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English HS Lit Terms
ACS English Department: Literary Terminology
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| allegory | a story of some complexity that corresponds to another situation on a deeper level; characters, plot events, setting all correspond to that situation; often used for satire or teaching moral lesson |
| alliteration | repetition of the same sound at the start of a series of words |
| antagonist | character who opposes the protagonist, thus causing conflict |
| analogy | comparison of two things which are alike in certain aspects; method by which an unfamiliar object or idea is explained through a comparison with a more familiar object or idea |
| anecdote | very brief story to illustrate a specific point |
| aside | when a character temporarily runs away from another character and speaks directly to the audience or to another character |
| assonance | repetition of the same vowel sound anywhere in a series of words that appear to be close together in a text; often to create approximate rhyme |
| atmosphere/mood | feeling given off by place, setting, or surroundings |
| audience | intended reader/observer/listener for a text or performance |
| blank verse | unrhymed iambic pentameter; often used by Shakespeare in his plays |
| dynamic character | one's who change by the time the plot reaches it's resolution |
| rounded characters | one's who are seen by the audience from many aspects |
| flat characters | one's who are seen by the audience from only one aspect |
| foil character | secondary character who contrasts the main character & therefore makes the main character's personality more obvious |
| static character | one's who do not change by the time the plot reaches it's resolution |
| characterization techniques | direct: author tells reader what to think about character indirect: reader must infer through what character does, says, or what others say or think about him; description |
| climax | highest point of plot after which all conflicts come to resolution and no new conflicts can begin |
| convention | the time honored, traditional and expected way of carrying out some aspect of drama/literature conventions are so normal, that you don't notice them until they are broken |
| conflict | described as internal/external; a struggle between two forces: human v human; individual v society; human v nature; human v self |
| connotation | the associated/suggested meaning of the word |
| consonance | repetition of the same constant sound anywhere in a series of words that appear close together in a text; often used to create approximate rhyme |
| couplet | rhyming pair of lines in same meter; often used by Shakespeare to conclude scenes or conclude sonnets |
| denotation | the literal, dictionary definition of a word |
| denouement (falling action) | final unravelling of the plot; explanation or outcome |
| dialects | differences of vocabulary, grammatical structure, and pronunciation within a single language |
| dialogue-direct speech | exact words of a character are given within quotation marks |
| dialogue-indirect speech | speaker reports what a character had said |
| dialogue-stream of consciousness | the unstructured record of a character's mental processes, especially when alone; stylistically unmediated by the author, therefore usually set down in sentence fragments ub random order; the first person "I" is not used |
| dialogue-interior monologue | character is thinking to self in words, conscious of what he/she is thinking |
| epithet | adjective or adjectival phrase used to point out a characteristic of a person or thing |
| fantasy | a genre of fiction that answers the question "what if?" |
| figurative language | any use of language that is not to be taken literally, but rather metaphorically/figuratively |
| figure of speech | any specific device (simile, metaphor, personification) which depends upon the reader understanding it on a metaphorical/figurative level |
| foreshadowing | a hint to the audience about upcoming plot events |
| free-verse | poetry that follows neither regular rhyme nor regular rhythm patterns |
| genre | type or category; determined by content (horror, comedy, tragedy) or by structure and form (essay, novel, play, memoir) |
| hyperbole | exaggeration for effect (opp. understatement) |
| iambic pentameter | the meter closest to natural human speech; lines of 10 syllables divided into 5 unstressed/stressed feet iambs (the word "today" is an iamb) |
| image/imagery | one image consists of language that is intended to trigger any of the 5 senses; imagery is a pattern of images connected through either the sense they appeal to or the subject matter of the images (e.g. sound imagery or nature imagery) |
| irony | a term referring to the recognition of a reality different from superficial appearances, a discrepancy of incongruity; it tends to play with the expectations of a reader or an audience, giving them something different than what they were led to expect |
| what types of irony are there? | situational, verbal, dramatic, tragic |
| lyric poetry | a type of poetry that is personal, subjective, often deeply emotional; also known for its musicality (obvious through rhyme, rhythm, other sound devices) |
| metaphor | a comparison of two disimilar objects that share a common characteristic |
| monologue | speech or narrative presented wholly by one character |
| motivation | the reason or force that drives a character to act |
| onomatopeia | the sound of a word imitates the sound it describes |
| oxymoron | a two-word expression that seems contradictory, but which upon a deeper examination contains truth |
| personification | a figure of speech that gives human characteristics to a non-human entity |
| plot | events of a narrative, in the order the author has chosen |
| figure of speech | any specific device (simile, metaphor, personification) which depends upon the reader understanding it on a metaphorical/figurative level |
| foreshadowing | a hint to the audience about upcoming plot events |
| free-verse | poetry that follows neither regular rhyme nor regular rhythm patterns |
| genre | type or category; determined by content (horror, comedy, tragedy) or by structure and form (essay, novel, play, memoir) |
| hyperbole | exaggeration for effect (opp. understatement) |
| point-of-view | the lens through which the person sees the action |
| protagonist | main character in work |
| prose | ordinary form of writing, as opposed to poetry; unit is the sentence |
| pun | play on words based on similarity of sound between two words with different meanings |
| rhythm | the general flow of sound created by stressed and unstressed syllables |
| rhyme | similarity of sound between accented syllables |
| rising action | the part of a dramatic plot which has to do with the complication of the action; begins with exciting/precipitating force and continues until the climax |
| setting | the time and place of the action of the plot |
| sibilance | repetition of the hissing "s" sound anywhere in a series of words that appear close together in a text |
| simile | a comparison between two dissimilar objects that share a common characteristic using "like" or "as" or "than" |
| soliloquy | when a character is alone on stage and speaks out his or her thoughts aloud |
| stanza | a unified grouping of lines of poetry within a poem; usually dictated by rhyme or meter; akin to a paragraph in a prose |
| stereotype | commonly held & oversimplified mental pictures or judgements of a person, a race, a group, or an issue |
| suspense | the anticipation of an audience regarding the outcome of plot events; either we now what will happen but not who, when, where; or we know something will happen but not any of the details |
| symbol | a person, place, or object that represents an abstract concept in addition to it's litera meaning |
| syntax | the arrangement of words in a sentence |
| theme | a work's universal message about the human condition |
| thesis | a statement of opinion/argument about a topic that the author will support through-out a non-fiction persuasive text |
| topic | subject matter of a work |
| tragedy | essentially, a genre where the hero undergoes a reversal of fortune brought about by godlike state, and starts with order that dissolves into disorder |
| voice | the controlling presence or "authorial voice" behind the characters and narrators; the implied author (not necessarily the real author). The particular qualities of voice are manifested by method of expression, use of irony, specific language, etc. |
| colloquial | expressions used in informal conversation but not accepted as good usage in formal speeches or texts; not as informal or "street" as slang |
Created by:
hannabella16
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