fair is foul, and foul is fair."

--Shakespeare, Macbeth

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"Your manuscript is both good and original; but the part that is good is not original, and the part that is original is not good."

--Samuel Johnson

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"I have taken more out of alcohol than alcohol has taken out of me."

--Winston Churchill

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"...that development, security, and human rights must go hand in hand; and that there can be no security without development and no development without security; and neither can be sustained in the longer term without it being rooted in the rule of law and respect for human rights.

-- Kofi Annan, Final Address to the United Nations General Assembly

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"The poet only desires exaltation and expansion. The poet only asks to get his head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens into his head -- and it is his head that splits."

-- G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

Repetition of ideas or grammatical structures in inverted order (A-B, B-A)

Chiasmus

(ki-AZ-mus)

(not to be mistaken with Antimetabole, in which identical words are repeated and inverted)

"But O, what damned minutes tells he o'er/Who dotes, yet doubts; suspects, yet strong loves."

--Shakespeare, Othello

Chiasmus

Repetition of ideas or grammatical structures in inverted order (A-B, B-A)

Chiasmus

Repetition of ideas or grammatical structures in inverted order (A-B, B-A)

"We lived and laughed and loved and left."

--James Joyce, Finnegans Wake

"And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so. And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good."

-- Genesis 1:24-25, King James Bible

"It's more than a game, and regardless of what level it's played upon, it still demands those attributes of courage and stamina and coordinated efficiency and goes even beyond that for [it] is a means -- it provides a mental and physical relaxation to everybody that watches it, like yourself."

-- Vince Lombardi, speaking about football

Polysyndeton

Figure of addition and emphasis which intentionally employs a series of conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) not normally found in successive words, phrases, or clauses; the deliberate and excessive use of conjunctions in successive words or clauses.

"Oh, my piglets, we are the origins of war -- not history's forces, nor the times, nor justice, nor the lack of it, nor causes, nor religions, nor ideas, nor kinds of government -- not any other thing. We are the killers."

-- delivered by Katherine Hepburn , from the movie The Lion in Winter

Polysyndeton

Figure of addition and emphasis which intentionally employs a series of conjunctions (and, or, but, for, nor, so, yet) not normally found in successive words, phrases, or clauses; the deliberate and excessive use of conjunctions in successive words or clauses.

"Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty."

-- John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Address

Parallelism

Figure of balance identified by a similarity in the syntactical structure of a set of words in successive phrases, clauses, sentences; successive words, phrases, clauses with the same or very similar grammatical structure.

"I've tried to offer leadership to the Democratic Party and the Nation. If, in my high moments, I have done some good, offered some service, shed some light, healed some wounds, rekindled some hope, or stirred someone from apathy and indifference, or in any way along the way helped somebody, then this campaign has not been in vain."

-- Jesse Jackson, 1984 Democratic National Convention Address

Parallelism

Figure of balance identified by a similarity in the syntactical structure of a set of words in successive phrases, clauses, sentences; successive words, phrases, clauses with the same or very similar grammatical structure.

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

Epanalepsis

Figure of emphasis in which the same word or words both begin and end a phrase, clause, or sentence; beginning and ending a phrase or clause with the same word or words.

"What is Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba?"

--Shakespeare, Hamlet

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"By day the frolic, and the dance by night".

-- Samuel Johnson, The Vanity of Human Wishes.

Chiasmus

Repetition of ideas or grammatical structures in inverted order (A-B, B-A)

"Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate."

--John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Address, January 20, 1961.

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"America did not invent human rights. In a very real sense, it is the other way round. Human rights invented America."

--Jimmy Carter, Farewell Address

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a slave was made a man."

--Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of an American Slave

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

To be kissed by a fool is stupid; To be fooled by a kiss is worse.

--Ambrose Redmoon

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight — it's the size of the fight in the dog."

--Dwight D. Eisenhower, January 1958, Republican National Committee speech

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

Well, it's not the men in your life that count, it's the life in your men."

Mae West, from the movie, I'm No Angel (1933)

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed."

--Genesis 9:6, King James Bible

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind."

--John F. Kennedy

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"Let's make sure that the Supreme Court does not pick the next president, and this president does not choose the next Supreme Court."

--Albert Gore Jr. at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.

Antimetabole

Figure of emphasis in which the words in one phrase or clause are replicated, exactly or closely, in reverse grammatical order in the next phrase or clause; an inverted order of repeated words in adjacent phrases or clauses (A-B, B-A).

"We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately."

--Benjamin Franklin

Antanaclasis

Repetition of a word in two different senses.

"The long cigarette that's long on flavor."

--from an advertisement for Pall Mall cigarettes

Antanaclasis

Repetition of a word in two different senses.

"Sorry, Charlie. StarKist doesn't want tunas with good taste.  StarKist wants tunas that taste good."

--From 1980s StarKist tuna advertisements

Antanaclasis

Repetition of a word in two different senses.

"Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana."

--Groucho Marx

Antanaclasis

Repetition of a word in two different senses.

Antanaclasis

Repetition of a word in two different senses.