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Literary Terms A-Z
Literary Terms from A-Z
Term | Meaning |
---|---|
onomatopoeia | Formation of a word by imitating the natural sound associated with the object or actions involved. |
personification | To think of or represent (for example, and inanimate object) as a person. |
plot | The organization of individual incidents in a narrative or play. |
poem | A rhythmic expression of feelings or ideas, often using metaphor, meter, and rhyme. |
prose | Literary expression not marked by rhyme or metrical regularity. |
protagonist | The main character of a play, novel, or story, usually the hero. |
Alliteration | the repetition of the initial sounds (usually consonants) of stressed syllables in neighboring words or at short intervals with in a line or passage, usually at word beginnings. |
Antonym | Words that are opposite in meaning. |
Couplet | Two seccessive lines of poetry with end-words that rhyme. |
Haiku | A Japanese form of poetry, which gives a brief description of nature. Haiku consists of three unrhymed lines of five, seven, and five syllables. |
Homonym | Two or more words with the same pronunciation but with different meanings and spellings. |
Homophone | Two or more words with the same pronunciation but with different meanings and spellings. |
Limerick | a light or humorous verse form of five lines in which lines one, two, and five are of three feet and lines three and four are of two feet, with a rhyme scheme of aabba |
Metaphor | an association of two completely different objects as being the same thing |
Simile | a comparison of two completely different objects using "like" or "as" |
Synonym | one of two or more words that have the same or nearly the same meanings |
Hyperbole | an exaggeration of the truth |
Imagery | figurative language used to create particular mental images |
Onomatopoeia | the use of words with sounds suggestive of their meaning, like buzz, clang, moo, whoosh. |