Anaphora Examples: Definition and Famous Examples in Literature
Anaphora is the repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses or sentences. It's one of the oldest and most powerful rhetorical devices in the language — used in the Bible, Greek oratory, Shakespeare, and Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream." Anaphora creates rhythm, builds emotional momentum, and makes the repeated phrase impossible to ignore. When it works, the repetition feels inevitable — like a drumbeat underneath the words.
Anaphora
Repetition at the start of successive clauses.
"I have a dream... I have a dream... I have a dream."
Epistrophe
Repetition at the end of successive clauses.
"...of the people, by the people, for the people."
Symploce
Repetition at both the start and end.
Combines anaphora and epistrophe — the same word opens and closes each clause.
Parallelism
Similar grammatical structure — not necessarily the same words.
Anaphora is a form of parallelism, but parallelism doesn't require repeated words.
Anaphora in Speeches and Oratory
Oratory is where anaphora has always lived — the public speech, the sermon, the political address. Spoken out loud, repetition becomes rhythm; rhythm becomes inevitability; inevitability becomes conviction. These five examples define the tradition.
Martin Luther King Jr. — "I Have a Dream" (1963)
"I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed... I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia..."
Why it works: The definitive example of anaphora in the English language. King repeats "I have a dream" eight times in succession, each repetition building on the last. The rhythm becomes incantatory — the repetition itself embodies the relentlessness of hope.
Winston Churchill — Speech to the House of Commons (1940)
"We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender."
Why it works: Churchill's anaphora creates the impression of total resolve. "We shall fight" accumulates across locations until it seems to fill all possible space. The final "we shall never surrender" breaks the location pattern — and lands harder because of it.
Charles Dickens — A Tale of Two Cities (1859)
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness..."
Why it works: Dickens opens his novel with relentless anaphora — "it was" — applied to contradictory states. The effect is paradox held in rhythm. We feel the chaos of revolution through the grammar itself.
Abraham Lincoln — Gettysburg Address (1863)
"We can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground."
Why it works: In three short clauses, Lincoln uses anaphora to build to a reversal: it is the soldiers who have hallowed it, not us. The three repeated negatives make the affirmation that follows feel earned.
John F. Kennedy — Inaugural Address (1961)
"Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe..."
Why it works: "Any" is the repeated word — applied to price, burden, hardship, friend, foe. Each application broadens the commitment. The anaphora enacts what it describes: a willingness to extend in all directions.
Anaphora in Poetry
Poetry has always exploited anaphora — line breaks make repetition visible, and the compressed form makes each repeated word carry more weight. These five poems show how poets use anaphora to create rhythm, accumulate meaning, and build emotional pressure.
Walt Whitman — "Song of Myself" (1855)
"I celebrate myself, and sing myself, / And what I assume you shall assume, / For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you."
Why it works: Whitman's entire poem is built on anaphoric structures — "I" begins line after line across hundreds of verses. The repetition enacts the poem's argument: the self is everywhere, contains multitudes, will not stop asserting itself.
Allen Ginsberg — "Howl" (1956)
"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked... who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness..."
Why it works: "Who" is repeated at the start of clause after clause for pages — a relentless catalog of lost souls. The anaphora creates the feeling of an endless indictment: the list never stops because the damage never stopped.
William Shakespeare — Sonnet 66
"Tired with all these, for restful death I cry: / As, to behold desert a beggar born, / And needy nothing trimm'd in jollity, / And purest faith unhappily forsworn..."
Why it works: "And" opens clause after clause — a technique called polysyndeton often used alongside anaphora. Shakespeare accumulates grievances until the speaker's exhaustion is felt structurally.
Langston Hughes — "A Dream Deferred" (1951)
"Does it dry up / like a raisin in the sun? / Or fester like a sore— / And then run? / Does it stink like rotten meat?"
Why it works: Hughes's "Does it" and "like" create anaphoric momentum through a series of comparisons. Each repetition adds another image of decay, so the accumulation itself enacts deferral.
William Blake — "The Tyger" (1794)
"Tyger Tyger, burning bright, / In the forests of the night... / Tyger Tyger burning bright, / In the forests of the night."
Why it works: Blake opens and closes the poem with the same two lines — a macro-level anaphora that frames the whole. The repetition makes the question feel unanswered, eternal, still burning.
Anaphora in Prose and Novels
In prose, anaphora risks feeling heavy-handed — but in the right moment, at the right intensity, it works as well as in any speech. These five examples show novelists reaching for anaphora when the moment demands it.
Charles Dickens — Bleak House (1852)
"Fog everywhere. Fog up the river... Fog down the river... Fog on the Essex marshes, fog on the Kentish heights... Fog in the eyes and throats of ancient Greenwich pensioners..."
Why it works: Dickens was obsessed with anaphora in descriptive passages. The repeated "Fog" doesn't just describe weather — it becomes the novel's governing metaphor for the legal system's obscuring of truth. The form enacts the content.
Ernest Hemingway — A Farewell to Arms (1929)
"I was always embarrassed by the words sacred, glorious, and sacrifice and the expression in vain... I had seen nothing sacred, and the things that were glorious had no glory..."
Why it works: Hemingway uses anaphoric repetition of abstract nouns to dismantle them — "sacred," "glorious," "sacrifice" are named and then denied. The repetition does the opposite of celebration: it strips language of meaning to show its hollowness.
Toni Morrison — Beloved (1987)
"124 was spiteful. Full of a baby's venom... 124 was loud. Loaded with a baby's fury... 124 was quiet."
Why it works: Morrison opens three sections of the novel with "124 was ___" — each time with a different adjective. The structural repetition marks time and change across the novel. The house number becomes a character through anaphora.
The Bible — Psalm 136
"Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. His love endures forever. Give thanks to the God of gods. His love endures forever..."
Why it works: "His love endures forever" is repeated 26 times in a single psalm — one of the most sustained anaphoric structures in any text. The repetition is liturgical: it becomes a chant, a truth driven home through accumulation.
George Orwell — 1984 (1949)
"War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength."
Why it works: Each slogan follows the same grammatical structure: [noun] is [its opposite]. The structural repetition makes the three slogans feel like one overwhelming system. The parallel form enacts totalitarian uniformity.
Why Anaphora Works
Rhythm and momentum
Each repetition accelerates the next. The reader's ear learns the pattern after the second occurrence and begins anticipating the third — which creates a kind of momentum that carries the prose forward. The rhythm becomes physically felt, not just intellectually registered. This is why anaphora works so well in speeches: the audience begins to lean in.
Emphasis
The repeated word or phrase cannot be ignored. It is the point. "We shall fight" is the subject and the argument simultaneously. Anaphora focuses the reader's attention on exactly what the writer wants them to feel — the repetition is like pointing at the same thing again and again until the reader looks there and cannot look away.
Emotional escalation
A list of anaphoric clauses feels longer than it is. "I have a dream" said eight times creates an experience of plenitude — of vision overflowing the speaker. Each repetition adds weight rather than redundancy. By the eighth "I have a dream," the reader has been moved in a way that a single statement never could achieve.
How to Write Anaphora
Use it at moments of emotional intensity
Anaphora raises the temperature of the prose. Use it only when the material calls for heightened feeling — a climactic speech, a moment of grief or resolve, a final reckoning. If you use it everywhere, it becomes wallpaper. Reserve it for the moments that need the full force of the device.
Keep the repeated phrase short and strong
"I have a dream" is five syllables. "We shall fight" is four. The anchoring phrase needs to be compact enough that it doesn't exhaust the reader before the variation arrives. A long repeated phrase becomes a weight, not a beat. Aim for two to six syllables in the anaphoric element.
Vary the length of what follows
The repeated phrase is the constant; what follows it is the variable. Vary the length of the clauses that follow the repeated phrase — some short, some long, some ending abruptly, some trailing into complexity. The variation keeps the structure from becoming mechanical even as the repetition makes it feel inevitable.
Know when to break the pattern
The most powerful moment in an anaphoric structure is often the moment it breaks. Churchill says "we shall fight" five times — and then says "we shall never surrender." The pattern's break is the arrival. Set up the expectation, then subvert it at the moment of maximum emotional weight.
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