Literary devices practice pt2

Question 1

Is this a dagger which I see before me?

Answer 1

apostrophe

Question 2

Thou sure and firm-set earth, Hear not my steps

Answer 2

apostrophe

Question 3

Hear it not, Duncan, for it is a knell / That summons thee to heaven or to hell.

Answer 3

rhyming couplet

Question 4

The sleeping and the dead / Are but as pictures; ’tis the eye of childhood / That fears a painted devil.

Answer 4

simile

Question 5

Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood / Clean from my hand?

Answer 5

hyperbole

Macbeth is exaggerating — he’s saying that even the entire ocean couldn’t wash the blood (his guilt) off his hands.

Question 6

The night has been unruly…chimneys blown down…earth was feverous

Answer 6

pathetic fallacy

when nature reflects human emotions or events.

Question 7

Twas a rough night

Answer 7

verbal irony, pretending to agree.

Question 8

Approach the chamber and destroy your sight / With a new Gorgon

Answer 8

allusion to the Gorgon (Medusa), who turns people to stone.

Question 9

O gentle lady, ’Tis not for you to hear what I can speak

Answer 9

dramatic irony, since Lady Macbeth planned the murder.

Question 10

What is amiss? / You are, and do not know it.

Answer 10

pun

Question 11

This murderous shaft that’s shot / Hath not yet lighted

Answer 11

metaphor comparing the danger to an arrow still in flight

Question 12

By th’ clock ’tis day, / And yet dark night strangles the travelling lamp

Answer 12

metaphor