Academic Vocabulary: Academic Words - Olsen Amy E. 2012

Chapter 19. Literature

Look Deeply

Poetry is an enduring form of literature because it touches people's hearts and minds as it deals with universal themes, such as love, death, and nature. However, many people also suffer from metrophobia, a fear of poetry. What often scares people about poetry is its ambiguous nature. A poem doesn't always have one clear meaning. It can have several possible meanings, which can be intimidating, but it can also be the joy of poetry because it can be discussed, delighted in, and reflected on in numerous ways.

The foremost Scottish poet Robert "Bobby" Bums (1759-1796) shows how the theme of love can be imaginatively dealt with in verse in this poem "A Red, Red Rose." He wrote:

О My Luve's like a red, red rose,

That's newly sprung in June;

О My Luve's like the melodie

That's sweetly played in tune.

Comparisons using like or as are called similes. They are an effective way to get a reader to make a connection between two distinct things. In this case, Bums compares love to a rose and to music. Bums could have used a metaphor such as, "My luve is a rose." The direct comparison of an object with something that is usually not associated with it also helps the reader see the object in a new way. Also important in "A Red, Red Rose" is the imagery. It is how readers come to feel a poem. Bums tries to get the reader to use his or her senses to feel the speaker's love. He wants the reader to see and smell the rose and hear the tune to understand the power of love.

Another important motif in poetry is death. A writer who tackled this subject was Emily Dickinson (1830-1886). Dickinson was a recluse who rarely saw anyone for most of her life. All but seven of her almost fifteen hundred poems were published posthumously. In her poem "Because I Could Not Stop for Death" she uses personification by giving death a carriage in which to pick up the speaker: "He [Death] kindly stopped for me—/The carriage held but just Ourselves." Giving an inanimate object human characteristics can help a reader identify with the subject of the poem.

To overcome one's metrophobia, it is important to appreciate that it is often through inference that readers come to understand a poem. Poets don't always come right out and tell the reader what they mean. For instance, in her poem "A Song in the Front Yard," American poet Gwendolyn Brooks (1917-2000) seems to be talking about her yard:

I've stayed in the front yard all my life.

I want a peek at the back

Where it's rough and untended and hungry weed grows.

A girl gets sick of a rose.

The reader now has to be willing to do some reasoning to figure out possible meanings. The front yard certainly seems to mean more than just a yard, but what does it mean? The rose, with its

multiple connotations, faces the reader again, and he or she needs to decide what it stands for this time. Though carefully looking at a poem can be challenging because of the language or format used, it is this effort to understand that makes poetry so enriching for readers.

Predicting

For each set, write the definition on the line next to the word to which it belongs. If you are unsure, return to the reading on page 116, and underline any context clues you find. After you've made your predictions, check your answers against the Word List on page 121. Place a checkmark in the box next to each word whose definition you missed. These are the words you'll want to study closely.

Set One

first in importance

comparisons introduced by like or as

a fear of poetry

open to several possible meanings

a comparison between things that are not literally alike

□ 1. metrophobia (line 4) ...

□ 2. ambiguous (line 5) ...

□ 3. foremost (line 10) ...

□ 4. similes (line 17) ...

□ 5. metaphor (line 19) ...

Set Two

the dominant theme in a work of art

the act of drawing a conclusion

mental pictures

occurring after death

the act of giving human qualities to inanimate objects

□ 6. imagery (line 21)

□ 7. motif (line 24)

□ 8. posthumously (line 26)

□ 9. personification (line 27)

□ 10. inference (line 30)

Self-Tests

1 For each set, match the vocabulary word to the words that could be associated with it.

Set One

1. posthumously

a. comparison, direct

2. imagery

b. fear, poems

3. metrophobia

c. senses, descriptions

4. metaphor

d. multiple, unclear

5. ambiguous

e. death, authors

Set Two

6. inference

f. human, perfect

7. foremost

g. compares, like or as

8. personification

h. reasoning, evidence

9. motif

i. top, leading

10. simile

j. main, recurring

2 Match each word to the appropriate example.

Vocabulary list

foremost

inference

simile

motifs

imagery

metaphor

ambiguous

posthumously

metrophobia

personification

1. His smile is a bolt of lightning. ...

2. Her first novel was printed fifty years after her death. ...

3. "I'm afraid to read Whitman's poem Leaves of Grass." ...

4. The tree's branches spread over me like a fortress. ...

5. The walls shook with laughter, the ceiling had a wide grin, and the floors just smiled; the house knew my cleaning wouldn't last a day. ...

6. I bit into the large, cream cheese-frosted, freshly baked cinnamon roll; listened to the screams from the midway rides; and felt the warm sun on my back—it was good to be at the county fair. ...

7. Yesterday was the change to daylight saving time, and John, who is usually prompt, is forty minutes late. He probably forgot to change his clock. ...

8. Nature's beauty, lost love, and patriotism are a few common ones. ...

9. The unexpected phone message: "Pick me up at the airport at 8 tomorrow." ...

10. William Shakespeare as a playwright and poet, and Beethoven in music. ...

3 Finish the sentences using the vocabulary words. Use each word once.

Vocabulary list

metrophobia

personification

ambiguous

metaphor

imagery

motif

simile

inference

foremost

posthumously

1. Kafka didn't want his writing published ..., so he asked his friend to destroy all of his remaining work.

2. Time is an important ... in many of Edgar Allan Poe's works.

3. The main character's answer about where he had been last night was ... . Without a clear explanation of his activities, he became a prime suspect in the inspector's investigation of the murder.

4. In "A Birthday," Christina Rossetti writes, "My heart is like an apple tree/Whose boughs are bent with thick set fruit." The ... shows how fulfilled the speaker is because she has found love.

5. My friend compared himself to a battleship. That ... fits him because he loves conflict.

6. Robert Frost is one of the ... American poets.

7. William Carlos Williams uses ... to help the reader see the wheelbarrow. He describes it as being red and "glazed with rain/ water/beside the white/chickens."

8. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz uses ... when the tree yells at Dorothy for picking one of its apples.

9. When the woman in the story said her husband wouldn't be coming to dinner, the reader had to make a(n)___________ ... because no direct reason for his disappearance was given.

10. Because some poets use many historical and literary references, their poems can be hard to understand, which has led to ... for many people.

Context Clue Mini-Lesson 5

This lesson combines the techniques you have practiced in the four previous context clue mini-lessons. You will be looking for synonyms, antonyms, general meaning, and examples (SAGE) to help you under­stand the underlined words. In the paragraph below, circle any clues you find and then write the types of clues and your definitions on the lines next to the words that follow the paragraph.

The severe winter weather had kept me inside for the last three weeks. In the last few days, the storms had become sporadic. Since the snowfall was no longer constant, I thought I had a chance to get out. I came up with the preposterous idea of walking to my friend's house four miles away. It was ridiculous to think that I could get that far in the cold with snow still covering much of the area, but I headed out. For the first few blocks, I savored the smell of the fresh air and the beauty of the snow-covered trees. But after another two blocks, the snow returned, and I quickly turned around.

Type of Context Clue and Your Definition

1. Severe ...

2. Sporadic ...

3. Preposterous ...

4. Savored ...

Interactive Version: Write a poem about love or nature using the images as inspiration. In your poem use four of the following elements: imagery, metaphor, motif, personification, or simile.

Don't let metrophobia get in the way. You don't have to write a great poem; this is simply a chance to practice using the vocabulary words.

Tips for Enjoying Literature

Readers enjoy a book more when they become involved with it. Try to put yourself in a novel or short story by imagining yourself in a character's situation. What would you do if you had to stop an alien invasion, cope with a broken heart, or solve a murder? Learn to appreciate the descriptions of the places in the story. Try to visualize yourself hiking through the jungle, cooking a big meal in the kitchen, or hiding under a bed. Look for the author's message as you read. Ask yourself what point the author is trying to get across. Do you agree or disagree with the author's point? By putting yourself in a work of literature and thinking about the sig­nificance of events, you will want to keep reading to see what happens to the characters because now they and their world are a part of you.

Words to Watch

Which words would you like to practice with a bit more? Pick 3-5 words to study, and list them below. Write the word and its definition, and compose your own sentence using the word correctly. This extra practice could be the final touch to learning a word.