Repetition of the word and

Repetition as
a stylistic device is a direct successor of repetition as an
expressive language means, which serves to emphasize certain
statements of the speaker, and so possesses considerable emotive
force.

It is not only
a single word that can be repeated but a word combination and a whole
sentence too.

As to the
position occupied by the repeated unit in the sentence or utterance,
we shall mention four main types, most frequently occurring in
English literature:

1) anaphora —
the repetition of the first word of several succeeding sentences or
clauses (a …, a …, a …);

2) epiphora —
the repetition of the final word (… a, … a, … a);

3) anadiplosis
or catch repetition — the repetition of the same unit (word or
phrase) at the end of the preceding and at the beginning of the
sentence (…a, a …);

The
combination of several catch repetitions produces a chain repetition.

4) framing or
ring repetition — the repetition of the same unit at the beginning
and at the end of the same sentence (a …, … a).

Stylistic
functions of repetition are various and many-sided. Besides
emphasizing the most important part of the utterance, rendering the
emotions of the speaker or showing his emotive attitude towards the
object described, it may play a minor stylistic role, showing the
durability of action, and to a lesser degree the emotions following
it.

Repetition,
deliberately used by the author to better emphasize his sentiments,
should not be mixed with pleonasm — an excessive, uneconomic usage of
unnecessary, extra words, which shows the inability of the writer to
express his ideas in a precise and clear manner.

Morphological
repetition, that is the repetition of a morpheme, is to be included
into the stylistic means.

e.g. I might
as well face facts: good-bye, Susan, good-bye a big car, good-bye a
big house, good-bye power, good-bye the silly handsome dreams.

23. Parallelism. Chiasmus

Parallel
Constructions

Constructions
formed by the same syntactical pattern, closely following one another
present the stylistic device of parallelism. Parallelism strongly
affects the rhythmical organization of the paragraph, so it is
imminent in oratoric speech, in pathetic and emphatic extracts.

Parallelism
can be complete when the construction of the second sentence fully
copies that of the first one. Or parallelism can be partial, when
only the beginning or the end of several sentences are structurally
similar.

Reversed
parallelism is called chiasmus. In chiasmus the central part of the
sentence – the predicate remains the hinge around which occur
syntactical changes – the subject of the first sentence becomes the
object of the second and vice versa.

e.g.
The coach was waiting, the horse were fresh, the roads were good, and
the driver was willing.

Chiasmus

Chiasmus
or Reversed Parallel Construction belongs to the group of stylistic
devices based on the repetition of a syntactical pattern; but it has
a cross order of words and phrases.

The
jail might have been the infirmary, the infirmary might have been the
jail.

Communicative
functions. The device of repetition aims at emphasizing a certain
component of the utterance. Being repeated, a language unit obtains
additional stylistic information. Consecutive contact repetition is
capable of rendering scores of modal meanings and human emotions.

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Editing 101 will always tell you the same thing: avoid repetition in your writing. But make no mistake, repetition isn’t a pariah in  the world of prose! In fact, when executed with finesse, it can make a piece of writing all the more compelling.

This post will take you through the basics of repetition. And because the best way to understand a literary device is to see it in skilled action, we’ll also cover 29 remarkable examples of repetition in literature. (To skip past the next section where we define repetition, you can jump straight to those examples!)

Repetition definition

Repetition is the act of repeating sounds, words, phrases, or full sentences. As a literary device, it’s used to stress key points, or to achieve a certain rhythm, tone, or style of prose — which is why you’ll often find it in poetry.

However, while it can be used to highlight important details or enhance rhythm, repetition needs to be done with care. If you accidentally repeat words or re-state the same information for readers over and over (and over) again, it can become jarring. For instance, if you’ve already told readers that a character has an unusual beauty mark on their shoulder, mention it once and leave it at that. Hearing about the beauty mark every time that character is in a scene is tiring. If it’s crucial to bring it up more than once, find new and interesting ways of bringing attention to it — instead of just stating its existence, maybe you can have another character comment on it.

If you’re going to repeat a word, phrase, or idea, it needs to have a purpose. Pinpoint exactly why it needs to be said again — or if there’s another way you present it that adds more to the narrative.

To figure out the right way to use this literary device, you first have to learn the different types of repetition.

Types of repetition

Did you know that there are at least 15 main types of repetition? They fall into two categories: words and sounds. Let’s start with…

Repetition of Words

1. Anadiplosis
The last word of a clause or sentence is repeated as the first word of the next one.

Example: «Fear leads to anger; anger leads to hatred; hatred leads to conflict; conflict leads to suffering.» — Yoda, in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.

2. Anaphora
The word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses or sentences is repeated.

Example: “It rained on his lousy tombstone, and it rained on the grass on his stomach. It rained all over the place.” — The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger

3. Antistasis
The repetition of words or phrases in different or contrary senses.

Example: “We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”  — Benjamin Franklin

4. Conduplicatio
The frequent repetition of a word or phrase within a paragraph, in order to expand upon its meaning.

Example: “Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children.» — Martin Luther King, Jr.

5. Diacope
The repetition of words separated be additional words, which alter their meaning.

Example: “We few, we happy few, we band of brothers.” — Henry V by Shakespeare

6. Epanalepsis
The word both at the beginning and at the end of the clause or sentence is repeated.

Example: “Next time there won’t be a next time.” — Phil Leotardo, in The Sopranos

7. Epimone
The word or phrase is repeated to place emphasis on its meaning.

Example: “Mr. Dick shook his head, as utterly renouncing the suggestion; and having replied a great many times, and with great confidence, ‘No beggar, no beggar, no beggar, Sir!’” — David Copperfield by Charles Dickens (Are you a Dickens fan? Read up on 15 of his classics novels in our guide to Dickens!)

8. Epiphora
The repetition of a word or phrase at the end of a series of clauses or sentences.

Example:
If you did know to whom I gave the ring,
If you did know for whom I gave the ring
And would conceive for what I gave the ring
And how unwillingly I left the ring,
When naught would be accepted but the ring,
You would abate the strength of your displeasure.
— The Merchant of Venice by Shakespeare

9. Epizeuxis
The successive repetition of a word or phrase within one clause or sentence.

Example: “The horror, the horror.” — Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

10. Negative-Positive Restatement
An idea or phrase is presented in negative terms, and then repeated in positive terms.

Example: “The tragedy of old age is not that one is old, but that one is young.” — The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

11. Polyptoton
The same root word is repeated in different forms.

Example: “Today you are You, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is Youer than You.” — Happy Birthday to You! by Dr. Seuss

12. Symploce
The repetition of a word or phrase both at the end and at the beginning of a clause or sentence. (In other words, a combination of  anaphora and epiphora.)

Example:
«The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes…”
— “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” by T.S. Eliot

Sound Repetition

Do you hear that? Is it bat, a rat, or a gnat? And speaking of sounds that repeat themselves, let’s take a look at…

13. Alliteration
The successive repetition of consonant sounds in the stressed part of a word.

Example: “She sells seashells by the sea-shore.”

14. Assonance
The vowel sounds are repeated.

Example: “»Hear the mellow wedding bells…” — “The Bells” by Edgar Allan Poe

15. Consonance
The repetition of consonant sounds in successive or closely connected words. The difference between consonance and alliteration is that alliteration is at the beginning of the word (so “Peter Piper”), but consonance can be anywhere in the word.

Example:
I’ll swing by my ankles.
She’ll cling to your knees.
As you hang by your nose,
From a high-up trapeze.
But just one thing, please,
As we float through the breeze,
Don’t sneeze. — “The Acrobats” by Shel Silverstein

Okay, now that we’ve gotten seamlessly up to speed (pardon the alliteration), on the different types of repetition, let’s look at some exemplary examples from literature (pardon the polyptoton).

Repetition examples in literature

Let’s turn this section into a little quiz. Try to guess what kind of repetition each quote is using as you read through — the answers will be provided at the bottom!

Example #1: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

«Space is big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist’s, but that’s just peanuts to space.»

Example #2: The Innocents Abroad by Mark Twain

«They are not paid for thinking—they are not paid to fret about the world’s concerns. They were not respectable people—they were not worthy people—they were not learned and wise and brilliant people—but in their breasts, all their stupid lives long, resteth a peace that passeth understanding!»

Example #3: Deep River by Shusaku Endo

“Hatred was spreading everywhere, blood was being spilled everywhere, wars were breaking out everywhere.”

Example #4: A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

“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—in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.”

Example #5: Beloved by Toni Morrison

“Beloved is mine; she is Beloved.”

Example #6: Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov

“What I present here is what I remember of the letter, and what I remember of the letter I remember verbatim (including that awful French).”

Example #7: Outer Dark by Cormac McCarthy

“And stepping softly with her air of blooded ruin about the glade in a frail agony of grace she trailed her rags through dust and ashes…”

Answers: a) Epimone; b) Symploce; c) Epistrophe; d) Anaphora; e) Epanalepsis; f) Anadiplosis; g) Assonance

Examples of repetition in poetry

Repetition is especially prevalent in poetry, as it can help achieve a certain resonance with readers. Again, read through the following examples of poetic repetition and guess what type each uses.

Example #1: «Stopping by Woods On a Snowy Evening» by Robert Frost

“The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.”

Example #2: «Do Not Go Gentle into the Good Night» by Dylan Thomas

“Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage, against the dying of the light.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight,
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”

Example #3: “Annabel Lee” by Edgar Allen Poe

“It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.”

Example #4: «Song of Myself, 3» by Walt Whitman

“There was never any more inception than there is now,
Nor any more youth or age than there is now,
And will never be any more perfection than there is now,
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.”

Example #5: «A Child is Born» by Stephen Vincent Benet

“Life is not lost by dying! Life is lost
Minute by minute, day by dragging day,
In all the thousand, small uncaring ways.”

Example #6: «The Gnome, The Gnat, & The Gnu» by Shel Silverstein

«I saw an ol’ gnome
Take a gknock at a gnat
Who was gnibbling the gnose of his gnu.
I said, «Gnasty gnome,
Gnow, stop doing that.»

Example #7: «Coda» by Dorothy Parker

“There’s little in taking or giving,
There’s little in water or wine;
This living, this living, this living
Was never a project of mine.”

Answers: a) Epizeuxis; b) Assonance; c) Consonance; d) Epiphora; e) Diacope; f) Alliteration ; g) Epizeuxis

Now that you know how to make repetition your writing’s best friend, let’s give a shout-out to your best friend when it comes to removing unnecessary repetition: CTRL+F. We are all guilty of over-relying on specific words that crop up in our writing again and again. Get acquainted with your own habitual words, and then use CTRL+F to sweep your document for them. Find, remove, repeat! 😊

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Do you incorporate repetition into your prose? Is there a specific type that you favor? Leave any thoughts or questions in the comments below!

What is repetition? At its simplest, repetition is a word or phrase used multiple times in a text, for the purpose of emphasizing an emotion or idea. It might seem counterintuitive to repeat, repeat, repeat, but when wielded correctly, the repetition of words and phrases has powerful effects in literature.

You’re most likely to find examples of repetition in poetry, but both poetry and prose utilize the same devices, like epizeuxis, anadiplosis, and chiasmus. We’ll dive into those strange Greek words in a minute, but before dissecting the types of repetition, let’s properly define repetition in literature. What is repetition?

Repetition Definition

When a writer utilizes repetition, they’re putting multiple iterations of a word or phrase in close proximity to each other. In other words, a word or phrase is repeated to provide clarity and emphasis, highlighting deeper meanings in the text.

Repetition is an instance where a word or phrase is repeated to provide clarity and emphasis, highlighting deeper meanings in the text.

Now, repetition can be both subtle and obvious, and writers can get very creative about what those repeating words signify. For example, take this excerpt from Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”:

Alone, alone, all, all alone,
Alone on a wide, wide sea.

In 11 words, “alone” is repeated 4 times, while “all” and “wide” are repeated twice each. Each word contributes its own importance to the poem. “All” emphasizes the intensity of the speaker’s aloneness, and while the word “alone” highlights the speaker’s solitude, “wide” highlights the vast amount of space between the speaker and anything else. The repetition here evokes the image of an insignificant dot floating in an endless nothingness—a loneliness without end.

It’s easy to find examples of repetition in poetry and in prose, but it’s much easier to execute repetition in poetry. Because poetry has greater freedom in syntax and structure, poets have more tools at their disposal to repeat themselves effectively.

Now, let’s take a look at the types of repetition in literature—both prose and poetry—before looking at more repetition examples in each genre.

10 Types of Repetition in Literature

Repetition literary devices have existed since the dawn of literature, and they were especially prominent in both Ancient Greece and Rome. These devices exist partially because of their emphatic value, and partially because literature was often retold orally, so repetition helped storytellers remember “what comes next” as they recited their work.

As such, the following devices all have Greek names. For the modern English speaker, this makes remembering each device a bit confusing—how am I supposed to know my antistrophe from my antanaclasis?

As such, we’ve defined each device next to the word itself, making these types of repetition easier to navigate. In addition to using these devices in your writing, you can also impress your friends by telling them what they just said is an antimetabole.

Repetition examples in literature are included with each device below.

1. Anadiplosis—Repetition in Successive Clauses

Anadiplosis is when a word or phrase is repeated in successive clauses. Usually, the phrase shows up at the end of one clause and the beginning of the next.

You’ll find anadiplosis often in classic literature, and this device is especially prevalent in the Bible. Take this excerpt from the Book of Genesis (1:1-2):

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void.

In this passage, “the earth” ends the first sentence and starts the second. This puts the earth at the center of the text, emphasizing its importance and outsized presence in Genesis.

Anadiplosis can also be used to offer a sense of placement. Take this example, from the poem “The Isles of Greece” by Lord Byron:

The mountains look on Marathon – And Marathon looks on the sea…

In this excerpt, the reader can view the arrangement of the landscape. We see Marathon literally situated between the mountains and the sea, because it’s situated that same way in the text, which also emphasizes Marathon’s importance to the poem itself.

2. Anaphora—Repetition at the Beginning of Lines or Clauses

For the most part, anaphora is an example of repetition in poetry. This device involves the repeated use of a word or phrase at the beginning of each line in a poem, or each sentence in prose.

Let’s look at repetition examples for each. In poetry, anaphora is present in the piece “The Delight Song of Tsoai-talee” by N. Scott Momaday. Read this poem at our article Literary Devices in Poetry.

In prose, consider this sentence from the novel Farewell, My Lovely by Raymond Chandler:

I needed a drink, I needed a lot of life insurance, I needed a vacation, I needed a home in the country. What I had was a coat, a hat, and a gun.

The repeating phrase “I needed” highlights the narrator’s desperation, especially since each need is a luxury only afforded to the wealthy and comfortable. The following sentence, which describes the narrator’s belongings, offers insight into the narrator’s psyche and behavior—we know his needs and what he has to obtain those needs.

3. Antanaclasis—Successive Repetition of a Word, In Which Each Use Has a Different Meaning

One word can have many different meanings, especially in the English language. Did you know that the word “set” has 430 different usages described in the Oxford English Dictionary?

Antanaclasis harnesses this facet of language so that each repetition of words has a different meaning.

Take this example from Robert Frost’s poem “Stopping by Woods on Snowy Evening.”

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

The repetition of the last line, and particularly the phrase “I sleep,” clues the reader towards two different meanings. The first “I sleep” is clearly referring to rest, while the second “I sleep” probably refers to the speaker’s death. This double meaning of “sleep” suggests the speaker has much more work to do before he can comfortably rest, both at night and at the end of his life.

4. Antimetabole—Phrases or Sentences Repeated in Reverse Grammatical Order

Antimetabole is when phrases or sentences are repeated in reverse order, with the intent of juxtaposing different meanings. In both clauses, the grammatical structure is exactly the same. This device is closely related to chiasmus, but with a slight difference that we explain later below.

This repetition literary device is much easier to demonstrate than to define. See the below examples, each of which uses inverted word order to emphasize a certain point:

Better a witty fool than a foolish wit.

This quote, spoken by Festes in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, repeats “wit” and “fool” in inverse order. The effect is that Festes underlines the importance of wit, and that foolishness and wit are not mutually exclusive: a “fool” or clown can be witty, which is far better than actually being a foolish person.

Here’s another example of antimetabole, from Zora Neale Hurston’s novel Their Eyes Were Watching God:

Women forget all those things they don’t want to remember, and remember everything they don’t want to forget.

Hurston’s novel frequently dwells on the themes of gender and society, and this quote sums up the novel’s attitude nicely. At a time when women were viewed as subservient to their husbands, Hurston is saying that women are fully in control of their fate, feelings, and thoughts, defying the typical gender roles of that era. The antimetabole of “forget” and “remember” reinforces that sense of control.

5. Antistrophe—Repetition at the Ends of Lines or Clauses

Antistrophe—also known as epistrophe or epiphora—is the repetition of a word or phrase at the end of successive lines or clauses. Like anaphora, the effect of antistrophe is the emphasis of a recurring idea.

You’ll find an example of antistrophe in the short poem “We Real Cool” by Gwendolyn Brooks:

        The Pool Players.
Seven at the Golden Shovel.
We real cool. We
Left school. We
Lurk late. We
Strike straight. We
Sing sin. We
Thin gin. We
Jazz June. We
Die soon.

The word “We” starts each sentence, but ends each line—except the last line. This repetition emphasizes two things. First, it shows the reader the speaker’s lack of identity: he can only identify as a weak “we,” and that “we” centers itself around youthful rebellion.

Second, it highlights the poet’s attitude towards the boys. There is no “we” after the phrase “die soon,” which underscores the poem’s finality and the poet’s belief that the boys will ruin their own lives.

6. Chiasmus—Phrases or Sentences Repeated in Reverse Order

Chiasmus, like antimetabole, is the repetition of a phrase in reverse order. By inverting a phrase, the writer juxtaposes different or opposite meanings.

Unlike antimetabole, a chiasmus does not have to invert a phrase grammatically. The two clauses can have different lengths and structures. As such, antimetabole is often viewed as a stricter form of chiasmus.

Let’s look at an example of each, side-by-side. The following, from Shakespeare’s Macbeth, is an example of both chiasmus and antimetabole, because each inverted clause preserves the same grammatical structure:

Fair is foul and foul is fair.

Now, this next quote, from Aeschylus, is an example of chiasmus, but not of antimetabole, because each inverted clause has a different grammatical structure:

It is not the oath that makes us believe the man,
but the man the oath.

To summarize: a chiasmus is also an antimetabole, but not every antimetabole is a chiasmus.

7. Epanalepsis—Repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning and end of a clause or sentence

Epanalepsis refers to repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning and end of a line, clause, or sentence. This is a feature of some other types of repetition—chiasmus and antimetabole, in particular, will often feature an epanalepsis.

This repetition device is just as useful for poets and storytellers as it is for rhetoricians. Here are a few examples:

The most obvious reason for using epanalepsis is emphasis on an important concept or keyword. That said, pay attention to how this repetition device adds a sense of rhythm and musicality to language. Something about the echoing of important words adds movement and tension to the sentence, making it moving and evocative.

8. Epimone—Repetition for the Purpose of Dwelling

Epimone, a device most often used in dialogue, occurs when the speaker repeats themselves for the purpose of dwelling on a point. This repetition doesn’t contribute anything new to the speaker’s argument, but it often shows us how the speaker truly feels.

Here’s an example from Romeo & Juliet:

NURSE
O woe! O woeful, woeful, woeful day.
Most lamentable day, most woeful day
That ever, ever, I did yet behold!
O day, O day, O day, O hateful day.
Never was seen so black a day as this.
O woeful day, O woeful day.

In addition to several epizeuxis examples (defined below), this quote has several examples of epimone. The repeating “woeful,” “O day,” and “O woeful day” phrases don’t contribute anything new to what the nurse is saying, but it does underscore how terrible the day is for her.

Epimone is best used as an element in dialogue to humanize characters. In real life, people repeat themselves for emphasis, and using epimone reflects this human tendency.

9. Epizeuxis—Words Repeated in Quick Succession

Epizeuxis, also known as diacope, is the repetition of words in quick succession.

There are countless repetition examples of epizeuxis in the poem “The Bells” by Edgar Allan Poe. Each stanza ends with some variation of the following:

To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
               Bells, bells, bells—
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

Here, the immediate repetition of “bells” is an epizeuxis. Try to read this stanza as though each iteration of “bells” was a bell jingling: the stanza becomes vibrant, exciting, and perhaps even overwhelming, as it is both figuratively and literally consumed by the bells.

10. Polyptoton—The Inclusion of Multiple Words with the Same Root

Polyptoton is the use of two or more words that, though different, share the same root. The words “bare & barely” have the same root; so do the word pairs “battle & embattled” and “lunar & lunatic.”

Polyptoton was a common facet of Latin and Greek poetry, since one word has hundreds of forms in each language. However, modern literature has examples of polyptoton, too. Take this excerpt from T. S. Eliot’s poem “The Dry Salvages”:

There is no end of it, the voiceless wailing,
No end to the withering of withered flowers,
To the movement of pain that is painless and motionless,
To the drift of the sea and the drifting wreckage,
The bone’s prayer to Death its God. Only the hardly, barely prayable
Prayer of the one Annunciation.

There are four examples of polyptoton here: “wither & withering”, “pain & painless”, “drift & drifting”, and “prayer, prayable, & Prayer.”

What is the effect of repetition with polyptoton? By using different forms of the same word, the writer can suggest an evolving relationship between those words. The flowers, withered, are still withering; the sea, which drifts, brings drifting wreckage. Polyptoton adds dimension to the meanings of words, providing contrast and emphasis to what those words signify.

11. Symploce—Repetition at Both the Beginnings and Ends of Clauses

Symploce occurs when a writer uses both anaphora and antistrophe at the same time. By using symploce, the writer highlights nuances of meaning and the differences between the two repeating phrases.

Because symploce happens at both the beginning and end of a line or sentence, it most often occurs as repetition in poetry. Here’s an example of a poem, “Sonnet 62” by Bartholomew Griffin, that has symploce in each line:

Most true that I must fair Fidessa love.
Most true that I fair Fidessa cannot love.
Most true that I do feel the pains of love.
Most true that I am captive unto love.
Most true that I deluded am with love.
Most true that I do find the sleights of love.
Most true that nothing can procure her love.
Most true that I must perish in my love.
Most true that She contemns the God of love.
Most true that he is snarèd with her love.
Most true that She would have me cease to love.
Most true that She herself alone is Love.
Most true that though She hated, I would love!
Most true that dearest life shall end with love.

“Sonnet 62” uses an anaphora with “most true” and an antistrophe with “love.” Each line slightly alters the relationship between truth and love, presenting a series of juxtapositions and paradoxes that complicates the speaker’s relationship to Fidessa. By writing this sonnet as a perfect symploce, Griffin is able to capture that complexity and his evolving relationship to love itself.

What is the Effect of Repetition?

Repetition in literature offers a variety of powerful rhetorical strategies. In the above repetition examples, we’ve seen this device do the following:

• Emphasize key themes and ideas
• Underscore the relationship between ideas
• Emulate sounds and experiences
• Invert ideas for emphasis
• Juxtapose ideas to challenge the reader
• Play with multiple meanings and ambiguities
• Situate an important setting in the text, both figuratively and literally
• Suggest a character’s interiority

Repetition can do all of the above, and much more. What makes repetition in poetry and prose so powerful is that it emphasizes other devices and ideas in the text.

Since the main effect of repetition is emphasis, writers should harness the repetition of words to underscore what their work is trying to accomplish. By skillfully repeating words and phrases, writers can clue the reader towards what they’re trying to say in their work, using the tools of rhetoric in artistic and literary ways.

Wield Repetition at Writers.com

Repetition is a powerful literary device, but if you have too many repeating words and phrases, your work can lose its impact. Writers.com can help! Become a part of our community: Take a look at our upcoming courses or join our Facebook group, and receive caring feedback on your work and repetition.