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a brief reference to a person, event, or place, real or fictitious, or to a work of art; an allusion may be drawn from history, geography, literature, or religion. |
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| the presence of two or more possible meanings in any passage; doubtfulness or uncertainty as regards interpretation |
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| a short account of a usually interesting or humorous incident |
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opposition or contrast of ideas or words in a balanced or parallel construction |
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| a brief saying embodying a moral, a concise statement of a principle or precept given in pointed words |
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| a figure of speech in which someone absent or dead or something nonhuman is addressed as if it were alive and present and was able to reply |
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| inflated, pretentious speech or writing that sounds important but is generally nonsense |
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| the use of unnecessarily wordy and indirect language to avoid getting to the point |
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a typically elaborate, fancy comparison of an image or metaphor to something else that
is seemingly very different |
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| the emotional implications and associations that a word may carry, in contrast to its denotative meanings |
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| a sentence which begins with the main idea and then expands on that idea with a series of details or other particulars |
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| the basic definition or dictionary meaning of a word |
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| a writer’s choice of words, phrases, sentence structures, and figurative language, which combine to help create meaning |
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| to intentionally depart from the main subject in speech or writing |
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| a sudden comprehension of the meaning of something--a sudden 'awakening' or arrival at understanding |
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| an adjective which expresses a quality or attribute considered characteristic of a person or thing |
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| the use of an indirect, mild, delicate, inoffensive, or vague word or expression in place of one thought to be coarse, sordid, or otherwise unpleasant, offensive, or blunt |
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| a metaphor developed at great length, occurring frequently in or throughout a work |
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| a figure of speech using deliberate exaggeration or overstatement |
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| language that evokes one or all of the five senses: seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, touching |
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| the act or habit of misusing words to comic effect |
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| implied comparison achieved through a figurative use of words |
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| when one term is substituted for another term with which it is closely associated |
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| any unexpected response to a set of predictable circumstances; a non-sequitur could also be a deliberately illogical response, offered for comedic effect |
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| a figure of speech in which two contradictory words or phrases are combined to produce a rhetorical effect |
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| a statement that is apparently self-contradictory or absurd but really contains a possible truth; often, a paradox is used to make a reader consider the point in a new way |
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| a final form of hyperbaton which consists of a word, phrase, or whole sentence inserted as an aside in the middle of another sentence |
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| a text that imitates the characteristic style of an author or a work for comic effect or ridicule |
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| a figure of speech in which abstractions, animals, ideas, and inanimate objects are endowed with human form, character, traits, or sensibilities |
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| a way the events of a story are conveyed to the reader, it is the “vantage point” from which the narrative is passed from author to the reader |
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| a play on words or the humorous use of a word emphasizing a different meaning or application |
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| the use of irony, sarcasm, ridicule, or the like, in exposing, denouncing, or deriding vice, folly, etc |
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| a figure of speech in which two things, essentially different but thought to be alike in one or more respects, are compared using “like,” “as,” “as if,” or “such” |
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| a mode of expression, through events conveying a reality different from and usually opposite to appearance or expectation |
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| in general terms, anything that stands for something else |
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| a part is used to signify the whole |
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| a condition in which one type of stimulation evokes the sensation of another |
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| the arrangement of words to form phrases, clauses and sentences; sentence construction |
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| the central meaning or dominant idea in a literary work; a theme provides a unifying point around which the plot, characters, setting, point of view, symbols, and other elements of a work are organized |
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| the author’s attitude, stated or implied, toward a subject; the emotion evoked from words |
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| deliberately expresses an idea as less important than it actually is, either for ironic/sarcastic emphasis or for politeness and tact |
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| a figure of speech that occurs when a person says one thing but means the opposite; sarcasm is a strong form of verbal irony |
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