From the Barron's 5th edition.
Terms : Hide Images
| 4385541924 | antithesis | "They promised freedom but provided slavery." "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." | 0 | |
| 4385546735 | Apollonian | in contrast to Dionysian, it refers to the most noble, godlike qualities of human nature and behavior | 1 | |
| 4385560370 | apostrophe | speaker addresses person or personified thing not present (i.e. "Oh, you cruel streets of Manhattan, how I detest you!") | 2 | |
| 4385563272 | ballad | simple narrative verse telling a story that is sung or recited (i.e. "Rime of the Ancient Mariner," "La Belle Dame sans Merci," "Reading Gaol") | 3 | |
| 4385570748 | bathos | use of insincere or overdone sentimentality | 4 | |
| 4385614471 | blank verse | poetry written in iambic pentameter, the primary meter used in English poetry and the works of Shakespeare and Milton; does not use rhyme | 5 | |
| 4385617917 | bombast | inflated, pretentious language used for trivial subjects | 6 | |
| 4385620229 | burlesque | work of literature meant to ridicule a subject; a grotesque imitation | 7 | |
| 4386216373 | caesura | pause in the middle of a verse, often (but not always) marked by punctuation -- "The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere / The ceremony of innocence is drowned." | 8 | |
| 4386226263 | classical, classicism | deriving from the orderly qualities of ancient Greek and Roman culture; implies formality, objectivity, simplicity, and restraint | 9 | |
| 4386393542 | conceit | witty or ingenious thought; a diverting or highly fanciful idea, often stated in figurative language | 10 | |
| 4386412978 | heroic couplet | two rhyming lines in iambic pentameter | 11 | |
| 4386524214 | deux es machina | use of an artificial device or gimmick to solve a problem | 12 | |
| 4386526296 | Apollonian | sensual, pleasure-seeking impulses, as distinguished from Dionysian | 13 | |
| 4386567334 | elegy | poem or prose selection that laments or meditates on the passing or death of someone or something of value | 14 | |
| 4386569625 | elliptical construction | sentence containing deliberate omission of words (i.e. "May was hot and June the same") | 15 | |
| 4386618791 | end-stopped | describing a line of poetry that ends with a natural pause often indicated by punctuation ("In the mountains, there you feel free. / I read, much of the night, and go south in the winter.") | 16 | |
| 4386624585 | enjambment | the use of successive lines with no punctuation or pause between them | 17 | |
| 4386628441 | epigram | concise but ingenious, witty, and thoughtful statement | 18 | |
| 4386677640 | exposé | piece of writing that reveals weaknesses, faults, frailties, or other shortcomings | 19 | |
| 4386689674 | explication | interpretation or analysis of a text | 20 | |
| 4386689675 | falling action | action in a play or story that occurs after the climax and that leads to the conclusion and often to the resolution of the conflict | 21 | |
| 4386693396 | farce | comedy that contains an extravagant and nonsensical disregard of seriousness, although it may have a serious, scornful purpose | 22 | |
| 4386735677 | foot | two "beats" in a poem's meter, unstressed and stressed | 23 | |
| 4386754307 | free verse | poetry without rhymed lines, rhythm, or fixed metrical feet | 24 | |
| 4386782420 | Gothic novel | novel in which supernatural horrors and an atmosphere of unknown terrors pervades the action (i.e. Frankenstein) | 25 | |
| 4386785313 | harangue | forceful sermon, tirade, or lecture | 26 | |
| 4386787762 | humanism | belief that emphasizes faith and optimism in human potential and creativity | 27 | |
| 4386790039 | idyll | lyrical poem or passage that describes a kind of ideal life or place | 28 | |
| 4386814562 | kenning | device employed in Anglo-Saxon poetry in which the name of a thing is replaced by one of its functions or qualities, as in "ring-giver" for king and "whale-road" for ocean | 29 | |
| 4386831245 | light verse | variety of poetry meant to entertain or amuse, but sometimes with a satirical thrust | 30 | |
| 4386837763 | litotes | form of understatement in which the negative of the contrary is used to achieve emphasis or intensity (i.e. "He is not a bad dancer") | 31 | |
| 4386840699 | loose sentence | sentence that follows the customary English word order, subject-verb-object | 32 | |
| 4386843966 | lyric poetry | personal, reflective poetry that reveals the speaker's thoughts and feelings about the subject | 33 | |
| 4386846405 | melodrama | literary form in which events are exaggerated in order to create an extreme emotional response | 34 | |
| 4386849854 | metaphysical poetry | the work of poets, particularly those of the seventeenth century, that uses elaborate conceits, is highly intellectual, and expresses the complexities of love and life | 35 | |
| 4386881375 | metonymy | figure of speech that uses the name of one thing to represent something else with which it is associated (i.e. "The White House says...") | 36 | |
| 4386932805 | mock epic | treats a frivolous topic with extreme seriousness, using conventions such as invocations to the Muse, action-packed battle scenes, and accounts of heroic exploits | 37 | |
| 4387009729 | montage | quick succession of images or impressions used to express an idea | 38 | |
| 4387013696 | novel of manners | novel focusing on and describing the social customs and habits of a particular social group (i.e. Pride and Prejudice, The Age of Innocence) | 39 | |
| 4387017140 | ode | lyric poem usually marked by serious, respectful, and exalted feelings toward the subject | 40 | |
| 4387022994 | ottava rima | eight-line rhyming stanza of a poem | 41 | |
| 4387218715 | pastoral | work of literature dealing with rural life | 42 | |
| 4387288353 | pathetic fallacy | faulty reasoning that inappropriate ascribes human feelings to nature or nonhuman objects | 43 | |
| 4387291758 | pentameter | verse with five poetic feet per line | 44 | |
| 4387294480 | periodic sentence | sentence with main thought at end | 45 | |
| 4387296863 | picaresque novel | episodic novel about a roguelike wanderer who lives off his wits (i.e. Don Quixote, Moll Flanders, The Red and the Black) | 46 | |
| 4387334783 | roman à clef | French for a novel in which historical events and actual people appear under the guise of fiction | 47 | |
| 4387430662 | scan, scansion | the act of determining the meter of a poetic line; if a verse doesn't do this, its meter is irregular | 48 | |
| 4387474764 | synecdoche | figure of speech in which part signifies the whole, or whole signifies the part, or name of a material stands for the thing itself (i.e. pigskin) | 49 | |
| 4387479783 | trope | generic name for a figure of speech | 50 | |
| 4387481882 | verisimilitude | similar to the truth; the quality of realism in a work that persuades readers that they are getting a vision of life as it is | 51 | |
| 4387484942 | versification | structural form of a line of verse as revealed by the number of feet it contains (monometer = 1 foot, tetrameter = 4 feet, pentameter = 5 feet, etc.) | 52 | |
| 4387518473 | villanelle | French verse form calculated to appear simple and spontaneous but consisting of 19 lines and a prescribed rhyme scheme | 53 | |
| 4387521494 | volta | any shift or turning point in a work of prose or poetry; may mark a shift in point of view, tone, mood, style, etc.; commonly found in sonnets between the octave and sestet | 54 |
