Syntactical Devices

1
Syntactical Devices

• Important
• These are different from the grammar concepts
  that we have been covering because these devices
  manipulate the structure of your sentence. They
  are not focusing on a grammar concept.
• Also, these are all forms of repetition!!!!
• There are no allusions for these because your
  sentences will have to be longer to incorporate
  these devices.

2
Anaphora

• The repetition of a word or phrase at the
  beginning of successive phrases, clauses or
  lines.
• The purpose of using Anaphora is to build up to a
  point or create strong emotional emphasis.

3
Examples

• We shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the
  end. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on
  the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing
  confidence and growing strength in the air, we
  shall defend our island, whatever the cost may
  be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight
  on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the
  fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the
  hills. We shall never surrender. Churchill.
• Churchill uses anaphora (We Shall) to emphasis to
  the people that this is not something just one
  man could do. He wanted England as a collective
  body to rally for the fight.

4
Other Examples

• "Sir Walter Raleigh. Good food. Good cheer. Good
  times."(slogan of the Sir Walter Raleigh Inn
  Restaurant, Maryland)
• "Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all
  the world, she walks into mine."(Rick Blaine in
  Casablanca)

5
Epistrophe

• This is the same concept as Anaphora except the
  repeated word, series of words, or phrase comes
  at the END of the sentence or sentences.

6
Examples

• "A day may come when the courage of men fails,
  when we forsake our friends and break all bonds
  of fellowship, but it is not this day. An hour of
  woes and shattered shields, when the age of men
  comes crashing down! But it is not this day! This
  day we fight!" (Viggo Mortensen as
  Aragorn in The Lord of
• the Rings The Return of the King,
  2003)
• "Don't you ever talk about my friends! You don't
  know any of my friends. You don't look at any of
  my friends. And you certainly wouldn't condescend
  to speak to any of my friends." (Judd
  Nelson as John Bender in The Breakfast
• Club, 1865)

7
More Examples

• Manny Delgado "Shel was there"
• "Shel Turtlestein was many things, but above all
  he was my friend. When I didnt get a date with
  Fiona Gunderson, Shel was there. When I didnt
  get to play the part of Tevye, Shel was there.
  And when a raccoon broke into my room,
  unfortunately, Shel was there." (Manny's
  eulogy for his turtle in the
• episode "Truth Be Told." Modern
  Family,
• March 2010)

8
Polysyndeton

• This is where you use many conjunctions between
  clauses
• One of the main purposes of this is often to slow
  the tempo or rhythm.

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EXAMPLE

• I said, "Who killed him?" and he said, "I don't
  know who killed him but he's dead all right," and
  it was dark and there was water standing in the
  street and no lights and windows broke and boats
  all up in the town and trees blown down and
  everything all blown and I got a skiff and went
  out and found my boat where I had her inside
  Mango Key and she was all right only she was full
  of water.Ernest Hemingway, "After the Storm."

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Another Example

• "He pulled the blue plastic tarp off of him and
  folded it and carried it out to the grocery cart
  and packed it and came back with their plates and
  some cornmeal cakes in a plastic bag and a
  plastic bottle of syrup."(Cormac McCarthy, The
  Road, Knopf, 2006)

11
Asyndeton

• Lack of conjunctions between coordinate phrases,
  clauses, or words.
• from Gk. a and sundeton bound together with

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Examples

• We shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any
  hardships, support any friend, oppose any foe to
  assure the survival and the success of liberty.
  J. F. Kennedy, Inaugural
• But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we
  cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground.
  Lincoln, Gettysburg Address

13
Anadiplosis

• Repeats the last word of one phrase, clause, or
  sentence at or very near the beginning of the
  next
• It can be generated in series for the sake of
  beauty or to give a sense of logical progression

14
Examples

• They have forsaken me, the fountain of living
  waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken
  cisterns that can hold no water. --Jer. 213
• The question next arises, How much confidence can
  we put in the people, when the people have
  elected Joe Doax?
• This treatment plant has a record of uncommon
  reliability, a reliability envied by every other
  water treatment facility on the coast.
• In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was
  with God, and the Word was God. --John 11

15
More Examples

• The love of wicked men converts to fear,That
  fear to hate, and hate turns one or both To
  worthy danger and deserved death. Shakespeare,
  Richard II 5.1.66-68
• The following shows anadiplosis of a phrase...a
  man could stand and see the whole wide reachOf
  blue Atlantic. But he stayed ashore.

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Epanalepsis

• Repeats the beginning word of a clause or
  sentence at the end
• The beginning and the end are the two positions
  of strongest emphasis in a sentence, so by having
  the same word in both places, you call special
  attention to it

17
Examples

• Examples  "In times like these, it is helpful to
  remember that there have always been times like
  these. " Paul Harvey
• "Believe not all you can hear, tell not all you
  believe." Native American proverb
• "A lie begets a lie." English proverb
• "To each the boulders that have fallen to each."
  Robert Frost, "Mending Wall"

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More Examples

• Water alone dug this giant canyon yes, just
  plain water.
• To report that your committee is still
  investigating the matter is to tell me that you
  have nothing to report.

19
Antimetabole

• Repetition of words, in successive clauses, in
  reverse grammatical order.
• Gk. anti in opposite direction and metabole
  turning about

20
Examples

• When the going gets tough, the tough get going.
  Ask not what your country can do for you ask
  what you can do for your country. John F.
  Kennedy
• You can take the gorilla out of the jungle, but
  you can't take the jungle out of the gorilla.

21
More Examples

• Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless,
  and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and
  dreadful. Samuel Johnson, Rasselas
• Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil
  that put darkness for light, and light for
  darkness that put bitter for sweet, and sweet
  for bitter! Isaiah 520