Literary Device Week Day Five: Anaphora

Dicken’s A Tale of Two Cities may well have the most beautiful first paragraph ever written:

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way.

This is an exquisite version of anaphora: the repetition of the first words of a sentence for dramatic effect. Prose writing can be as poetic as poetry, but what else did Dickens achieve with this anaphora?

Clearly, his excerpt has a compelling rhythm. Clearly, you read it with an increasing sense of desperation, but he achieved another important goal: By giving his reader nothing to focus on but a list of paradoxes, he gives them an emphasis that few other literary devices could have achieved.

Martin Luther King used anaphora in a similar way:

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today.

You might know this section of his speech by heart, even if you’ve never tried to memorise it. That’s why anaphora is so popular in politics. The human brain loves patterns, and if you include them, they will shine through the rest of your text as if in Technicolor.

Our own @asexual_slut used anaphora and repetition to achieve a lilting sense of passion in Emma. The repetition remains even as the situation devolves into darkness. We watch those words change meaning right in front of us.

There are so many ways to use and abuse this device. Write your own poem or prose piece with anaphora. You will love it.