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Grammar Clinic: The REAL difference between ALLITERATION, ASSONANCE and CONSONANCE

All three – Assonance, Alliteration and Consonance, create sound effects.

Alliteration

The repetition of an initial consonant sound, as in “a peck of pickled peppers.” Although alliteration is often associated with literary language, it also appears in many common idioms and advertising slogans.

Assonance

The repetition of identical or similar vowel sounds in neighbouring words. As in “a heart no bigger than an orange seed has ceased to beat.”

Consonance

Consonance is the repetition of consonant sounds; more specifically, the repetition of the final consonant sounds of accented syllables or important words as in ” ‘word’ and ‘lord,’ or ‘blood,’ ‘food,’ and ‘good'”

The difference between Assonance, Alliteration and Consonance

Alliteration is the repetition of initial consonant sounds in neighbouring words  with emphasis on the first letters.

Good men are gruff and grumpy, cranky, crabbed, and cross.

A moist young moon hung above the mist of a neighboring meadow

Assonance is the repetition of similar vowel sounds in neighbouring words.

Try to light the fire

It beats . . . as it sweeps . . . as it cleans

The spider skins lie on their sides

Consonance is also the repetition of consonant sounds but emphasis on the final consonant letters or sound.

First and last, odds and ends, short and sweet and a stroke of luck.

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