A figure of speech is a phrase or word having different meanings than its literal meanings. It conveys meaning by identifying or comparing one thing to another, which has connotation or meaning familiar to the audience. That is why it is helpful in creating vivid rhetorical effect.

Allegory
=
abstract ideas and principles are described in terms of characters, figures and events

Alliteration
=
Repetition of the same initial sound

Anaphora
=
a technique where several phrases or verses begin with the same word or words

Antithesis
=
juxtaposition of contrasting ideas in balanced phrases

Apostrophe
=
breaking off discourse to address some absent person or thing, some abstract quality or nonexistant character

Assonance
=
when two or more words close to one another repeat the same vowel sound but start with different consonant sounds

Caesura
=
a pause, usually in the middle of a line, and generally shown by a punctuation mark

Chiasmus
=
words, grammatical constructions, or concepts are repeated in reverse order

Hyperbole
=
exaggeration for emphasis or effect

Imagery
=
descriptive writing that appeals to the senses

Irony
=
using words where the meaning is the opposite of their usual meaning

Litotes
=
a positive statement is expressed
by negating its opposite
(sometimes with double negatives)

Metaphor
=
compares two unlike things or ideas

Metonymy
=
one word is replaced by another
with which it is closely associated

Onomatopoeia
=
a word that sounds like what it is describing

Oxymoron
=
a figure of speech in which
apparently contradictory terms
appear in conjunction

Paradox
=
a statement that appears to be
self-contradictory

Personification
=
giving human qualities to non-living things or ideas

Pun
=
humorous effect is produced by using a word that suggests two or more meanings or by exploiting similar sounding words having different meanings

Simile
=
comparison between two unlike things using the words "like" or "as"

Synecdoche
=
when a part represents the whole or the whole is represented by a part