Home › Glossary › Letter V

Void

Psychology
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

Void: An absolute state of emptiness, an absence of meaning, presence, or form, used in poetry to evoke existential dread, cosmic nothingness, or spiritual desolation.

Detailed Definition
Void in poetry is the ultimate negation—silence, white space, abyss. Poets confront it in existential and mystical verse, where language strains against nothingness. Void appears as cosmic darkness, personal loss, or epistemological collapse. It invites readers into the limits of representation, often yielding to ineffable awe or despair. The void challenges poetry to create meaning from absence, making each word a fragile bulwark.
Example
Example in poetry:
Void in Emily Dickinson's poetry where void is a theme; In T.S. Eliot's "The Hollow Men," void is a theme; In Samuel Beckett's poetry, void is a theme; In contemporary poetry, void is often existential; In "The Waste Land," void is a theme; In confessional poetry, void is a frequent theme.
Additional Notes
Void in poetry is the ultimate negation—silence, white space, abyss—confronted in existential and mystical verse where language strains against nothingness. In teaching, distinguish void from oblivion: void is absolute emptiness, while oblivion is the state of being forgotten. Void appears as cosmic darkness or personal loss, inviting limits of representation. It challenges poetry to create meaning from absence. Students should examine how poets use imagery of silence, emptiness, and abyss, along with sparse form, to convey void's existential, boundary-testing power.
Other Meanings of “Void”
Also Known As
Emptiness abyss nothingness nullity blankness
Skip to main content