polysyndeton

Polysyndeton Definition

Polysyndeton (PAH-lee-SIN-di-ton) is the stylistic addition of coordinating conjunctions where none are grammatically necessary.

Polysyndeton Construction

To create polysyndeton, a writer or speaker need only add more coordinating conjunctions than necessary between words, phrases, or clauses. In a list of three or more items, only one conjunction is required—between the last two items in the list—and all other items are separated by commas.

Coordinating conjunctions link sentence elements so that each element carries equal weight. These are the only conjunctions that pertain to syndeton, asyndeton, and polysyndeton.

There are seven coordinating conjunctions, which you can remember with the mnemonic device FANBOYS.

• For: “I’m putting in little effort, for it’s my last day.”
• And: “The salt cave made everyone feel cleansed, rejuvenated, and at peace.”
• Nor: “He was not awake, nor was he asleep; he was lucid napping.”
• But: “I like the tuxedo T-shirt, but the top hat is a bit much.”
• Or: “Were you lying before or are you lying now?”
• Yet: “I’ve watched this movie three times, yet I can’t remember anything about it.
• So: “I’m not leaving any time soon, so you can park behind me.”

Examples of Polysyndeton

To apply polysyndeton to the sentence “If I could have anything to eat right now, it would be nachos, pancakes, crab rangoon, and popcorn shrimp.”, the word and would be added after each entry in the list. It would then become “If I could have anything to eat right now, it would be nachos and pancakes and crab rangoon and popcorn shrimp.”

Here’s another example. Take the sentence “I either want to be a supermodel, a CEO, a chemistry teacher, an animal trainer, or a lounge singer when I grow up.” and add or between each list item. You would get “I either want to be a supermodel or a CEO or a chemistry teacher or an animal trainer or a lounge singer when I grow up.”, which is polysyndeton.

One can also create polysyndeton by beginning sentences with coordinating conjunctions, a choice often frowned upon by traditionalists. Consider this example: “I was too upset to brush my teeth before bed. Getting back to sleep was out of the question. Something in my life had to change. Things would only get worse.” By starting the second, third, and fourth sentences with coordinating conjunctions, this example would include polysyndeton: “I was too upset to brush my teeth before bed. But getting back to sleep was out of the question. So, something in my life had to change. Or things could only get worse.”

Types of Polysyndeton

There are different levels of polysyndeton: between words, phrases, clauses, or sentences.

Polysyndeton Between Words

The simplest way to use polysyndeton is to add a conjunction between words in a list. In this example, the conjunction and is used twice in a list, when conventional grammar would replace the first and with a comma: “Watching the mainstream news for five minutes made me feel dismayed and disillusioned and defenseless.”

Polysyndeton Between Phrases

A phrase is a group of words that doesn’t contain both a subject and a verb. Here, the word and is inserted between each phrase: “Loretta is so spoiled that she got a jar of rare honey and a doll that cries real tears and a gift certificate for the movies and a trip to Europe for her birthday.”

Polysyndeton Between Clauses

A clause is a non-sentence group of words with a subject and a verb. In this example, polysyndeton is achieved by adding and between each clause: “He fed me soup and he gave me new pajamas and he brushed my teeth and he put me to bed.”

Polysyndeton at the Sentence Level

A sentence is a complete, self-sustaining group of words with a subject and a verb. As mentioned earlier, polysyndeton can be formed by beginning sentences with coordinating conjunctions: “But how could you have picked up the phone if you were asleep? And how could you have written down that message? Or did someone else do it?”

The Effects of Polysyndeton

Polysyndeton can give equal weight to each item in a list by spacing them out evenly. Some writers use polysyndeton in dialogue to make their characters sound more natural and relatable, as it can convey anxiety, exasperation, or excitement.

Strangely, similar to asyndeton—its stylistic opposite that removes conjunctions—polysyndeton can create the illusion of an unending list.

As with any device that subverts grammatical norms, polysyndeton may also be used to maintain or break a rhythm within speech to make the words more memorable.

Polysyndeton and Related Terms

Polysyndeton vs. Asyndeton

Asyndeton is essentially the opposite of polysyndeton: it’s the stylistic omission of a coordinating conjunction at the end of the list. For example, rather than saying “The peach is picked out was round, bright, ripe, and juicy,” you’d say, “The peach I picked out was round, bright, ripe, juicy.”

Polysyndeton vs. Syndeton

Syndeton is business as usual. It uses one conjunction where it’s appropriate to do so. The first version in the asyndeton example demonstrates syndeton.

Polysyndeton vs. Parataxis

Parataxis is the juxtaposition of sentence elements to show that each element carries equal weight in relation to the others. Parataxis and polysyndeton can overlap, but not all parataxis is polysyndeton, and vice versa.

Here is an example that is both parataxis and polysyndeton: “We rode the Ferris wheel and ate cotton candy and tried to win a bear and saw two clowns kissing.” The clauses all share the same weight, function, and even the same syllable count. They’re also all joined by conjunctions.

This example is parataxis but not polysyndeton: “She drank some juice. She heard a sound. She went to see.” The elements are equal here, but they aren’t joined by conjunctions. Additionally, this is an example of asyndeton.

Finally, here is polysyndeton that isn’t parataxis: “But I wanted to go home and it wasn’t because I was sad.” Polysyndeton is present here because the sentence begins with a coordinating conjunction, but this isn’t an example of parataxis because the subordinating conjunction (because) makes the two connected phrases unequal.

Examples of Polysyndeton in Song Lyrics

1. Kendrick Lamar, “i (single version)”

Famously political hip-hop artist Kendrick Lamar often raps about the long and intense struggle against racial injustice in the United States. In this song, the adversity takes place in the backdrop, but the use of polysyndeton shows that it’s endless:

They wanna say it's a war outside and a bomb in the street

And a gun in the hood, and a mob of police

And a rock on the corner, and a line for the fiend

And a bottle full of lean, and a model on the scene, yup

2. Pink Floyd, “One of My Turns”

In their rock opera about capitalism and isolation, psychedelic rock band Pink Floyd tell the life story of a rock star who ultimately becomes a deranged cult leader. At this point in the story, protagonist Pink is burnt out and bored with fame and fortune. Simultaneously, the abuses of his childhood and adolescence, once buried, begin to bubble to the surface:

Day after day, the love turns gray

Like the skin of the dying man

And night after night, we pretend it's all right

But I have grown older, and you have grown colder

And nothing is very much fun any more

And I can feel one of my turns coming on

I feel cold as a razor blade, tight as a tourniquet

Dry as a funeral drum

Interestingly, in addition to polysyndeton, this example contains asyndeton (the last two lines). The asymmetry points to the speaker’s instability just as he is about to erupt.

3. Jewel Akens, “The Birds and the Bees”

The best-known version of this somewhat saccharine hit was sung by Jewel Akens in 1964. The sweet simplicity of the chorus is enhanced by the bouncy rambling created by polysyndeton:

Let me tell ya ‘bout the birds and the bees

And the flowers and the trees

And the moon up above

And a thing called “Love”

Examples of Polysyndeton in Literature

1. Thornton Wilder, Our Town

This play is about taking everyday life for granted. The heroine, Emily, dies in the last act. She watches her own funeral with loved ones who had passed before her, and she’s horrified by their complacency. Permitted to relive an ordinary day from her life, Emily chooses her 12th birthday and is immediately overwhelmed. She treats the audience to a good cry, saying goodbye to earthly pleasures the Living might consider mundane:

Good-bye, Good-bye world. Good-bye, Grover's Corners....Mama and Papa. Good-bye to clocks ticking....and Mama's sunflowers. And food and coffee. And new ironed dresses and hot baths....and sleeping and waking up. Oh, earth, you are too wonderful for anybody to realize you. Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it--every, every minute?”

The use of polysyndeton and ellipses ascertain that this is a list that will go on forever.

2. Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

In this oft-cited example of polysyndeton, Angelou lists out some of the many privileges white people enjoy that are not afforded to Black people in the United States:

Let the whitefolks have their money and power and segregation and sarcasm and big houses and schools and lawns like carpets, and books, and mostly--mostly--let them have their whiteness.

The repetition of and here creates a strong rhythm and structure, in addition to making the point that this list of privileges is ongoing.

3. Holy Bible, KJV, Genesis 1:24-25

Because the Hebrew Bible uses the word and so often, and the King James translation kept most of those instances, the Old Testament is rife with polysyndeton.

And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so. And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

4. C.S. Lewis, Screwtape Proposes a Toast

Years after the publication of his popular novel The Screwtape Letters, which follows a young devil and is told mostly through the correspondence between the devil and his mentor Screwtape, Lewis published an epilogue of sorts, Screwtape Proposes a Toast. In this addition, Screwtape laments the banquet of souls set before him:

They all tasted to me like undersexed morons who had blundered or trickled into the wrong beds in automatic response to sexy advertisements, or to make themselves feel modern and emancipated, or to reassure themselves about their virility or their “normalcy,” or even because they had nothing else to do.

The humor of the genuine outrage expressed over something so absurd is enhanced by the rhythm created by the polysyndeton.

5. William Shakespeare, Othello

Another oft-cited example of polysyndeton is from Act III, Scene 3 of Othello, where the audience first sees Iago’s scheme to make Othello distrust his wife start to take effect.

If there be cords, or knives, or poison, or fire, or suffocating streams, I'll not endure it.

This expresses Othello’s intense exasperation at the thought of his beloved wife could be unfaithful.

Further Resources on Polysyndeton

This lesson plan from the Juan Diego Academy offers additional insight and examples of asyndeton and polysyndeton.

Professional speaker John Zimmer provides more insight and examples of polysyndeton, as well as pertinent clips from classic movies Inherit the Wind and A Lion in Winter on his site, In a Manner of Speaking.

Related Terms

• Asyndeton
• Conjunction
• Parataxis
• Repetition
• Syndeton