Terms : Hide Images
| 3459449931 | Allegory | a symbolism device where the meaning of a greater, often abstract, concept is conveyed with the aid of a more corporeal object or idea being used as an example. | 0 | |
| 3459467961 | Allusion | a figure of speech whereby the author refers to a subject matter such as a place, event, or literary work by way of a passing reference. | 1 | |
| 3459470429 | Antagonist | a character or a group of characters which stand in opposition to the protagonist or the main character. | 2 | |
| 3459477937 | Archetype | a reference to a concept, a person or an object that has served as a prototype of its kind and is the original idea that has come to be used over and over again. They are literary devices that employ the use of a famous concept, person or object to convey a wealth of meaning. | 3 | |
| 3459489336 | Comedy | a literary genre and a type of dramatic work that is amusing and satirical in its tone, mostly having cheerful ending. The motif of this dramatic work is triumph over unpleasant circumstance by which to create comic effects, resulting in happy or successful conclusion. | 4 | |
| 3459496528 | Climax | that particular point in a narrative at which the conflict or tension hits the highest point. | 5 | |
| 3459502467 | In Media Res | Latin for "into the middle of things." It usually describes a narrative that begins, not at the beginning of a story, but somewhere in the middle — usually at some crucial point in the action. | 6 | |
| 3459521320 | Epiphany | that moment in the story where a character achieves realization, awareness or a feeling of knowledge after which events are seen through the prism of this new light in the story. | 7 | |
| 3459534158 | Exposition | a literary device used to introduce background information about events, settings, characters etc. to the audience or readers. | 8 | |
| 3459543374 | Conflict | a literary element that involves a struggle between two opposing forces usually a protagonist and an antagonist. | 9 | |
| 3459561179 | Denouement | a literary device which can be defined as the resolution of the issue of a complicated plot in fiction. | 10 | |
| 3459567376 | Limited Omniscient P.O.V | A narrator whose knowledge is limited to one character, either major or minor | 11 | |
| 3459578448 | Omniscient P.O.V | a point of view where the narrator knows all the thoughts, actions, and feelings of all characters. | 12 | |
| 3459578449 | Situational Irony | a literary device that you can easily identify in literary works. Simply, it occurs when incongruity appears between expectations of something to happen, and what actually happens instead. Thus, entirely different happens from what audience may be expecting or the final outcome is opposite to what the audience is expecting. It is also known as irony of situations that generally include sharp contrasts and contradictions. | 13 | |
| 3459580844 | Static Character | a literary or dramatic character who undergoes little or no inner change; a character who does not grow or develop. | 14 | |
| 3459580845 | Stock Character | a character in literature, theater, or film of a type quickly recognized and accepted by the reader or viewer and requiring no development by the writer. | 15 | |
| 3459583374 | Story of Initiation | a short story depicting a decisive incident that initiates a character into a higher state of awareness, whether for better or for worse. | 16 | |
| 3459585568 | Indirect Characterization | the process by which the writer shows the character's personality through speech, actions and appearance. | 17 | |
| 3459585569 | Dramatic Irony | occurs when the audience knows something the characters do not. Because of this understanding, the words of the characters take on a different meaning. | 18 | |
| 3459585570 | Round Character | a character in fiction whose personality, background, motives, and other features are fully delineated by the author. | 19 | |
| 3459588218 | Motivation | reason why characters do what they do | 20 | |
| 3459588219 | Cosmic Irony | the idea that fate, destiny, or a god controls and toys with human hopes and expectations; also, the belief that the universe is so large and man is so small that the universe is indifferent to the plight of man; also called irony of fate | 21 | |
| 3459588220 | Confidant | a character who has little effect on the action but in whom the protagonist or some other major character confides | 22 | |
| 3459590409 | Dynamic Character | a literary or dramatic character who undergoes an important inner change, as a change in personality or attitude | 23 | |
| 3459590410 | Verbal Irony | occurs when a speaker speaks something contradictory to what he intends to. | 24 | |
| 3459593087 | Direct Characterization | occurs when the author specifically reveals traits about the character in a direct, straightforward manner. | 25 | |
| 3459593088 | Diction | defined as style of speaking or writing determined by the choice of words by a speaker or a writer/word choice | 26 | |
| 3459593089 | Flashback | interruptions that writers do to insert past events in order to provide background or context to the current events of a narrative. | 27 | |
| 3459595190 | Foreshadowing | a literary device in which a writer gives an advance hint of what is to come later in the story. | 28 | |
| 3459595191 | Horatian | clever and humorous and generally mocks others. It is not negative, it aims to make fun of human behavior in a comic way. | 29 | |
| 3459598216 | Juvenilian | addresses social evil through scorn, outrage, and savage ridicule. This form is often pessimistic, characterized by irony, sarcasm, moral indignation and personal invective, with less emphasis on humor. | 30 | |
| 3459598217 | Motif | an object or idea that repeats itself throughout a literary work. | 31 | |
| 3459598218 | Genre | means the type of art, literature or music characterized by a specific form, content and style. | 32 | |
| 3459600142 | Plot | a literary term used to describe the events that make up a story or the main part of a story. | 33 | |
| 3459600143 | Symbol | an object or action that means something more than its literal meaning. | 34 | |
| 3459602114 | Syntax | a set of rules in a language. It dictates how words from different parts of speech are put together in order to convey a complete thought. | 35 | |
| 3459602115 | Setting | an environment or surrounding in which an event or story takes place. | 36 | |
| 3459602116 | Tone | an attitude of a writer toward a subject or an audience. It is generally conveyed through the choice of words or the viewpoint of a writer on a particular subject. | 37 | |
| 3459602117 | Theme | defined as a main idea or an underlying meaning of a literary work that may be stated directly or indirectly. | 38 | |
| 3459604724 | Tragedy | kind of drama that presents a serious subject matter about human suffering and corresponding terrible events in a dignified manner. | 39 | |
| 3459608735 | Alliteration | a stylistic device in which a number of words, having the same first consonant sound, occur close together in a series. This occurs at the beginning of words | 40 | |
| 3459608736 | Antithesis | literal meaning opposite, is a rhetorical device in which two opposite ideas are put together in a sentence to achieve a contrasting effect. | 41 | |
| 3459608737 | Apostrophe | the act of addressing some abstraction or personification that is not physically present | 42 | |
| 3459611091 | Assonance | takes place when two or more words close to one another repeat the same vowel sound but start with different consonant sounds. | 43 | |
| 3459611092 | Consonance | refers to repetitive sounds produced by consonants within a sentence or phrase. This repetition often takes place in quick succession such as in pitter, patter. | 44 | |
| 3459611093 | Deus Ex Machine | means to solve a seemingly intractable problem in a plot by adding in an unexpected character, object, or situation. | 45 | |
| 3459614444 | Epistle | a composition in prose or poetry written in the form of a letter to a particular person or group. | 46 | |
| 3459614445 | Foil | a character that shows qualities that are in contrast with the qualities of another character with the objective to highlight the traits of the other character. | 47 | |
| 3459614446 | Hubris | extreme pride and arrogance shown by a character that ultimately brings about his downfall. | 48 | |
| 3459614447 | Hyperbole | a figure of speech, which involves an exaggeration of ideas for the sake of emphasis. | 49 | |
| 3459616971 | Metaphor | a figure of speech which makes an implicit, implied or hidden comparison between two things or objects that are poles apart from each other but have some characteristics common between them. | 50 | |
| 3459616972 | Metonymy | a figure of speech that replaces the name of a thing with the name of something else with which it is closely associated. | 51 | |
| 3459619340 | Montage | A quick succession of images or impressions used to express an idea | 52 | |
| 3459619341 | Onomatopoeia | a word, which imitates the natural sounds of a thing. It creates a sound effect that mimics the thing described, making the description more expressive and interesting. | 53 | |
| 3459621966 | Parable | a figure of speech, which presents a short story typically with a moral lesson at the end. | 54 | |
| 3459621967 | Paradox | a statement that appears to be self-contradictory or silly but may include a latent truth. It is also used to illustrate an opinion or statement contrary to accepted traditional ideas. | 55 | |
| 3459621968 | Pathos | a quality of an experience in life or a work of art that stirs up emotions of pity, sympathy and sorrow. | 56 | |
| 3459624736 | Personification | a figure of speech in which a thing, an idea or an animal is given human attributes. | 57 | |
| 3459624737 | Simile | explicit comparison between two unlike things through the use of connecting words, usually "like" or "as." | 58 | |
| 3459626819 | Synecdoche | a literary device in which a part of something represents the whole or it may use a whole to represent a part. | 59 | |
| 3459626820 | Understatement | a figure of speech employed by writers or speakers to intentionally make a situation seem less important than it really is. | 60 | |
| 3459628333 | Unreliable Narrator | a character whose telling of the story is not completely accurate or credible due to problems with the character's mental state or maturity. | 61 | |
| 3460969570 | Literary Criticism | a natural human response to literature; nothing more than discourse-spoken or written-about literature | 62 | |
| 3460982498 | Formalist Criticism | paying special attention to the formal features of the text- the genre, style, structure, imagery, symbolism, tone (especially when repeated or seen in patterns). These critics believe that what gives a literary text its special status as art is how all of its elements work together to create the reader's total experience. | 63 | |
| 3461047134 | Biographical Criticism | understanding that an author's life can help readers more thoroughly comprehend the work; biographical information provides the practical assistance of underscoring subtle but important meanings. | 64 | |
| 3461061903 | Historical Criticism | seeks to understand a literary work by investigating the social, cultural, and intellectual context that produced it; this critic sees a literary work chiefly as a reflection of the author's life and times or the life and times of the characters in the work. | 65 | |
| 3461094366 | Psychological Criticism | exploring human behavior through wish fulfillment, sexuality, repression, dreams, and the unconscious. | 66 | |
| 3461106604 | Mythological Criticism | combines the insights of anthropology, psychology, religion, history and comparative literature. Closely related to the psychological approach because both are concerned with the motives underlying human behavior. This is collective and communal, binding a tribe or nation together in common psychological and spiritual activities. | 67 | |
| 3461131425 | Sociological Criticism | examines literature in the cultural, economical, and political context. Examines social groups, relationships, and values as they are manifested in literature. Illuminates political and economic dimensions of literature other approaches overlook. | 68 | |
| 3461161903 | Gender Criticism | examines how sexual identity influences the creation and reception of a literary work. Feminist criticism focuses on a concern for the perspective of women on life, intending to raise the consciousness about sexual exploitation, marginalization, and alienation. | 69 | |
| 3461193465 | Postmodernism | a term offered by some literary historians to refer to the period from the mid 1970s to the present. Now used to define contemporary culture and technology, as well as art. Describes an age transformed by information technology, shaped by electronic images, and fascinated by popular culture. | 70 | |
| 3461216918 | Reader-response Criticism | attempts to describe what happens to the reader's mind while interpreting a text. | 71 | |
| 3461225272 | Marxist Criticism | focuses on the ideological content of a work, its explicit and implicit assumptions and values about matters such as culture, race, class, and power. | 72 | |
| 3461236603 | Deconstructionalist Criticism | rejects the traditional assumption that language can accurately represent reality. According to this critic, language is an unstable medium. | 73 | |
| 3461250275 | Cultural Studies Criticism | does not offer a singular way to analyze literature. Mission is to identify both the overt and covert values reflected in a cultural practice. It is composed of elements of Marxism, new historicism, feminism, gender studies, anthropology, studies of race and ethnicity, film theory, sociology, urban studies, public policy studies, popular culture studies, and postcolonial studies- fields that focus on social and cultural forces that either create community or cause division and alienation. | 74 |
