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heroic couplet definition

heroic couplet

a rhyming pair of iambic-pentameter lines, first used extensively in English by Chaucer and later developed as a syntactically complete unit, esp. by Dryden and Pope (Ex.: “In every work regard the writer's end, Since none can compass more than they intend”)

Webster's New World College Dictionary Copyright © 2005 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Cleveland, Ohio.
Used by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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