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Midnight

Time And Calendar
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

The point dividing one calendar day from the next. It is a traditional hour of secrecy, transformation, and solitude.

Detailed Definition
Midnight is both a precise boundary in clock time and a richly symbolic moment in literature. One day has ended, another has begun, yet the world may appear unchanged, making the hour ideal for poems about thresholds and hidden continuities. Folktales and dramas often treat midnight as a time when rules loosen, spirits move, or identities shift. In lyric verse, it can intensify isolation, insomnia, confession, desire, and the stark consciousness of passing time.
Example
Example in poetry:
Emily Dickinson begins one poem, “We grow accustomed to the Dark—,” and midnight imagery can intensify that movement into darkness and uncertainty; “At midnight, the clock forgot its face,” personifies the hour as a threshold where ordinary order weakens; Midnight often marks transition, since it divides one calendar day from the next; A poet may write, “At midnight, yesterday closed its hand around the key,” using the hour to dramatize ending and renewal
Additional Notes
Midnight is both an ending and a beginning, making it a powerful threshold image. Folklore often associates it with secrecy, ghosts, dreams, danger, and private revelation.
Other Meanings of “Midnight”
Also Known As
Twelve Midnight 12 A.M.
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