In “On Bird, Bird-Watching and Jazz,” by Ralph Ellison, it provides many examples of diction and syntax. For diction, I came across questions such as why the author uses the word virtuosi, and if the author provided any examples of metaphors. In the sentence, “Mimic thrushes, which include the catbird and brown thrasher, along with the mockingbird, are not only great virtuosi, they are the tricksters and con men of the bird world,” it provides the answer to both questions. Furthermore, the word virtuosi is defined as a person skilled in music, and the bird is being described as this human characteristic, which shows the author applying personification. As an example of metaphor, Ellison refers to these types of birds as con men, something
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Throughout the piece, there were examples of a compound, cumulative, and a periodic sentence, but he mostly used long complex sentences. An example of a compound sentence is, “Indeed, on summer nights in the south, when the moon hangs low, mockingbirds sing as though determined to heat every drop of romance in the sleeping adolescent’s heart to fever pitch.” An example of cumulative is found in the following sentence, “Their song thrills and swings the entire moon struck night to arouse one’s sense of the mystery, promise and frustration of being human, alive and hot in the blood.” The example of a periodic sentence was, “They are fond of fruit, especially mulberries, and if there is a tree in your yard, there will be, along with the wonderful music, much chalky, blue tinted evidence of their presence.” The phrase, “delightful to the eye as to the ear,” is an example of antithesis, the author used this structure to show how these two objects contrasts each other. The example of parallelism was, “They are as delighted to the eye as to the ear, but sometimes a similarity of voice and appearance makes for a confusion with the shrike, a species given to impaling insects and smaller songbirds on the points of thorns, and they are destroyed.” There is a repetition of “they are,” and “to the,” showing similar
Throughout the piece, there were examples of a compound, cumulative, and a periodic sentence, but he mostly used long complex sentences. An example of a compound sentence is, “Indeed, on summer nights in the south, when the moon hangs low, mockingbirds sing as though determined to heat every drop of romance in the sleeping adolescent’s heart to fever pitch.” An example of cumulative is found in the following sentence, “Their song thrills and swings the entire moon struck night to arouse one’s sense of the mystery, promise and frustration of being human, alive and hot in the blood.” The example of a periodic sentence was, “They are fond of fruit, especially mulberries, and if there is a tree in your yard, there will be, along with the wonderful music, much chalky, blue tinted evidence of their presence.” The phrase, “delightful to the eye as to the ear,” is an example of antithesis, the author used this structure to show how these two objects contrasts each other. The example of parallelism was, “They are as delighted to the eye as to the ear, but sometimes a similarity of voice and appearance makes for a confusion with the shrike, a species given to impaling insects and smaller songbirds on the points of thorns, and they are destroyed.” There is a repetition of “they are,” and “to the,” showing similar