Sound

      Music is created in poetry through sound. Techniques such as rhyme, cadence, enjambment, and caesura can be used to create sound. In addition, alliteration, assonance, and onomatopoeia can also add to the musical quality of poetry. The analysis of sound adds to the meaning of a poetry or play. In Robert Frost’s poem, “Out-Out-,“ there are various sounds. Onomatopoeia is used in the words “buzz” and “rattled.” Alliteration is used when he says, “ and the saw snarled and rattles, snarled and rattled.” Cleverly, the use of sound in the poem personifies the inanimate saw. In William Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet, sound is employed as a mechanism to draw the reader’s attention to certain situations or emotions. When the ghost first arrives, Horatio uses alliteration when he says, speak of it: stay and speak! Stop it, Marcellus.” In this quote, alliteration is used to portray the sense of fear the characters have to the reader. The usage of sound is important in both “Out-Out-“ and Hamlet because it accentuates important events and ideas.