Home › Glossary › Letter U

Unbroken elegy

Form
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

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

A lament for the dead presented without formal or thematic interruption

Detailed Definition
An unbroken elegy is a continuous lament that flows without stanzaic division or tonal interruption, sustaining grief as a single, unified utterance; Tennyson’s “In Memoriam” and Whitman’s “When Lilacs Last” achieve this through ritualized repetition, natural imagery, and seamless syntactic progression.
Example
Example in poetry:
Tennyson’s “In Memoriam” flows as unbroken elegy across 131 sections; Whitman’s “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d” sustains mournful tone without stanzaic rupture; Milton’s “Lycidas” moves seamlessly from pastoral to prophetic lament; Hardy’s “Poems of 1912–13” forms continuous mourning for his wife
Additional Notes
An unbroken elegy maintains consistent mournful tone and form without digression—sustains focus on loss through steady rhythm, refrain, or imagery; contrasts with digressive or meditative elegiac modes.
Also Known As
Continuous elegy uninterrupted lament seamless mourning verse unbroken threnody Flowing elegy Flowing lament flowing threnody
Skip to main content