RRhetoric
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Syntax & Word Order

Anastrophe

uh-NAS-truh-fee / əˈnæstrəfi

Reversing the usual order of a word pair — adjective after noun, preposition after object: 'the forest primeval.' A small, controlled inversion that sounds older or more poetic.

"the forest primeval" — Longfellow

Don't confuse it with Hyperbaton. The gentle end of hyperbaton's spectrum; periodic structure delays whole clauses, not word pairs.

Drill its family — Syntax & Word Order

In the Reader — 3 excerpts

Of Man's first disobedience, and the fruit
— John Milton, Paradise Lost · open the passage →
As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect.
— Franz Kafka, The Metamorphosis (trans. David Wyllie) · open the passage →
The bull was squared on all four feet to be killed, and Romero killed directly
— Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises · open the passage →

Travels with

Devices that share a passage with anastrophe most often — company reveals character.

Passive Voice 4 Synecdoche 3 Asyndeton 3 Litotes 3 Polyptoton 3 Hyperbaton 3

The rest of the family

Hyperbaton Periodic Sentence Cumulative (Loose) Sentence Parataxis Parenthesis Apposition / Appositive Zeugma Hendiadys Pleonasm Enumeration / Accumulatio Passive Voice Cleft Sentence