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Rueful

Mood
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

Rueful conveys gentle regret or wistful sadness, often with ironic self-awareness, expressed through understated diction and reflective tone.

Detailed Definition
Rueful mood in poetry conveys tender remorse through understated diction, reflective imagery, and wistful tone; it appears in aging poems, missed-opportunity lyrics, or ironic elegies—like Frost or Larkin—where the speaker looks back with affectionate regret, blending sorrow and humor to acknowledge human fallibility with grace and self-awareness.
Example
Example in poetry:
In “Fern Hill,” Dylan Thomas expresses rueful nostalgia for lost youth; Emily Dickinson’s “After great pain, a formal feeling comes” conveys rueful numbness; In “The Road Not Taken,” Frost’s speaker looks back with rueful ambiguity; Thomas Hardy’s “The Voice” expresses rueful longing; Sylvia Plath’s “Mirror” portrays rueful aging; In “Dover Beach,” Matthew Arnold laments with rueful despair.
Additional Notes
Rueful mood conveys regretful or wry sadness; signaled by ironic tone, backward glances, and gentle self-reproach—e.g., aging or missed-opportunity poems; related to nostalgic, wistful, and melancholic moods; carries a touch of wisdom or acceptance.
Also Known As
Regretful Melancholy Wistful Sorrowful Remorseful
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