The Glossary of Literary Terms for the AP English Literature and Composition Test
Terms : Hide Images
| 4189116233 | Hubris | The excessive pride or ambition that leads to the main character's downfall | 0 | |
| 4189116234 | Hyperbole | Exaggeration or deliberate overstatement. | 1 | |
| 4189116235 | Implicit | To say or write something that suggests and implies but never says it directly or clearly. | 2 | |
| 4189116236 | In media res | Latin for "in the midst of things," i.e. beginning an epic poem in the middle of the action. | 3 | |
| 4189116237 | Irony | A statement that means the opposite of what it seems to mean; uses an undertow of meaning. | 4 | |
| 4189116238 | Lament | A poem of sadness or grief over the death of a loved one or over some other intense loss. | 5 | |
| 4189116239 | Lampoon | A satire. | 6 | |
| 4189116240 | Loose sentence | A sentence that is grammatically complete before its end: Jack loved Barbara despite her irritating snorting laugh. | 7 | |
| 4189116241 | Periodic Sentence | A sentence that is not grammatically complete until it has reached it s final phrase: Despite Barbara's irritation at Jack, she loved him. | 8 | |
| 4189116242 | Lyric | A type of poetry that explores the poet's personal interpretation of and feelings about the world. | 9 | |
| 4189116243 | Metaphor | A comparison or analogy that states one thing IS another. | 10 | |
| 4189116244 | Simile | A comparison or analogy that typically uses like or as. | 11 | |
| 4189116245 | Metonymy | A word that is used to stand for something else that it has attributes of or is associated with. | 12 | |
| 4189116246 | Objectivity | Treatment of subject matter in an impersonal manner or from an outside view. | 13 | |
| 4189116247 | Subjectivity | A treatment of subject matter that uses the interior or personal view of a single observer and is typically colored with that observer's emotional responses. | 14 | |
| 4189116248 | Onomatopoeia | Words that sound like what they mean | 15 | |
| 4189116249 | Oxymoron | A phrase composed of opposites; a contradiction. | 16 | |
| 4189116250 | Parable | A story that instructs. | 17 | |
| 4189116251 | Paradox | A situation or statement that seems to contradict itself, but on closer inspection, does not. | 18 | |
| 4189116252 | Parallelism | Repeated syntactical similarities used for effect. | 19 |
