Polysyndeton

__//Polysyndeton//__


 * D** **efinition::** //Polysyndeton//, Sentences that include repetition of conjunctions in close succession.


 * Origin::** Is from the Greek word which mean "bound together".

-Many **examples** of this literary rhetoric appeared in "The Love Song of J.Alfred Prufrock" by T.S. Elliot. -This story is part of a video game that can be played [|here.]


 * Examples** from text:

1) "But though I have __wept and fasted, wept and prayed__, Though I have seen my head..."

2) "Should I, after __tea and cakes and ices__, have the strength to force the moment of its crisis?"

3) "After the __sunsets and the dooryards and the spindled streets__..."

All quotations are from (The Love Song of J.Alfred Prufrock, Elliot)


 * Other Examples**:

1) "He was tall and listless and his tired..." (p.245)

Quotation taken from Tlon, Uqbur, Orbis.

As you can see, Elliot uses many repetitions of conjunctions in this story. The conjunctions are mostly used to emphasis the words that each conjunction is between. Instead of saying "tea, cakes, and ices", Elliot uses "tea and cakes and ices" to emphasis each noun in the sentence. Elliot uses polysndetons throughout his text for precisely this purpose.

JB