Alliteration 头韵 修辞手法

Alliteration

t he repetition of a speech sound in a sequence of nearby words.

T he term is usually applied only to consonants, and only when the recurrent sound begins a word or a stressed syllable within a word.

Alliteration is the repetition of consonants, especially at the beginning of words or stressed syllables.

In Old English alliterative meter, alliteration is the principal organizing device of the verse line:

the verse is unrhymed; each line is divided into two half-lines of two strong stresses by a decisive pause, or caesura;

and at least one, and usually both, of the two stressed syllables in the first half-line alliterate with the first stressed syllable of the second half-line.

(In this type of versification a vowel was considered to alliterate with any other vowel.)

A number of Middle English poems, such as William Langland's Piers Plowman

and the romance Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, continued to use and play variations upon the old alliterative meter.

In the opening line of Piers Plowman, for example, all four of the stressed syllables alliterate:

In a somer seson,

when soft was the sonne ....

I n later English versification, however, alliteration is used only for special

stylistic effects,

s uch as to reinforce the meaning, to link related words, or to provide tone color and enhance the palpability of enunciating the words.

Alliteration used in poetry:

The fair breeze blew,

the white foam flew,

The furrow followed free;

We were the first that ever burst

Into that silent sea.

和风吹荡、水花飞溅，

船儿破浪前进，

闯入那沉寂的海洋领域，

我们是第一群人。

A lliteration used in prose:

N ext to health, heart, home, happiness for mobile Americans depends upon the automobile.

T he world believes in the wonder worker, not in the words of wisdom.

T he flakes were falling thick and hard now, pouring past the window, a waterfall mystery.

对于好动的美国人来说，幸福不仅取决于健康、爱情、舒适和温暖的家庭，还取决于汽车。

世界信任的是创造奇迹的劳动者，而不是智慧的话。

现在雪下得又密又大，好似神秘的瀑布在窗外瓢泼。

Alliteration used in idioms:

Money makes the mare go.

A fair face may hide a foul heart.

Willful waste makes woeful want.

有钱能使鬼推磨。

笑里藏刀。

肆意挥霍，家徒四壁。

Alliteration in advertisement:

Vitamins for Vim and Vigor

Cut Costs without Cutting Corners

Sensuously smooth, Mysteriously mellow.

Gloriously golden.

Who can resist the magic of Camus XO Cognac?

摄取活力和精力的各种维生素

减少花费而不必节省

诱发美感的柔和，神秘的芳醇，

荣耀的金色，有谁能抗拒Camus XO康涅克白兰地酒的广告？

Alliteration in the titles of books and newspapers：

Pride and Prejudice

Starlight on Skyline,

Galaxy of Glamour

傲慢与偏见

高楼摩天，星光灿烂；

火树银花，瑰丽绝伦

Consonance is the repetition of a sequence of two or more consonants, but with a change in the intervening vowel: live-love, lean-alone, pitter-patter. Assonance is the repetition of identical or similar vowels—especially in stressed syllables—in a sequence of nearby words.

Note the recurrent long i in the opening lines of Keats'

"Ode on a Grecian Urn" (1820):

T hou still unravished bride of quietness,

T hou foster chiId of silence and slow time. . . .