Intro to Lit Final Exam
About this set
Created by:
mmknighton on May 1, 2010
Subjects:
Log in to favorite or report as inappropriate.
Order by
74 terms
Terms | Definitions |
|---|---|
 Protagonist | main character, not necessarily a "hero"; usually initiates the main action of the story, often in conflict with the antagonist |
| Antagonist | most significant character or force that opposes the protagonist; not always a person; ex. - society, internal |
| Aside | a dramatic device where the audience is able to get inside the mind of the character, who is speaking in front of other characters, but it is understood that those other characters cannot hear what is being said |
| Diction | word choice or vocabulary; refers to the class of words that an author decides is appropriate to use in a particular work |
| Dramatic Irony | occurs when the audience understands more than the characters on stage |
| Epiphany | a moment of insight, discovery, or revelation by which a character's life is greatly altered |
| Dialect | a particular variety of language spoken by an identifiable regional group or social class of persons; dialects are often used in literature in an attempt to present a character more realistically and to express significant differences in class or background |
| Allegory | a narrative in verse or prose in which the literal events (persons, places, and things) consistently point to a parallel sequence of symbolic ideas; used to dramatize abstract ideas, historical events, religious systems, or political issues |
| Anti-hero | does not have heroic qualities, but is not the evil villain, ex - Sammy from "A & P" |
| Round Character | refers to how well-developed the character is; presented in depth and detail; change significantly during the course of a narrative; most often the central character(s) |
| Flat Character | character with only one outstanding trait; rarely the central character |
| Static Character | stays the same; NOT the same as a flat character |
| Dynamic Character | changes throughout the story |
| Omniscient Narrator | AKA "all-knowing narrator"; has the ability to move freely through the consciousness of any character; has complete knowledge of all of the external events in a story |
| Unreliable Narrator | a narrator who - intentionally or unintentionally - relates events in a subjective or distorted manner |
| Tone | indicates author's attitude toward the subject and/or character |
| Story of Initiation | narrative in which the main character, usually a child or adolescent, undergoes an important experience or rite of passage - often a difficult or disillusioning one - that prepares him or her for adulthood |
| Foreshadowing | indication of events to come |
| Theme | the main idea or larger meaning of a work of literature |
| Fable | a brief, often humorous narrative told to illustrate a moral |
| Novel | an extended work of fictional prose narrative; usually implies a book-length narrative |
| Allusion | a brief (and sometimes indirect) reference in a text to a person, place or thing - fictitious or actual; operates as a literary shorthand to enrich the meaning of a text |
| Soliloquy | this occurs when the character is on stage by themselves and speaks, allowing the audience to get into his or her mind |
| Hubris | excessive pride that could cause a downfall - perhaps Oedipus |
| Irony | present when a writer says one thing but means something quite opposite |
| Narrative Poem | a poem that tells a story |
| Point of View | the perspective from which a story is told |
| Cosmic Irony | the irony that exists between a character's aspiration and the treatment he or she receives at the hands of fate; AKA irony of fate |
| Stream of Consciousness | a type of modern narration that uses various literary devices in an attempt to duplicate the subjective and associative nature of human consciousness |
| Tragedy | the representation of serious and important actions that lead to a disastrous end for the protagonist |
| Sarcasm | a conspicuously bitter form of irony in which the ironic statement is designed to hurt or mock its target |
| Symbol | a person, place, or thing in a narrative that suggests meanings beyond its literal sense |
| Naturalism | a reaction against romanticism; Environment + Heredity + Luck = Fate; Plays a role in Death of a Salesman; Willy's father left when he was a young child, which causes him to believe it is important to be popular |
| Expressionism | a distortion of reality; a reaction against realism's focus on surface details and external reality |
| Imagery | the collective set of images in a poem or other literary work |
| Visual Imagery | a word or sequence of words that refers to the sense of sight or presents something one may see |
| Tactile Imagery | a word or sequence of words that refers to the sense of touch |
| Auditory Imagery | a word or sequence of words that refers to the sense of hearing |
| Olfactory Imagery | a word or sequence of words that refers to the sense of smell |
| Gustatory Imagery | a word or sequence of words that refers to the sense of taste |
| Rhyme Scheme | any recurrent pattern of rhyme within an individual poem or fixed form; usually described by using small letters |
| Stanza | sub unit of a poem with two or more lines of verse |
| Alliteration | the repetition of two or more consonant sounds in successive words in a line of verse |
| Lyric | a short poem expressing the thoughts and feelings of a single speaker; often written in 1st person; songlike immediacy and emotional force |
| Paraphrase | the restatement in one's own words of what we understand a literary work to say |
| Narrator | a voice or character that provides the reader with information and insight about the characters and incidents in a narrative |
| Didactic Poetry | using poetry to preach to an audience; kind of poetry intended to teach the reader a moral lesson or impart a body of knowledge; poetry that aims for education over art |
| Carpe Diem | Latin for "seize the day" |
| Tone | indicates author's attitude toward the subject and/or character |
| Personae | Latin for ":mask; "the person the poet takes on; a fictitious character created to be the narrator of a work, not merely a character in it |
| Personification | giving something non-human, human qualities |
| Verbal Irony | when someone says something, but does mean it, or means the opposite |
| Ironic Point of View | when the whole work is ironic |
| Satiric Poetry | author is poking fun at something |
| Concrete Poetry | a visual poetry composed exclusively for the page in which a picture or image is made of printed letters and words |
| Concrete Diction | involves a highly specific word choice in the naming of something or someone |
| Denotation | the literal, dictionary meaning of a word |
| Connotation | an association or additional meaning that a word, image, or phrase may carry, apart from its literal dictionary meaning |
| Simile | a figure of speech that uses "like" or "as" in comparisons |
| Metaphor | a statement that one thing is something else, which literally is not |
| Figure of Speech | an expression or comparison that relies not on its literal meaning, but rather on its connotations and suggestions |
| Haiku | a Japanese verse form that has three unrhymed lines of five, seven, and five syllables; usually set in one of the four seasons |
| Mixed Metaphor | the result of combining two or more incompatible metaphors resulting in ridiculousness or nonsense |
| Implied Metaphor | a metaphor that uses neither connectives nor the verb to be |
| Hyperbole | exaggeration used to emphasize a point |
| Open Form | verse that has no set formal scheme - no meter, rhyme, or even set stanza pattern (AKA free verse) |
| Closed Form | poetry written in some preexisting pattern of meter, rhyme, line or stanza; includes the sonnet, sestina, villanelle, ballade, and rondeau |
| Couplet | a two-line stanza in poetry, usually rhymed, which tends to have lines of equal length |
| Tercet | a group of three lines of verse, usually all ending in the same rhyme |
| Quatrain | a stanza consisting of four lines |
| Sonnet | a fixed form of fourteen lines, traditionally written in iambic pentameter, usually made up of an octave (the first eight lines) |
| Shakespearean Sonnet | has a rhyme scheme organized into three quatrains with a final couplet: abab, cdcd, efef, gg |
| Vilanelle | a fixed form developed by French courtly poets of the Middle Ages in imitation of Italian folk song; consists of six rhymed stanzas in which two lines are repeated in a prescribed pattern |
| Blank Verse | contains five iambic feet per line and is never rhymed |
First Time Here?
Welcome to Quizlet, a fun, free place to study. Try these flashcards, find others to study, or make your own.