Editing Alliteration (section)

=== Poetry ===
Poets can call attention to certain words in a line of poetry by using alliteration. They can also use alliteration to create a pleasant, rhythmic effect. In the following poetic lines, notice how alliteration is used to emphasize words and to create rhythm:<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Meliyevna |first=Zebo Nizomova |date=2021 |title=Alliteration as a Literary Device |url=http://mentaljournal-jspu.uz/index.php/mesmj/article/view/110 |journal=Mental Enlightenment Scientific-Methodological Journal |volume=3 |issue=03 |pages=162–172}}</ref>

*"Give me the splendid silent sun with all his beams full-dazzling!' ([[Walt Whitman]], "Give Me the Splendid Silent Sun")
*"They all gazed and gazed upon this green stranger, / because everyone wondered what it could mean/ that a rider and his horse could be such a 'colour- / green as grass, and greener it seemed/ than green enamel glowing bright against gold".{{efn|The original in [[Middle English]] was:{{sfn|Tolkien|Davis|1995}}<poem>For vch mon had meruayle quat hit mene myȝt
Þat a haþel and a horse myȝt such a hwe lach,
As growe grene as þe gres and grener hit semed,
Þen grene aumayl on golde glowande bryȝter.</poem>}} (232-236) (''[[Sir Gawain and the Green Knight]]'', translated by [[Bernard O'Donoghue]].)

*"Some papers like writers, some like wrappers.  Are you a writer or a wrapper?"  ("Paper I" by [[Carl Sandburg]])

Alliteration can also add to the mood of a poem. If a poet repeats soft, melodious sounds, a calm or dignified mood can result. If harsh, hard sounds are repeated, on the other hand, the mood can become tense or excited.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Meliyevna |first=Zebo Nizomova |date=2021 |title=Alliteration as Literary Device |url=http://mentaljournal-jspu.uz/index.php/mesmj/article/view/110 |journal=Mental Enlightenment Scientific-Methodological Journal |volume=3 |issue=03 |pages=162–172}}</ref> In this poem, alliteration of the s, l, and f sounds adds to a hushed, peaceful mood:

*"Softer be they than slippered sleep the lean lithe deer the fleet flown deer."  ([[All in green went my love riding]] by [[E. E. Cummings]]<ref>Techniques Writers Use</ref>)

====Examples from alliterative verse====

Source:<ref>{{Cite web |title=Published Authors of Alliterative Verse |url=https://alliteration.net/authors |access-date=2023-11-29 |website=Forgotten Ground Regained |language=en}}</ref>

*"In the first age, the frogs dwelt / at peace in their pond: they paddled about ..."  ''(Moralities'' by [[W.H. Auden]])
*"Holocaust, pentecost:  what heaped heartbreak: / The tendrils of fire forthrightly tasting foundation to rooftree ..."  ''(My Grandfather's Church Goes Up'' by [[Fred Chappell]])
*"Chestnuts fell in the charred season, / Fell finally, finding room / In air to open their old cases ..."  ''(Another Reluctance'' by [[Annie Finch]])
*"Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches' wings; / Landscape plotted & pieced -- fold, fallow, & plough ..." ''([[Pied Beauty]]'' by [[Gerard Manley Hopkins]])
*"Effortlessly at height hangs his still eye. / His wings hold all creation in a weightless quiet ..." ''([[The Hawk in the Rain]]'' by [[Ted Hughes]])
*"As one who wanders into old workings, / Dazed by the noonday, desiring coolness, Has found retreat barred by fall of rockface ..." ''(As One Who Wanders into Old Workings'' by [[C. Day Lewis]])
*"We were talking of dragons, Tolkien and I / In a Berkshire bar. The big workman / Who had sat silent and sucked his pipe / All the evening, from his empty mug ..." ''(We Were Talking of Dragons'' by [[C. S. Lewis]])
*"We set up mast and sail on that swart ship / Bore sheep aboard her, and our bodies also / Heavy with weeping, so winds from sternward / Bore us out onward with bellying canvas ..." ''(Canto I'' by [[Ezra Pound]])
*"Out of doubt, out of dark to the day's rising / I came singing in the sun, sword unsheathing ..."  ''(Eomer's Wrath'' by [[J.R.R. Tolkien]])
*"An axe angles from my neighbor's ashcan; / It is hell's handiwork,  the wood not hickory, ..."  ''(Junk'' by [[Richard Wilbur]])
[[File:Mikado 02 - Weir Collection.jpg|thumb|300px|[[Gilbert and Sullivan]]'s comic opera ''[[The Mikado]]'' contains a well-known example of alliterative lyrics:{{sfn|Wren|2006|p=168}}<br>"To sit in solemn silence in a dull, dark dock,<br>In a pestilential prison, with a lifelong lock,<br>Awaiting the sensation of a [[short, sharp shock]],<br>From a cheap and chippy chopper on a big black block!"<ref>[https://openlibrary.org/details/mikadolibrettoof00sulluoft ''The Mikado''] libretto, p. 16, Oliver Ditson Company</ref>]]

====Lines from other poems====
*"And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain" ''([[The Raven]]'' by [[Edgar Allan Poe]])
*"The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew / The furrow followed free" (''[[The Rime of the Ancient Mariner]]'' by [[Samuel Taylor Coleridge]])
*"I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet"  (''[[Acquainted with the Night]]'' by [[Robert Frost]]
*"I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore" ''([[The Lake Isle of Innisfree]]'' by [[W. B. Yeats]])
*"And churlish chiding of the winter's wind / Which, when it bites and blows upon my body" (from [[William Shakespeare]]'s play ''[[As You Like It]])''
*"A pleasing calm; while broad and brown, below / Extensive harvests hang the heavy head" (''[[The Seasons (Thomson)|Autumn]]'' by [[James Thomson (poet, born 1700)|James Thomson]])

====Alliteration combined with rhyme====
*"Great Aunt Nellie and Brent Bernard who watch with wild wonder at the wide window as the beautiful birds begin to bite into the bountiful birdseed" ("Thank-You for the Thistle" by Dorie Thurston)
*"Three grey geese in a green field grazing. Grey were the geese and green was the grazing." (From the nursery rhyme ''Three Grey Geese'' by [[Mother Goose]]) 
*"Betty Botter bought a bit of butter, but she said, this butter's bitter; if I put it in my batter, it will make my batter bitter, but a bit of better butter will make my bitter batter better..." (from the [[tongue-twister]] rhyme ''[[Betty Botter]]'' by [[Carolyn Wells]])
*"Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, where's the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?" (anonymous tongue-twister rhyme)

====Music lyrics====
* "[[Helplessly Hoping]]" by [[Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young]] has rich alliteration in every verse.
* "[[Mr. Tambourine Man]]" by [[Bob Dylan]] employs alliteration throughout the song, including the lines: "Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free / Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands."
* "[[Mother Nature's Son]]" by [[The Beatles]] includes the line: "Swaying daisies sing a lazy song beneath the sun."
* "Spieluhr" by [[Rammstein]] includes a spoken line: "Das kleine Herz stand still für Stunden" (eng. "The little heart stood still for hours). 
* "Fairyland Fanfare" by [[Falconer (band)|Falconer]] has a part that alliterates the "l" over 30 times: "Live the legend, live life all alone / Longing to linger in lore / Illuminating a lane / That leads you aloft / You're lost to the lunar lure / Leave the languish / Leave lanterns of lorn / Lend lacking lustre to lies / Liberate the laces / Of life for the lone / Lest lament yet alights“
* "[[Werewolves of London]]" by [[Warren Zevon]] includes the line "Little old lady got mutilated late last night."