octave
Other forms: octaves
An octave is a musical interval of eight notes. Sing from “do” to “do” — on key — and you will have an octave.
Like octagon and octopus, the key to an octave is “eight.” An octave may be the entire eight-note scale, or just the bottom and top notes, like C and C. Octave can also refer to an eight-line group in an Italian sonnet, or an eight-day festival; in fact, the word comes from the Latin expression octava dies, meaning “eighth day” — as in the eighth festival day after a feast. The ave in octave is usually pronounced “iv.”
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a musical interval of eight tonessynonyms: musical octave
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a rhythmic group of eight lines of versetype of:stanzaa fixed number of lines of verse forming a unit of a poem
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a feast day and the seven days following it
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Vocabulary lists containing octave
One of the stumbling blocks when trying to study poetry is that it seems like a different world. Familiar things, like words, are put to unfamiliar use, and there is an entire descriptive vocabulary that is completely foreign and quite often puzzling. This list seeks to explain the words used to describe poetry through examples from famous poems. Nassim Nicholas Taleb said, "If you want to annoy a poet, explain his poetry," but we are willing to take that risk to make the world of literary analysis a little clearer and further illuminate the mystery of poetry.
Walter Dean Myers' short story "The Treasure of Lemon Brown" explores the question of what's worth fighting for. Here are all the word lists to support the reading of Grade 6 Unit 1's texts from SpringBoard's Common Core ELA series: Imperfect Me, My Superpowers, Flipped, The Jacket, Kira-Kira, Thank You, M'am, Pandora and the Whispering Box, Eleven, The Treasure of Lemon Brown, The Fun They Had
You'll understand rhyme's reason when you practice this list of words related the structure of poetry. To learn even more about poetry, explore our lists on Genre and Literary Devices.