Importance of Literary Figures

In the field of literature, there are various forms of expression that aim to enrich what is being written. In this way, the texts, whether in prose or in verse, gain beauty and stylistic resources that the language informal and everyday does not have. This is known as literary figures and understanding what types there are and what they are for is important if one wants to know more about the resources of literature.

Literature and its need to build its own language

Any of us, having read a novel, poems, a short story or any type of literary work, notes immediately that it is not written in the same terms and with the same forms as those one uses to speak informally.

Thus, literature has created numerous forms and ways of expressing themselves that differ from colloquial language and that is why it can sometimes seem bulky or flashy. This is due to the need for literature to build its special methods of writing that signify distinction from other forms of writing. communication, and there enter the literary figures.

Literary figures versus tropes

When we talk about the methods that literature has to express its ideas, we find two main groups of functions, some better known than others. Among those known as tropes, the most famous are metaphors, metonymy, antonomasia, allegory or hyperbole. To a greater or lesser degree these are relatively familiar to those people They are not dedicated to literature.

However, literary figures are not so well known outside the field of writers since they have to do with grammatical aspects or even the metric of the words. words, which transforms them into quite specific elements that not everyone knows about. Within this type of figures we find two large groups in turn: figures of diction (those that are made up of grammatical or metrical elements) and those of thought (that have to do with the meaning of the words that are use).

What examples exist of this type of literary construction?

As said, literary figures can be of speech or thought. Among the first we can find the following: diastole, sinalefas (both transformation of words), silepsis, hyperbaton or anadiplosis.

On the side of the literary figures of thought we find the paraphrase, the paraphrase, the paradox, the etopeia or the rhetorical question.

Photos: Fotolia. wavebreakmediamicro