| Term | Definition |
|---|
| Allegory | a narrative that serves as an extended metaphor. |
| Alliteration | a pattern of sound that includes the repitition of consonant sounds |
| Allusion | a reference in a literary work to a person, place, or thing in history or another work of literature |
| Antagonist | a character in a story or poem who dceives, frustrates, or works against the main character |
| Aside | an actors speech, directed to the audience, that is not supposed to be heard by other actors on stage. |
| Ballad | a narrative folk song |
| Character | a person who is responsible for the thoughts and actions within a story, poem, or other literature |
| Connotation | an association that comes along with a particular word |
| Couplet | a style of poetry defined as a complete thought written in two lines with rhyming ends. |
| Denotation | the exact meaning of a word, without the feelings or suggestions that the word may imply |
| Denouement | literally meaning the action of untying, it is the final outcome of the main complication ina story or play |
| Dialogue | The conversation between characters in a drama or narrative |
| Didactic | refers to literature or other types of art that are instructional or informative |
| Dramatic Monologue | a literary device that is used when a character reveals his or her innermost thoughts and feelings, which are hidden throughout the course of the story line, through a poem or speech. |
| Elegy | a type of literature defined as a poem or song, written in elegiac couplets, that expresses sorrow or lamentation, usually for one who has died |
| Epigram | a short poem or verse that seeks to ridicule a thought or event, usually with witticism or sarcasm |
| Figurative Language | a type of language that doesnt mean exactly what it says |
| Flashback | allows a writer to present past events during current events |
| Genre | a type of literature |
| Gothic | a literary style popular during the end of 18th century and the beginning of the 19th-tales dealing with horror, despair, the grotesque, other dark subjects |
| Hyperbole | an extravagant exaggeration |
| Irony | a literary term referring to how a person, situation, statement, or circumstance is not as it would actually seem |
| Lyric | a song-like oem written to express feelings or emotions |
| Metaphor | saying one thing is, when it literally isnt |
| Metonymy | commonly used words or phrases that are substituted for other words |
| Motif | a recurring object, concept, or structure in a work of literature |
| Myth | any story that attempts to explain why something is the way it is |
| narrative | a collection of events that tells a story |
| narrative poem | a poem that tells a story |
| narrator | one who tells a story-speaker of a written work |
| parable | a brief and simple narative that teaches a lesson |
| persona | the narrator or storyteller of a story-created by author |
| point of view | a way the events of a story are conveyed to the reader-vantage point |
| protagonist | a protagonist is considered to be the main character or lead figure-hero |
| rhyme | repitition of an identical or similarly accented sound or sounds in a work |
| rhyme cheme | the pattern of rhyme used in a poem |
| setting | time, place, physical details, circumstances |
| simile | a comparison with two unlike objects or ideas using like or as |
| short story | a prose narrative that is brief in nature |
| sonnet | distinctive poetic style that uses 14 lines arranged in a set rhyme scheme or pattern |
| symbol | word or object that stands for another word or object |
| theme | a common thread or repeated idea that is incorporated throughout the literary work |
Combine with other sets
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