English Department

Even Semester 2022

Universitas Negeri Semarang
Today’s topic discusses sound and meaning as major
components in poetry. The word ‘sound’ actually refers to
sound devices such as alliteration, assonance, consonance,
etc. While the word ‘meaning’ can suggest ‘theme’. As one
basic element in poetry, sound that is expressed through the
devices can also evoke meaning. The discussion is focused
on linguistic and accoustic aspects of poetic language. The
use of certain sound devices such as alliteration or
onomatopoeia often can be effective devices to convey a
particular subject and thus evoke a certain meaning. In a
word, the sound devices serve as the agents that
communicate a particular meaning to the readers.
By the end of the lesson, students are expected to be
able:
1.To understand the notions of sound and meaning in
reading poems.
2.To understand the difference between sound and
meaning and the interrelatedness between the two.
3.To identify sound and meaning in any poetic text
and write about them.
 Rhythm and sound “produce what we call the music
of poetry.”
 The music serves two functions: (1) it may be

enjoyable in itself; (2) it may reinforce meaning and

intensify the communication.
 Yet, humans have experienced their pleasure in

sound and rhythm since the very early age during

infant cooing in the cradle through their chanting of
nursery rhymes & playing of skipping rope (Perrine
& Arp 1992, 197).
 The peculiar function of poetry compared with music
is “to convey not sounds but meaning or experience
through sounds.”
 The poet may express meaning through sound in
several ways:
 First, the poet “can choose words whose sound in
some degree suggests their meaning.” This is often
called onomatopoeia, or “the use of words which at
least sound like what they mean, such as in the
words hiss, clank, clink, creak, thrum, etc.
 Yet, the use of onomatopoeia is very restricted since it
works only when the poet uses sound elements, while most
poems do not always have these.
 This means that it is necessary to combine onomatopoeia
with other devices to convey meaning.
 In addition, there is another group of words called phonetic
intensives, whose sounds are connected with their meaning.
 For instance, an initial fl- sound often connotes the idea of
moving light, such as in the words flame, flare, flash,
flicker, flush (a piece of wet ground over which water
flows).
 An initial gl- also suggests the idea of light, but
unmoving ones, such as in the words glare, gleam,
glint, glow, glisten; an initial sl-sound denotes
“smoothly wet” such as in the words slippery, slick,
slide, slime, slop, slosh, slobber, slushy; an initial st-
sound suggests strength, such as in the words
staunch, stalwart, stout, sturdy, steady, stocky, steel;
short –i- sound often denotes the idea of smallness,
as in inch, imp, thin, slim, little, bit, chip, sliver,
chink, sip, snip, kid; long –o- or –oo- sound suggest
melancholy or sorrow, as in moan, groan, woe, toll;
 Final –are sound often suggests the idea of a big
light or noise, as in flare, glare, stare, blare; medial –
att- sound suggests some kind of particled
movement, as in spatter, scatter, shatter, chatter,
clatter, batter; final –er and –le sounds indicate
repetition, such as in glitter, flutter, shimmer,
whisper, jabber, chatter, clatter, sputter, flicker,
twitter, mutter, and ripple, bubble, twinkle, sparkle,
rattle, rumble, jingle (Perrine & Arp 1992, 199).
 Second, the poet can reinforce meaning through
sound by choosing the sounds and group them so
that the effect is smooth and pleasant (euphonious)
or rough and harsh sounding (cacophonous). The
vowels are “in general more pleasing than the
consonants.” The long vowels such as in fate, reed,
rime, coat, food are fuller and more resonant than
the short vowels as in fat, red, rim, cot, foot, and dun.
Some consonants are mellifluous (pleasant
sounding) are called liquids such as l, m, n, and r (see
last material on sound color).
 Third, a poet can reinforce meaning through sound “by
controlling the speed and movement of the lines by
the choice and use of meter, by the choice and
arrangement of vowel and consonant sounds, and by
the disposition of pauses.”
 In meter, the unaccented (unstressed) syllables usually
“go faster than the accented (stressed) syllables”; the
triple meters are “swifter than the duple”.
 The poet can “vary the tempo of any meter by the use
of substitute feet” (Perrine & Arp 1992, 201).
 In general, when two or more unaccented syllables
go hand in hand, “the effect will be to speed up the
pace of the line; when two or more accented
syllables emerge together, the effect will be to
slow it down.”
 This pace is also influenced by “the vowel lengths
and by whether the sounds are easily run
together”; “the long vowels take longer to
pronounce than the short ones” (Perrine & Arp
1992, 201).
 Fourth, a poet can reinforce meaning through
sound by “controlling both sound and meter in
such a way as to emphasize words that are
important in meaning.”
 One can identify these by “highlighting such words
through alliteration, assonance, consonance, or rime
(rhyme); placing them before a pause; by skillfully
placing or displacing them in the metrical scheme”
(Perrine & Arp 1992, 202).
The axe rings in the wood,
And the children come,
Laughing and wet from the river;
And all goes on as it should.
I hear the murmur and hum
Of their morning forever.
The water ripples and slaps
The white boat at the dock;
The fire crackles and snaps.
The little noise of the clock
Goes on and on in my heart,
Of my heart parcel and part.
O happy early stir!
A girl comes out on the porch
And the door slams after her.
She sees the wind in the birch,
And then the running day
Catches her into its way.
1. Read the poem and identify its visual and auditory
imagery. Some words have onomatopoeia, while
some others use an imitation of sound without
actually exemplifying onomatopoeia: distinguish
between these two sets of words.
2. Identify other sound devices (alliteration, assonance,
consonance, euphony, cacophony, rhyme). How do
these devices express and reinforce the meaning of
the poem? Give examples.
And now the dark comes on, all full of chitter noise.
Birds huggermugger crowd the trees, (disorderly)
the air thick with their vesper cries, (evening)
and bats, snub seven-pointed kites, (to rebuff, ignore)
skitter across the lake, swing out, (move lightly, quickly)
squeak, chirp, dip, and skim on skates (to make a high-pitched sound)
of air, and the fat frogs wake and prink (to spend time making
wide-lipped, noisy as ducks, drunk minor adjustments to
on the boozy black, gloating chink-chunk. one’s appearance)
And now on the narrow beach we defend ourselves from dark.
The cooking done, we build our firework
bright and hot and less for outlook
than for magic, and lie in our blankets
while night nickers around us. Crickets
chorus hallelujahs; paws, quiet
and quick as raindrops, play on the stones
expertly soft, run past and are gone;
fish pulse in the lake; the frogs hoarsen.
Now every voice of the hour—the known, the supposed, the strange,
the mindless, the witted, the never seen—
sing, thrum, impinge, and rearrange
endlessly; and debarred from sleep we wait
for the birds, importantly silent,
for the crease of first eye-licking light,
for the sun, lost long ago and sweet.
By the lake, locked black away and tight,
we lie, day creatures, overhearing night.
Glory be to God for dappled things—
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;
And all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;

Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.
‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

‘Beware the Jabberwock, my son!

The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!’
He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought—
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,

The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!
One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

‘And has thou slain the Jabberwock?

Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!’
He chortled in his joy.
‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
1. Read the poem above. Identify visual and auditory
imagery. What words suggest onomatopoeia? How
do the sound of these words reinforce meaning of
the poem in general?
2. Describe the rhyme of the poem. What rhyme
scheme can you write about it?
3. Identify what figurative language used in the poems?
Give examples of each figures of speech.
4. Scan the first stanza of the poem. What metrical
pattern can you have from this?