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| A story illustrating an idea or a moral principle in which objects take on symbolic meanings. In Dante Alighieri's "Divine Comedy," Dante, symbolizing mankind, is taken by Virgil the poet on a journey through Hell, Purgatory and Paradise in order to teach him the nature of sin and its punishments, and the way to salvation |
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| Used for poetic effect, a repetition of the initial sounds of several words in a group. The following line from Robert Frost's poem "Acquainted with the Night provides us with an example of ______________": I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet." The repetition of the s sound creates a sense of quiet, reinforcing the meaning of the line |
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| A reference in one literary work to a Character or theme found in another literary work. |
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| A statement which can contain two or more meanings. For example, when the oracle at Delphi told Croesus that if he waged war on Cyrus he would destroy a great empire, Croesus thought the oracle meant his enemy's empire. In fact, the empire Croesus destroyed by going to war was his own |
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| A person or force which opposes the protagonist in a literary work. |
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| Rhetorical figure in which ideas are directly opposed in grammatically parallel presentation of ideas |
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| Addressing someone or something not present |
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| Overall aesthetic effect; a dominant mood or emotional effect |
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| Close juxtaposition of similar sounds, usually vowel sounds |
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| pause in a line of poetry, usually designated by a punctuation mark |
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| Purification or purgation of the emotions through use of tragedy |
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| Harsh, displeasing sound; produced by combination of words that require a staccato delivery. Used well, it can vitalize the content of imagery |
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| A person represented in a story |
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| A trite (stereotyped) phrase |
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| Moment of highest tension in a story |
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| Opposition of persons or forces |
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| Associated or secondary meaning of a word |
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| Repetition of constant sounds usually in middle or end of words |
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| An established technique, practice, or device in literature or theater |
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| Theory of literary criticism that questions traditional assumptions about certainty, identity, and truth; asserts that words can only refer to other words; and attempts to demonstrate how statements about any text subvert their own meanings |
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| Dictionary definition of a word |
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| Final outcome, unraveling of the of the plot following the climax |
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| (Literally "god out of a machine") describes an unexpected, artificial, or improbable character, device, or event introduced suddenly in a work of fiction or drama to resolve a situation or untangle a plot (e.g. the rope that binds the hero's hands is luckily chewed off by a rat, or an angel suddenly appearing to solve problems). |
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| Conversation between two people |
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| A division of a whole--nothing can belong simultaneously to both parts, and everything must belong to one part or the other. They are often contrasting and spoken of as "opposites." |
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| Figure of speech similar to the pun, in which a spoken phrase can be understood in either of two ways, |
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| The audience knows more about a story than the characters on stage |
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| One who changes significantly during the course of the story. Changes considered to qualify a character as dynamic include changes in insight or understanding, changes in commitment, and changes in values. |
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| in poetry, marked by a grammatical pause at the end of a line |
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| Continuation of a line or sentence beyond the end of a line of verse |
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| manifestation of insight or revelation gained when one suddenly understands the essence of a (generally commonplace) object, gesture, statement, situation, moment, or mentality, when one “gets it, ” or recognizes the commonplace for what it really is beneath the surface and perceives its inner workings, its nature. |
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| Pleasing sound, accomplished through use of vowel sounds in words of serene imagery. Used well, it can create a sense of peace and harmony |
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| Events that occur after climax on way to denouement |
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| Literary approach that attempts to examine ways in which literature has been shaped according to issues of gender and expose standards on which canonical literature is patriarchal. |
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| Any writing that is not true, created by imagination |
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| Opposed to literal language, it’s often used and crafted for emphasis, freshness of expression, or clarity. |
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| Technique that interrupts chronological order of text to by interjecting events or scenes or earlier occurrences |
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| A character that does not change during the course of a story |
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| A character presented as a contrast to a second character so as to point out and/or highlight some aspect of the second character |
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| Hinting at events that may occur later in a work |
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| Literary theory that attempts to focus on the formal aspects of the text or content, apart from any other influence (biographical, psychological, etc) |
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| A distinctive category of literary composition |
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| Mythological or legendary figure—often of divine descent—who is endowed with great strength or ability |
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| Language that appeals to the senses |
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| Explanation of events, actions, or statements by the exploration of inner relationships |
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| Use of words to express something other than, and especially opposite, of the literal meaning. |
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| Placement of two opposing ideas, characters, objects nearly side by side for heightened effect |
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| Latin American literacy characterized by use of fantastic or mythical elements without drawing attention to their presence or use. |
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| a type of criticism in which literary works are viewed as the product of work and whose practitioners emphasize the role of class and ideology as they reflect, propagate, and even challenge the prevailing social order. Can be described as a form of critique, a discourse for interrogating ALL societies and their texts in terms of certain specific issues, such as race, class, and attitudes shared within a given culture, all of which are as timely as ever. |
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| a figure of speech that associates two distinct things; the representation of one thing by another. The image used to represent something else is the vehicle; the thing represented is called the tenor. Eg: The child is a mouse: child is tenor and mouse is vehicle. |
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| Similar to a motif in that it is a recurring pattern, but it is used to show similarities between one or more characters, events, images, etc. |
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| A figure of speech in which one word or phrase is substituted for another with which it is closely associated (such as "crown" for "royalty"). Metonymy is also the rhetorical strategy of describing something indirectly by referring to things around it, such as describing someone's clothing to characterize the individual. |
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| the feeling we get when we read a work. Generally synonymous with atmosphere. |
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| a unifying element in an artistic work, especially any recurrent image, symbol, theme, character type, subject, or narrative detail. Ex: colors such as green and white in The Great Gatsby, storm and stress (late 18th-century German literary movement whose adherents emphasized inspiration, emotion, passion, and individualism) in Frankenstein, the trickster in Native American tales. |
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| story. Either fictional or true, verse or prose. |
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| the speaker through whom the author tells the story, often (not always) a character in the work. |
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| all knowing – inner thoughts and emotions of characters |
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| words that sound like what they mean: hiss, suck, spurt, sizzle. |
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| statement that seems self-contradictory or nonsensical on the surface but that, upon closer examination, may be seen to contain an underlying truth. |
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| grammatical similar construction. Using it invites readers to compare and contrast the parallel elements. |
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| a form of comedy (employing exaggeration or distortion) that imitates a specific literary work or the style of an author for comic effect, usually to ridicule that work, author, or style. |
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| arrangement and interrelation of events in a narrative. |
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| vantage point from which a narrative is told. First, third omniscient, third limited. |
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| Main character of a story, usually good |
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| used for emphasis of authorial point/theme. |
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| culmination of plot. (drama/fiction) |
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| The point in a story when the protagonist’s fortunes turn in an unexpected direction. |
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| art of persuasion through speaking and writing. |
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| Refers to plot structure: events that contribute to the climax of the work. |
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| emphasizes subjective experience, innovation, imagination, and the individual. Mary Shelley among foremost romantic writers in England. |
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| more complex than flat or stock characters, and often display the inconsistencies and internal conflicts found in most real people. |
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| literary art of ridiculing a folly or vice in order to expose or correct it. The object of satire is usually some human frailty; people, institutions, ideas, and things are all fair game for satirists. Satire evokes attitudes of amusement, contempt, scorn, or indignation toward its faulty subject in the hope of somehow improving it. |
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| physical and social context in which the action of a story occurs. The major elements of setting are the time, the place, and the social environment that frames the characters. Setting can be used to evoke a mood or atmosphere that will prepare the reader for what is to come, as in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story "Young Goodman Brown." Sometimes, writers choose a particular setting because of traditional associations with that setting that are closely related to the action of a story. For example, stories filled with adventure or romance often take place in exotic locales. |
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| turning point, usually in a poem, that marks a change in emotion, attitude, subject, etc |
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| there is an incongruity between what is expected to happen and what actually happens due to forces beyond human comprehension or control. |
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| Literary character who remains unchanged throughout a story. |
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| organization of parts as dominated by general character of the whole |
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| The distinctive and unique manner in which a writer arranges words to achieve particular effects. Style essentially combines the idea to be expressed with the individuality of the author. These arrangements include individual word choices as well as matters such as the length of sentences, their structure, tone, and use of irony. See also diction, irony, tone. |
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| The secondary action of a story, complete and interesting in its own right, that reinforces or contrasts with the main plot. There may be more than one subplot, and sometimes as many as three, four, or even more, running through a piece of fiction. Subplots are generally either analogous to the main plot, thereby enhancing our understanding of it, or extraneous to the main plot, to provide relief from it. See also plot. |
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| An underlying, often distinct theme in a piece of writing or conversation. |
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| An object that represents itself and something else |
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| psychological process whereby one kind of sensory stimulus evokes the subjective experience of another. sight of ants might make you feel itchy. In literature, specifically, the practice of associating two or more different senses in the same image. To speak of coal as red hot, The hard and braying light, etc. |
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| A figure of speech in which a part is used for the whole (as hand for sailor), the whole for a part (as the law for police officer), the specific for the general (as cutthroat for assassin), the general for the specific (as thief for pickpocket), or the material for the thing made from it (as steel for sword). |
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| Arrangement – ordering, grouping, and placement- of words within a sentence. A component of grammar, not a synonym for grammar. One of 2 components of diction (other being vocabulary). Unusual syntax and vocab. often differentiates poetic diction from that of prose. (I rode across the meadow/Across the meadow rode I /Rode I across the sea of grass vs. I rode across the meadow”) |
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| The interrelation between the two types of meaning in a poem (extension – concrete, denotative meaning – vs. intension – abstract, metaphorical meaning). Either signifies oppositions that give a poem stability or wholeness or to refer to poems that have densely interrelated components. |
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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. It is important not to mistake the theme for the actual subject of the work; the theme refers to the abstract concept that is made concrete through the images, characterization, and action of the text. In nonfiction, however, the theme generally refers to the main topic of the discourse. |
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| The author’s implicit attitude toward the reader or the people, places, and events in a work as revealed by the elements of the author’s style. Tone may be characterized as serious or ironic, sad or happy, private or public, angry or affectionate, bitter or nostalgic, or any other attitudes and feelings that human beings experience. See also style. |
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| A story that presents courageous individuals who confront powerful forces within or outside themselves with a dignity that reveals the breadth and depth of the human spirit in the face of failure, defeat, and even death |
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| Unity – three types: unity of action (all action of drama must occur within one continuous plot without extraneous subplots), unity of time (all action must occur within 24 hours, or one whole day), and unity of place (all action of work must occur in one place or city). |
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| figure of speech that occurs when a person says one thing but means the opposite. Sarcasm is a strong form of verbal irony that is calculated to hurt someone through, for example, false praise. |
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| the quality of believability or “realness” of a work of literature. |
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| the authorial presence that pervades a literary work, lying behind or beyond such things as imagery, character, plot, or theme. |
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