On the First Day of Christmas My True Love Sent to Me...

... a partridge in a pear tree, which in creative writing terms is an excellent example of alliteration, so this is what I'm going to look at in the first verse of my Creative Writing Christmas Carol.
Alliteration is when you cluster the same consonants together for acoustic effect. The Partridge in a Pear Tree, which dates from 1780, is stuffed full of them and the fact that you have to get your tongue round the lords a leaping and the maids a milking gives the lyrics a bright staccato quality that compliments the music.The reason for using alliteration is to make your prose (or poetry) more resonant, so that the words you choose capture the sound of what you are describing. For example, seven swans a swimming perfectly sums up the slow glide of the swans swimming upstream (you see, I'm doing it too.). Alliteration isn't just used for decorative purposes, it can give emphasis to phrases (think tabloid headlines) and helps to create atmosphere as well. Used judiciously, it can add a certain je ne sais quoi to your work as it suggests stylistic confidence. It's a handy tool in the creative writing kit.

Designer This, Designer That....

....but Designer Alliterations??

I did a double take when I saw this sign on a tired old building backing onto the tracks on the way into London Bridge station. I know I'm a person with literary preoccupations (not to say literary pretensions) but all the same...

I pushed my brand-new specs further up my nose and looked again: designer alterations!  Of course! But  the seed of the idea was sown, I couldn't help pondering what a designer alliteration might be -- lots and lots of different skirts in the same colour, or in different lengths?  And then I started thinking about alliterative blackness -- the different shades of a night sky? - and it seemed to me that alliteration is a delightful device (!) and that you could have fun using it as a warm-up exercise to some proper writing, or sparingly in your actual work.

At the risk of stating the obvious, alliteration is the repeated use of the same consonant in a phrase or sentence and is much favoured by advertising execs and headline writers as it can be a great way of grabbing the attention : I'm Backing Britain  is a good example. Why not have a go at half a dozen phrases of your own (on the lines of around the ragged rocks of the ragged rascal ran, only better) and see if they get your juices flowing: they might work as the basis for a poem, or perhaps just be something you can file away and possibly use later....