Key terms in AP English Literature and Composition from the Kaplan study guide.
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| 3132964181 | allegory | a prose or poetic narrative in which the characters, behavior, or setting demonstrate multiple levels of meaning or significance | 0 | |
| 3132964182 | alliteration | the sequential repetition of a similar initial sound | 1 | |
| 3132964183 | allusion | a reference to a literary or historical event, person, or place | 2 | |
| 3132964184 | anapestic | a metrical foot in poetry that consists of two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed one: "Twas the NIGHT before CHRISTmas" | 3 | |
| 3132964185 | anaphora | the regular repetition of the same word or phrase at the beginning of successive phrases or clauses | 4 | |
| 3132964186 | anecdote | a brief story or tale told by a character in a piece of literature | 5 | |
| 3132964187 | antagonist | any character or force that is in opposition to the main character, or protagonist | 6 | |
| 3132964188 | antithesis | the juxtaposition of sharply contrasting ideas in balanced or parallel words | 7 | |
| 3132964189 | apostrophe | an address or invocation to something that is inanimate | 8 | |
| 3132964190 | archetypes | recurrent designs, patterns of action, character types, themes, or images which are identifiable in a wide range of literature | 9 | |
| 3132964191 | assonance | a repetition of identical or similar vowel sounds | 10 | |
| 3132964192 | asyndeton | a style in which conjunctions are omitted | 11 | |
| 3132964193 | attitude | the sense expressed by the tone of voice and/or mood of a piece of writing | 12 | |
| 3132964194 | ballad | a narrative poem that is, or originally was, meant to be sung | 13 | |
| 3132964195 | ballad stanza | a common stanza form, consisting of a quatrain (stanza of four lines) that alternates four-beat (iambic tetrameter) and three-beat (iambic trimeter) lines: "In SCARlet TOWN where I was BORN/ there LIVED a FAIR maid DWELLin'" | 14 | |
| 3132964196 | blank verse | the verse form that most resembles common speech, consisting of unrhymed lines in iambic pentameter | 15 | |
| 3132964197 | caesura | a pause in a line of verse, indicated by natural speech patterns rather than specific metrical patterns | 16 | |
| 3132964198 | caricature | a depiction in which a character's characteristics or features are so deliberately exaggerated as to render them absurd | 17 | |
| 3132964199 | chiasmus | a figure of speech by which the order of the terms in the first of two parallel clauses is reversed in the second: "Pleasure is a sin, and sometimes sin's a pleasure." | 18 | |
| 3132964200 | colloquial | ordinary language, the vernacular | 19 | |
| 3132964201 | conceit | a comparison of two unlikely things that is drawn out within a piece of literature, particularly a piece of extended metaphor within a poem | 20 | |
| 3132964202 | connotation | what is suggested by a word, apart from what it implicitly describes | 21 | |
| 3132964203 | consonance | the repetition of a sequence of two or more consonants, but with a change in the intervening vowels: "pitter-patter, pish-posh" | 22 | |
| 3132964204 | couplet | two rhyming lines of iambic pentameter that together present a single idea or connections: "So long as men can breathe or eyes can see/So long lives this and this gives life to thee." | 23 | |
| 3132964205 | dactylic | a metrical foot in poetry consisting of two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed syllable: "Everywhere, everywhere, Christmas tonight." | 24 | |
| 3132964206 | denotation | a direct or specific meaning, often referred to as the dictionary meaning of a word | 25 | |
| 3132964207 | dialect | the language and speech idiosyncrasies of a specific area, region, or group of people | 26 | |
| 3132964208 | diction | the specific word choice an author uses to persuade or convey tone | 27 | |
| 3132964209 | dramatic monologue | a monologue set in a specific situation and spoken to an imaginary audience; soliloquy | 28 | |
| 3132964210 | elegy | a poetic lament upon the death of a particular person, usually ending in consolation | 29 | |
| 3132964211 | enjambment | the continuation of a sentence from one line or couplet of a poem to the next | 30 | |
| 3132964212 | epic | a poem that celebrates, in a continuous narrative, the achievements of mighty heroes and heroines, often concerned with the founding of a nation or developing of a culture | 31 | |
| 3132964213 | exposition | that part of the structure that sets the scene, introduces or identifies characters, and establishes the situation at the beginning of a story or play | 32 | |
| 3132964214 | extended metaphor | a detailed or complex metaphor that extends over a long section of a work, also known as a conceit | 33 | |
| 3132964215 | fable | a legend or short story often using animals as characters | 34 | |
| 3132964216 | falling action | that part of plot structure in which the complications of the rising action are untangled; also known as the denouement | 35 | |
| 3132964217 | farce | a play or scene in a play or book that is characterized by broad humor, wild antics, and often slapstick or physical jokes | 36 | |
| 3132964218 | flashback | retrospection, where an earlier event is inserted into the normal chronology of the narrative | 37 | |
| 3132964219 | foreshadowing | to hint at or to present an indication of the future beforehand | 38 | |
| 3132964220 | formal diction | language that is lofty, dignified, and impersonal | 39 | |
| 3132964221 | free verse | poetry that is characterized by varying line lengths, lack of traditional meter, and non-rhyming lines | 40 | |
| 3132964222 | genre | a type or class of literature such as epic or narrative poetry or belles lettres | 41 | |
| 3132964223 | hyperbole | overstatement characterized by exaggerated language | 42 | |
| 3132964224 | iambic | a metrical foot in poetry that consists of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable: "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?/Thou art more lovely and more temperate." | 43 | |
| 3132964225 | idyll | a short poem describing a country or pastoral scene, praising the simplicity of rustic life | 44 | |
| 3132964226 | imagery | any sensory detail or invocation in a work; also, the use of figurative language to evoke a feeling, call to mind an idea, or describe and object | 45 | |
| 3132964227 | informal diction | language that is not as lofty or impersonal as formal diction; similar to everyday speech | 46 | |
| 3132964228 | in medias res | "in the midst of things"; refers to opening a story in the middle of the action, necessitating filling in past details by exposition or flashback | 47 | |
| 3132964229 | irony | a situation or statement characterized by significant difference between what is expected or understood and what actually happens or is meant | 48 | |
| 3132964230 | jargon | specialized or technical language of a trade, profession, or similar group | 49 | |
| 3132964231 | juxtaposition | the location of one thing as being adjacent or juxtaposed with another, to create a certain effect | 50 | |
| 3132964232 | limited point of view | a perspective confined to a single character, whether a first person or a third person | 51 | |
| 3132964233 | litote | a figure of speech that emphasizes its subject by conscious understatement: "Last week I saw a woman flayed and you would hardly believe how it altered her appearance for the worse." | 52 | |
| 3132964234 | loose sentence | a sentence grammatically complete and usually stating its main idea before the end | 53 | |
| 3132964235 | lyric | originally designated poems meant to be sung to the accompaniment of a lyre; now any short poem in which the speaker expresses intense personal emotion rather than describing a narrative or dramatic situation | 54 | |
| 3132964236 | message | a misleading term for theme; the central statement or idea of a story, misleading because it suggests a simple, packaged statement that pre-exists and for the simple communication of which the story was written | 55 | |
| 3132964237 | metaphor | one thing pictured as if it were something else, suggesting a likeness or analogy between them | 56 | |
| 3132964238 | meter | the more or less regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in a line of poetry | 57 | |
| 3132964239 | metonymy | a figure of speech in which an attribute or commonly associated feature is used to name or designate something: "The White House announced today," "The pen is mightier than the sword." | 58 | |
| 3132964240 | mood | a feeling or ambiance resulting from the tone of the piece as well as the writer/narrator's attitude and point of view | 59 | |
| 3132964241 | motif | a recurrent device, formula, or situation that often serves as a signal for the appearance of a character or event | 60 | |
| 3132964242 | narrative structure | a textual organization based on sequences of connected events, usually presented in a straightforward, chronological framework | 61 | |
| 3132964243 | narrator | the character who "tells" the story, or in poetry, the persona | 62 | |
| 3132964244 | occasional poem | a poem written about or for a specific occasion, public or private | 63 | |
| 3132964245 | ode | a lyric poem that is somewhat serious in subject and treatment, is elevated in style, and sometimes uses elaborate stanza structure, which is often patterned in sets of three; often written to praise or exalt a person, quality, characteristic, or object | 64 | |
| 3132964246 | omniscient point of view | also called unlimited focus; a perspective that can be seen from one character's view, then another's, then another's and can be moved at any time | 65 | |
| 3132964247 | onomatopoeia | a word capturing or approximating the sound of what it describes: "buzz," "clank" | 66 | |
| 3132964248 | overstatement | exaggerated language also called hyperbole | 67 | |
| 3132964249 | oxymoron | a figure of speech that combines to apparently contradictory elements: "jumbo shrimp," "deafening silence" | 68 | |
| 3132964250 | parable | a short fictional story that illustrates an explicit moral lesson through the use of analogy | 69 | |
| 3132964251 | paradox | a statement that seems contradictory but may actually be true: "fight for peace" | 70 | |
| 3132964252 | parallel structure | the use of similar forms in writing for nouns, verbs, phrases, or thoughts: "Jane likes reading, writing, and skiing," NOT "Martha takes notes quickly, thoroughly, and in a detailed manner." | 71 | |
| 3132964253 | parody | a work that imitates another work for comic effect by exaggerating the style and changing the content of the original | 72 | |
| 3132964254 | pastoral | a work that describes the simple life of country folk, usually shepherds who live a timeless, painless life in a world full of beauty, music, and love; also called an eclogue, a bucolic, or and idyll | 73 | |
| 3132964255 | periodic sentence | a sentence that is not grammatically complete until the end: "The child, who looked as if she were being chased by demons, ran." | 74 | |
| 3132964256 | personification | treating an abstraction or nonhuman object as if it were a person by endowing it with human qualities | 75 | |
| 3132964257 | persona | the voice or figure of the author who tells and structures the story and who may or may not share the values of the actual author (e.g. adult Scout in 'To Kill a Mockingbird,' Watson in 'Sherlock Holmes') | 76 | |
| 3132964258 | Petrarchan sonnet | a sonnet form that divides the poem into one section of eight lines (octave) and a second section of six lines (sestet) usually following the abba abba cde cde rhyme scheme; also called an Italian sonnet | 77 | |
| 3132964259 | plot | the arrangement of the narration based on the cause-effect relationship of the events | 78 | |
| 3132964260 | protagonist | the main character in a work, who may or may not be heroic | 79 | |
| 3132964261 | quatrain | a poetic stanza of four lines | 80 | |
| 3132964262 | realism | the practice in literature of attempting to describe nature and life without idealism and with attention to detail | 81 | |
| 3132964263 | refrain | a repeated stanza or line(s) in a poem or song | 82 | |
| 3132964264 | rhetorical question | a question that is simply asked for stylistic effect and is not expected to be answered | 83 | |
| 3132964265 | rhyme | the repetition of the same or similar sounds, most often at the ends of lines | 84 | |
| 3132964266 | rhythm | the modulation of weak and strong elements in the flow of speech | 85 | |
| 3132964267 | rising action | the development of action in a work, usually at the beginning | 86 | |
| 3132964268 | sarcasm | a form of verbal irony in which apparent praise is actually harshly or bitterly critical | 87 | |
| 3132964269 | satire | a literary work that holds up human failings to ridicule and censure | 88 | |
| 3132964270 | scansion | the analysis of verse to show its meter | 89 | |
| 3132964271 | setting | the time and place of the action in a story, poem, or play | 90 | |
| 3132964272 | Shakespearean sonnet | a sonnet form that divides the poem into three units of four lines each and a final unit of two lines, usually abab cdcd efef gg; also called an English sonnet | 91 | |
| 3132964273 | shaped verse | another name for concrete poetry, poetry that is shaped to look like an object | 92 | |
| 3132964274 | simile | a direct, explicit comparison of one thing to another, using the words 'like' or 'as' | 93 | |
| 3132964275 | soliloquy | a monologue in which the character in a play is alone and speaking only to himself or herself | 94 | |
| 3132964276 | speaker | the person, not necessarily the author, who is the voice of a poem | 95 | |
| 3132964277 | stanza | a section of a poem demarcated by extra line spacing | 96 | |
| 3132964278 | couplet | two-line stanza | 97 | |
| 3132964279 | tercet | three-line stanza | 98 | |
| 3132964280 | quatrain | four-line stanza | 99 | |
| 3132964281 | cinquain | five-line stanza | 100 | |
| 3132964282 | sestet | six-line stanza | 101 | |
| 3132964283 | heptatich | seven-line stanza | 102 | |
| 3132964284 | octave | eight-line stanza | 103 | |
| 3132964285 | stereotype | a characterization based on conscious or unconscious assumptions that some aspect, such as gender, age, ethnic or national identity, religion, occupation, marital status, and so on, are predictable accompanied by certain character traits, action, and even values | 104 | |
| 3132964286 | Everyman character | main character that actually represents all people | 105 | |
| 3132964287 | stock character | character who appears in a number of stories or plays such as the cruel stepmother, the femme fatale, etc. | 106 | |
| 3132964288 | structure | the organization or arrangement of the various elements in a work | 107 | |
| 3132964289 | style | a distinctive manner of expression | 108 | |
| 3132964290 | symbol | a person, place, thing, event, or pattern in a literary work that designates itself and at the same time figuratively represents or "stands for" something else | 109 | |
| 3132964291 | synecdoche | when a part is used to signify a whole: "All hands on deck," "He stole five hundred head of longhorns." | 110 | |
| 3132964292 | syntax | the way words are put together to form phrases, clauses, and sentences | 111 | |
| 3132964293 | terza rima | a verse form consisting of three-line stanzas in which the second line of each rhymes with the first and third of the next, in the form ababcb | 112 | |
| 3132964294 | theme | a generalized, abstract paraphrase of the inferred central or dominant idea or concern of a work | 113 | |
| 3132964295 | tone | the attitude a literary work takes toward its subject and theme | 114 | |
| 3132964296 | tragedy | a drama in which a character (usually good and noble and of high rank) is brought to a disastrous end in his or her confrontation with a superior force due to a fatal flaw in his or her character | 115 | |
| 3132964297 | trochaic | a metrical foot in poetry that is the opposite of iambic, with the first syllable stressed and the second not: "BY the SHORES of GITCHee GUMee,/BY the SHINing BIG-Sea-WATer" | 116 | |
| 3132964298 | turning point | the third part of plot structure, the point at which the action stops rising and begins falling or reversing; also called the climax | 117 | |
| 3132964299 | villanelle | a verse form consisting of 19 lines divided into six stanzas - five tercets and one quatrain; the first and third lines of the first tercet rhyme, and this rhyme is repeated through each of the next four tercets and in the last two lines of the concluding quatrain | 118 | |
| 3132964300 | voice | the acknowledged or unacknowledged source of the words of the story; the "person" telling the story or poem | 119 |
