What is the Effect of Parallelism in This Excerpt

Parallelism in Rhetoric

Parallelism in rhetoric is used to persuade, motivate, and/or evoke emotional responses in an audience and is oftentimes used in speeches. The residual betwixt clauses or phrases makes complex thoughts easier to process while holding the reader’s or listener’s attention. The balance in importance is too an essential element; each phrase or idea should be as important as its counterpart.

Some examples of parallelism in rhetoric include the following:

• “I accept a dream that my iv piddling children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their pare but by the content of their character. I take a dream today.” – Martin Luther Male monarch, Jr.
• “My beau Americans, ask not what your state can do for yous, ask what you lot can do for your country.” -John F. Kennedy
• “I don’t want to live on in my work. I want to live on in my flat.” -Woody Allen
• “Today’south students can put dope in their veins or promise in their brains. If they can conceive it and believe information technology, they tin can achieve it. They must know information technology is not their bent just their attitude that will make up one’s mind their distance.” -Jesse Jackson
• “For the stop of a theoretical scientific discipline is truth, just the stop of a practical science is performance.” -Aristotle
• “My fellow citizens: I stand up here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust yous take bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors.” -Barack Obama
• “One small step for homo, one giant leap for mankind.” -Neil Armstrong
• “We’ve seen the unfurling of flags, the lighting of candles, the giving of claret, the saying of prayers.” -George Due west. Bush

You tin also meet rhetorical parallelism used in longer speeches, such as this example by John F. Kennedy:

“The Republic of ireland of 1963, one of the youngest of nations and the oldest of civilizations, has discovered that the accomplishment of nationhood is non an end but a beginning. In the years since independence, yous accept undergone a new and peaceful revolution, an economical and industrial revolution, transforming the face of this land while withal holding to the old spiritual and cultural values. Y’all accept modernized your economy, harnessed your rivers, diversified your industry, liberalized your trade, electrified your farms, accelerated your charge per unit growth, and improved the living standard of your people.”

Parallelism in Literature

The opening paragraph of Charles Dickens’
A Tale of Two Cities
is perhaps the best-known instance of parallelism in literature. Parallelism is shown past using “it was” to connect opposing ideas.

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, information technology was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of promise, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before usa, nosotros had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Sky, we were all going direct the other manner.”

William Shakespeare often used parallelism in his plays. Consider the following excerpt from
Richard Ii.

“I’ll give my jewels for a set of beads,

My gorgeous palace for a hermitage,

My gay clothes for an almsman’southward gown,

My figured goblets for a dish of wood,

My scepter for a palmer’due south walking staff

My subjects for a pair of carved saints

and my large kingdom for a little grave.”

Diazeugma, using a number of verbs to describe a subject area, is also a class of parallelism. This can be seen in
Vacation ’58, a short story by John Hughes.

“It wasn’t a big cliff. Information technology was simply about four anxiety high. Simply it was enough to blow out the forepart tire, knock off the dorsum bumper, break Dad’s glasses, make Aunt Edythe spit out her false teeth, spill a jug of Kool-Aid, crash-land Missy’s head, spread the Auto Bingo pieces all over, and make Mark practice number two.”

Shooting an Elephant, an essay by George Orwell, uses the feel of hunting an ambitious elephant in Burma as a metaphor for British Imperialism. Starting each phrase with “some” creates a parallel structure that reinforces how easy it is for observers of the same event to have entirely different opinions.

“Some of the people said that the elephant had gone in i direction, some said that he had gone in some other, some professed non even to have heard of any elephant.”

The poem
The Tyger
by William Blake uses repetition of “what” to create a pleasing rhythm.

“What the hammer? what the chain?

In what furnace was thy brain?

What the anvil? What dread grasp

Dare its deadly terrors squeeze?”

How Exercise I Love Thee?
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning likewise creates rhythmic verse with repetition of the parallel construction “I honey thee.”

“How do I dearest thee? Allow me count the means.

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height

My soul can accomplish, when feeling out of sight

For the ends of being and ideal grace.

I love thee to the level of every mean solar day’s

Most quiet need, past sun and candle-light.

I love thee freely, as men strive for right.

I dear thee purely, as they turn from praise.

I dearest thee with the passion put to use

In my one-time griefs, and with my babyhood’southward faith.

I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,

Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God cull,

I shall but love thee ameliorate afterwards death.”

Community
by John Donne contrasts ideas of “adept” and “beloved” with “ill”and “hate” using parallel construction.

“Good we must love, and must hate ill,

For sick is ill, and proficient adept notwithstanding;

Only at that place are things indifferent,

Which we may neither detest, nor love,

But i, and so some other show,

Every bit nosotros shall find our fancy aptitude.”

East.Due east. Cummings’ poem,
love is more thicker than forget,
uses the words “love is” and “more” or “less” to create a parallel structure that explains the meaning of love.

“love is more than thicker than forget

more thinner than call back

more seldom than a wave is wet

more frequent than to fail

it is well-nigh mad and moonly

and less it shall unbe

than all the sea which only

is deeper than the sea

love is less always than to win

less never than alive

less bigger than the least begin

less littler than forgive”

Understanding Parallel Construction

Parallelism uses similar words, phrases, or clauses to bear witness that ideas have the aforementioned level of importance. This construction improves readability by giving a natural flow to a written work.

For native speakers of English, parallelism is frequently instinctive. We say, “I similar reading, writing, and painting” instead of “I like to read, writing, and painting.”

Mistakes in Parallel Construction

However, 1 common mistake novice writers brand involves failing to keep items in a list after a colon in a parallel form. For instance, “Writers can apply an online dictionary to find help with these issues: word meanings, pronunciations, and finding right spellings” does non use a parallel structure. Changing the text to read, “Writers can utilise an online dictionary to find assist with these problems: word meanings, pronunciations, and right spellings” gives information technology a parallel construction and improves readability.

More than Examples of Parallel Structure

Additional examples of parallel sentence structure include the following:

• Mother was very busy gathering the laundry, dusting the furniture, and washing the dishes.
• He likes television shows that have deep characters, interesting stories, and skillful actors.
• My confront is washed, my hair is combed, and my teeth are brushed.
• We are giving away our furniture, selling our firm, and moving to Spain.
• To succeed in life, you lot need to have advantage of opportunities and to follow your dreams.

Other Literary Devices Used With Parallelism

As you lot utilise parallel construction in your writing or begin to place information technology in the literature you read, y’all’ll run across that it besides goes with other literary devices:

• Rhythm – The meter or rhythm of the repeated elements are frequently similar. You’ll see the same stressed syllables in a pattern in the parallel elements of the judgement or piece.
• Repetition – At its root, parallelism is near repetition. The phrase construction or impact of an idea is repeated to make information technology more powerful.
• Antithesis – A sophisticated style to use parallelism is to contrast two unlike ideas with the aforementioned structure.
• Ingemination – Using the aforementioned sounds for a listing of items or similar phrases helps further enhance the parallelism.

Stay Balanced in Your Writing

Reading written text out loud is often an effective manner to identify examples of parallelism or areas that demand editing to maintain a parallel structure. Listening to the rhythm of words as they menstruum from your tongue will help yous maintain the desired remainder in your writing, whether you’re writing a persuasive essay or a romantic dearest poem.