Poetic Terms

Denotation: The basic definition or dictionary meaning(s) of a word (41).
Connotation: What a word suggests or implies beyond its basic dictionary definition; a word's overtones of meaning (41).
Figure of Speech: A way of saying one thing and meaning another (70).
Personification: A figure of speech in which human attributes are given to an animal, an object, or a concept (73-75).
Onomatopoeia: The use of words that supposedly mimic their meaning in their sound (ex. BOOM, CRASH) (223).
Overstatement: A figure of speech in which exaggeration is used in the service of truth (113).
Dramatic Irony: A device by which the author implies a different meaning from that intended by the speaker (or by a speaker) in a literary work (119).
Verbal Irony: A figure of speech in which what is meant is opposite of what is said (116).
Simile: A figure of speech in which an explicit comparision is made between two things essentially unalike. The comparison is mande explicit by the use of some such word or phrase as like, as, than, resembles, etc. (70-73)
Metaphor: A figure of speech in which an implicit comparision is made between two things essentially unalike (70-73).
Imagery: Representation through language of sense experience (55).
Diction: The choice and use of words or phrases in speech or writing.
Metonymy: A figure of speech in which a part or something closely related is substituted for the thing literally meant. (77)
Alliteration: The repetition at close intervals of the initial consonant sounds of accented syllables or important words (for example, map-moon, kill-code, preach-approve).
Apostrophe: A figure of speech in which someone absent or dead or something nonhuman is addressed as if it were alive and present and could reply.
Situational Irony: A situation in which there is an incongruity between actual circumstances and those that would seem appropriate, or between what is anticipated and what actually comes to pass. (120)
Tone: The writer's or speaker's attitude toward the subject, the audience, or herself or himself; the emotional coloring, or emotional meaning, of a work. (161)
Theme: The central idea of a literary work. Usually written out in a complete sentence. (25)
Allusion: A reference, explicit or implicit, to something in literature or history. (139)