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Literary Terms
NHS 2014-2015 English IV Literary Terms
Term | Definition |
---|---|
allegory | the device of using character and/or story elements symbolically to represent an idea in addition to its literal meaning |
flashback | allows the writer to present events that happened before the time of the current narration or current events in the fiction |
hyperbole | an exaggeration or an overstatement |
verbal irony | the word's literally state the opposite of the writer's true meaning. |
situational irony | events turn out the opposite of what was expected |
dramatic irony | facts or events are unknown to a character but known to the reader |
novella | a prose fiction longer than a short story but shorter than a novel |
symbol | something that on the surface is its literal self but which also has another meaning or even several meanings |
tone | the manner in which an author expresses his attitude |
allusion | a reference in a literary work to a person, place or thing in history or another work of literature |
connotation | an association that comes along with a particular word - the connections that are made to a word |
denotation | the exact meaning or a word...the dictionary meaning |
dialogue | the conversation between characters |
figurative language | the language does not mean exactly what is says |
setting | time, place, physical details, and circumstances in which a situation occurs |
foreshadowing | hinting about what will occur later in a narrative or text |
analogy | the comparison of two pairs which have the same relationship. |
first-person point of view | the narrator is a character in the work who tells everything in his or her own words |
third-person point of view | events are related by a voice outside the action, not by one of the characters |
third-person omniscient point of view | the narrator is an all-knowing, objective observer who stands outside the action and reports what different characters are thinking |
limited omniscient point of view | the narrator stands outside the action and focuses on one character's thoughts, observations, and feelings |
omniscient | a narrator who knows everything about all the characters and is all knowing |
mood | the overall atmosphere or tone of a literary work |
avant-garde | new and experimental concepts |