Alliteration is created by repeating the initial letter or sound of two or more neighboring words. Alliteration can add emphasis, create rhythm, or influence the mood of a text.

Alliteration can overlap with consonance and assonance, but the three devices are distinct in definition: 

• Consonance is the repetition of a consonant sound in neighboring words. 
• Assonance is the repetition of a vowel sound in neighboring words.

Alliteration is derived from the Latin words ad, meaning “to,” and literal, meaning “letter” or “script.”

Many children’s rhymes and tongue twisters employ alliteration to create a humorous effect, such as “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.”

Edgar Allan Poe uses alliteration in his poem “The Raven,” which strengthens the poem’s rhythm and builds suspense:

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,

Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—

While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping

(lines 1–3)

Another example of alliteration is found in Jack London’s short story “To Build a Fire,” which focuses attention on critical moments in the man’s quest for survival:

 

He stripped the mitten from his right hand and fetched forth the birch bark. The exposed fingers were quickly going numb again.

see: assonance, consonance, idiom.