APOSTROPHE

a rhetorical device by which a speaker turns from the audience as a whole to address a single person or thing. For example, in William Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, Mark Antony addresses the corpse of Caesar in the speech that begins: O, pardon me, thou bleeding piece of earth, That I am meek and gentle with these butchers! Thou art the ruins of the noblest man That ever lived in the tide of times. Woe to the hand that shed this costly blood! Another example is in the first stanza of William Wordsworth's poem Ode to Duty: Stern Daughter of the Voice of God! O Duty! if that name thou love Who are a light to guide, a rod To check the erring, and reprove; Thou, who art victory and law When empty terrors overawe; From vain temptations dost set free; And calm'st the weary strife of frail humanity!