All terms

What is Enjambment?

When a sentence runs over the end of one line of verse into the next.

The Running Sentence: Enjambment in Creative Writing

Enjambment, a word derived from the French enjambement, is a technique often used by poets and authors, where a sentence flows over the end of a line and continues into the next one, without any grammatical pause. This technique adds to the fluidity of the language, creating a cascade of ideas that moves smoothly.

Enjambment is a master stroke in creative writing. It can help heighten the drama, create a sense of tension or urgency, or even add a comedic effect. It's like a trick of the light that keeps your readers guessing, allowing them to soak up the rhythm and music of the words. A sentence that keeps running is like a train that never stops, the perfect vehicle to carry your ideas forward.

To use enjambment effectively, it's important to have a keen sense of where to break the lines in a poem or prose. Sometimes, it's a matter of taste, of what sounds right in your head. But more often than not, enjambment is a deliberate choice to enhance the theme and tone of your work.

The Art of Continuity: Examples of Enjambment in Literature

Here are two examples from literary works that effectively use enjambment for dramatic effect:

The Waste Land by T.S. Eliot

'April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.'

Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day? by William Shakespeare

'Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date.'