| Term | Definition |
|---|
| Allegory | A form of extended metaphor in which objects, persons, and actions in a narrative, either in prose or verse, and are equated with meanings that lie outside the narrative itself. Ex. The Faerie Queen |
| Allusion | A figure of speech that makes brief, often casual reference to a historical or literary figure, event, or object;Always indirect |
| Ambiguity | The expression of an idea in language that gives more than one meaning and leaves uncertainty as to the intended significance of the statement; it's uses range from simple double meanings for words |
| Anachronism | False assignment of an event, a person, a scene, language-in fact anything-to a time when that event or thing or person was not in existence |
| Antagonist | The character in fiction or drama who stands directly opposed to the protagonist. A rival or opponent of the protagonist. |
| Antihero | The protagonist of a modern play or novel who has the converse of most of the traditional attributes of the hero. This character is graceless,inept,sometimes stupid, and dishonest. |
| Antithesis | A figure of speech characterized by strongly contrasting words, phrases, sentences, or ideas, as in "Man proposes, God disposes." |
| Aphorism | A concise statement of a principle or precept given in pointed words. |
| Apostrophe | A figure of speech in speech in which someone (usually absent, some abstract quality, or nonexistent personage is directly addresses as through present. |
| Archetype | An image, a descriptive detail,a plot pattern, or a character type that occurs frequently in literature, myth, religion, or folklore. Used to evoke powerful emotions in the reader because it awakens a primordial image in the unconscious memory. |
| Aside | A dramatic convention by which an actor directly and audibly addresses the audience, but is not supposed to be heard by the other actors on the stage. |
| Bard | a poet. poets of the Celts who recited verses glorifying the deeds or heros and leaders, to the accompaniment of a harp or other musical instrument |
| Burlesque | A form of comedy characterized by ridiculous exaggerations. |
| Canto | A section or division of long poem |
| Caricature | Descriptive writing seizes upon certain qualities of a person and through exaggeration or distortion, produces a ridiculous effect |
| Carpe Diem | "Seize the Day" this phrase has come to be applied generally to literature, especially to lyric poems, which exemplify the spirit of "Let us eat and drink", for tomorrow we shall die" This theme was a very common one in 16th and 17th century English love poetry |
| Catalog | A list of people, things, or attributes. |
| Catastrophe | The conclusion of a play, particularly a tragedy |
| Catharsis | The process by which an unhealthy emotional state produced by an imbalance of feelings is corrected and emotional health is restored |
| Character Foil | A character who sets off another character by contrast |
| Cliche | Any expression so often used that its freshness and clarity have worn off |
| Colloquialism | Any expression used in informal conversation but not accepted as good usage in formal speech |
| Comedy of manners | A play satirizing that fashions, manners, and outlook on life of an artificial, highly sophisticated society |
| Comic relief | A humorous scene,incident, or speech in the course of serious fiction or drama |
| Conceit | An ingenious and fanciful notion or conception,usually expressed through an elaborate analogy,and pointing to a sticking parallel between two seemingly dissimilar things |
| Convention | Any device or style or subject matter which has become,in its time and by reason of its habitual use, a recognized means of literary expression, an accepted element in technique |
| Determinism | The belief that all apparent acts of will are actually the result of causes which determine them |
| Deus ex Machina | the employment of some unexpected and improbable incident in a story or play in order to make things turn out right |
| Dialectic | in classical literature, it refers to the tradition of continued debate or discussion of eternally unresolved issues |
| Didacticism | instructiveness in literary work, one of the purposes of which appears to be give guidance in moral, ethical or religious matters |
| Elizabethan Drama | the phrase is commonly used for body of renaissance English drama produced in the century preceding the closing of the theaters in 1642 |
| Enlightenment, The | A philosophical movement of the 18th century, particularly in France but effectively over much Europe and America |
| Epic | A long narrative poem in elevated style presenting charcters of high position in a series of adventures which form an organtic whole through ther relation to a central figure of heroic propositions and through their development of episodes important to the history of a nation or race |
| Epigram | Any pithy, pointed, consise saying;the use of the word is derives from certain qualities of a type of poem |
| Epistle | therorectically an epistle is any letter, but in practice the term is limited to formal compositions written by an individual or group to a distant individual or group |
| Epithet | Strictly an adjective or adjective phrase used to point out a characteristic or a person or thing, as " normal mansions", but sometimes applied to noun or noun phrase used for familiar purpose |
| Eulogy | A formal, dignified speech or writing, highly praising a person or a thing |
| Euphemism | a figure of speech in which an indirect statement is substituted for a direct one in effort to avoid bluntness |
| Exemplum | A moralized tale |
| Farce | In the late 17th century, farce was used in England to mean any short humorous play, as distinguished from regular 5 act comedy |
| Framework Story | A story within a narrative setting or framework, a story within a story |
| Genre | A term used in literary criticism to designate the distinct types or categories into which literary works are grouped according to form or technique or sometimes subject matter |
| Gothic | "Medieval" or form of literature in which magic, mystery, and chivalry are the chief characteristics |
| Heroic Couplet | iambic pentameter lines rhymed in pairs |
| Homeric Simile | an elaborate comparison using a compound word such as those Homer used in his epic poems (fleet-footed, wine-dark, bolt-hurling) |
| Hubris | Overbearing pride or presumption; arrogance which results in the misfortune of the protagonist of a tragedy |
| Idyll | Not so much a definite poetic genre as a descriptive term which may be applied to one or another of the poetic genres which are short and possess marked descriptive, narrative, and pastoral qualities. |
| In Medias Res | in or into the middle of a plot; into the middle of things. " in the midst of things" |
| Interior Monologue | an extended presentation of a character's thoughts, not in the helter-skelter order of stream of consciousness |
| Inversion | the placing of a sentence element out of its normal position either to gain emphasis or to secure a so-called poetic effect |
| Kenning | conventional metaphoric name for something, or sterotyped figurative phrase , used especially in Old English and Old Norse poetry as a synonym for a simple noun |
| Laureate | someone honored for great achievements,honored with a crown of laurel, hence. |
| Maxim | a short, consise statement, usually drawn from experience and offering some practical advice;an adage |
| Metrical Romance | A romantic tale in verse |
| Miracle Play | A popular religious drama of medieval England |
| Mock Epic | a literaruy form which burlesques the epic by treating a trivial subject in the "grand style" or which uses epic convenient to make ridiculous a trivial subject ludicrously overstating it |
| Mode | In literary criticism, a term applied to broad categories of treatment of material, such as romance, comedy, tragedy, or satire |
| Mood | A state of mind in which one emotion or set of emotions has ascendancy |
| Motif | A simple element which serves a basis for expanded narrative: or less strictly, a conventional situation, device, interest, or incident employed in folklore, fiction,or dram |
| Motivation | The presentation of the reasons explanations for the actions of a character in any work of fiction |
| Myth, Recurrent Themes | The mythology of all groups takes shape around certain common themes; they all attempt to explain creation, dignity and religion, to guess at the meaning of existence and death, to account for natural phenomena, and to chronicle the adventures of racial heroes |
| Muses | Nine goddesses represented as presiding over song, the various departments of literature,and the liberal arts |
| Narrative | An account in prose or verse of an actual or fictional event or sequence of such events;anything that is narrated |
| Naturalism | A term sometimes applied to writing that demonstrates a deep interest in nature;extreme realism |
| Neoclassicism | A revival in the 17th and 18th centuries of classical standards or order, balance, and harmony in literature |
| Objectivity | A quality in literary work of impersonality, of freedom form the expression of person sentiments, attitudes, or emotions by the author |
| organic form | A concept of form in which the structure of a literary work is said to grow from its conception in the thought, feeling, and personality of the writer,rather than mechanically shaped through mechanical force in preconceived work |
| Oxymoron | n. a figure of speech combining apparently contradictory terms, e.g., "darkness visible" |
| Paradox | a statement or proposition that seems self-contradictory or absurd but in reality expresses a possible truth. |
| Parallelism | phrases or sentences of a similar construction/meaning placed side by side, balancing each other |
| Parody | a humorous or satirical imitation of a serious piece of literature or writing |
| Pathetic Fallacy | Coined by the 19th century English writer John Ruskin, the term refers to the attachment of human traits and feelings to nature |
| Pathos | From the Greek root for suffering and deep feeling, pathos is the quality of art and literature which stimulates pity, tenderness, or sorrow in the reader |
| Persona | assumed speaker of the poem; typically used synonymously with 'speaker' |
| Prologue | introductory remarks in a speech, play, or literary work |
| Protagonist | The chief character in a play or story. |
| Realism | The attempt in literature and art to represent life as it really is, without sentimentalizing or idealizing it |
| Rhetorical Question | a statement that is formulated as a question but that is not supposed to be answered |
| Romanticism | A movement in the 18th and 19th centuries which marked the reaction in literature, philosophy, art, religion, and politics form neoclassicism and formal orthodoxy of the preceding period |
| Sarcasm | sneering and often ironic language intended to hurt a person's feelings |
| Satire | form of literature in which irony, sarcasm, and ridicule are employed to attack human vice and folly |
| Scop | An old English poet;bard |
| Soliloquy | a long speech made by a character who is onstage alone and who reveals his private feelings to the audience |
| Stereotype (stock Character) | a commonly held or oversimplified mental picture or judgment of a person, a race, an issue, a kind of art |
| Stream of Consciousness | the total range of awareness and emotive-mental response of an individual, from the level to the highest fully articulated level of rational thoughts |
| Subplot | A subordinate or minor complication running through a piece of fiction |
| Surrealism | A movement in art and literature emphasizing the expression of the imagination as realized in dreams and presented without conscious control |
| Tale | A simple narrative in prose or verse without a complicated |
| Tone | The attitude of the author toward the audience and characters (e.g., serious or humorous). |
| Tragedy | drama in which the protagonist is overcome by some superior force or circumstance |
| Tragi-comedy | a dramatic composition involving elements of both tragedy and comedy usually with the tragic predominating |
| Tragic Flaw | the flaw, error, or defect in the tragic hero which leads to the hero's downfall |
| Understatement | a statement that is restrained in ironic contrast to what might have been said |
| Universality | a critical term frequently employed to indicate the presence in a piece of writing of an appeal to all readers of all time |
| Synaesthesia | a sensation that normally occurs in one sense modality occurs when another modality is stimulated |
| Analogy | drawing a comparison in order to show a similarity in some respect |
| Dynamic character | one whose character changes in the course of the play or story |
| Static Character | a character that does not change from the beginning of the story to the end |
| Climax | the highest point of anything conceived of as growing or developing or unfolding |
| Conflict | opposition in a work of drama or fiction between characters or forces (especially an opposition that motivates the development of the plot) |
| Denouncement | a public act of denouncing; |
| Fable | a story about mythical or supernatural beings or events |
| Flashback | a transition (in literary or theatrical works or films) to an earlier event or scene that interrupts the normal chronological development of the story |
| Foreshadowing | the use of hints and clues to suggest what will happen later in a plot |
| Hyperbole | extravagant exaggeration |
| Irony | incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs |
| Local color | writing which presents the mannerisms, dress, speech and customs of a particular geographical region |
| Ornate style | fancy writing style |
| Parable | a short narrative designed to teach a moral lesson maybe with animal characters |
| Plain style | a way of writing that stresses simplicity and clarity of expression |
| Point of View | the perspective from which a story is told |
| Pun | a humorous play on words |
| Suspense | excited anticipation of an approaching climax |
| Symbolism | the practice of investing things with symbolic meaning |
| theme | a unifying idea that is a recurrent element in a literary or artistic work |
Combine with other sets
Share on Facebook
Share on MySpace