The Glossary of Literary Terms for the AP English Literature and Composition Test
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| 6719121143 | Allegory | A story in which each aspect of the story has a symbolic meaning outside the tale itself. | 0 | |
| 6719121144 | Alliteration | The repetition of initial consonant sounds. | 1 | |
| 6719121145 | Allusion | A reference to another work or famous figure. | 2 | |
| 6719121146 | Anachronism | "Misplaced in time." An aspect of a story that doesn't belong in its supposed time setting. | 3 | |
| 6719121147 | Analogy | A comparison, usually involving two or more symbolic parts, employed to clarify an action or a relationship. | 4 | |
| 6719121148 | Anecdote | A Short Narrative | 5 | |
| 6719121153 | Aphorism | A short and usually witty saying. | 6 | |
| 6719121154 | Apostrophe | A figure of speech wherein the speaker talks directly to something that is nonhuman. | 7 | |
| 6719121158 | Assonance | The repeated use of vowel sounds: "Old king Cole was a merry old soul." | 8 | |
| 6719121160 | Ballad | A long, narrative poem, usually in meter and rhyme. Typically has a naive folksy quality. | 9 | |
| 6719121162 | Pathos | Writing evokes feelings of dignified pity and sympathy. | 10 | |
| 6719121166 | Cacophony | In poetry, using deliberately harsh, awkward sounds. | 11 | |
| 6719121176 | Conceit (Controlling Image) | A startling or unusual metaphor, or to a metaphor developed and expanded upon several lines. | 12 | |
| 6719121177 | Denotation | A word's literal meaning. | 13 | |
| 6719121178 | Connotation | Everything other than the literal meaning that a word suggests or implies. | 14 | |
| 6719121179 | Consonance | The repetition of consonant sounds within words (rather than at their beginnings) | 15 | |
| 6719121182 | Diction | The words an author chooses to use. | 16 | |
| 6719121183 | Syntax | The ordering and structuring of words. | 17 | |
| 6719121187 | Dramatic Irony | When the audience knows something that the characters in the drama do not | 18 | |
| 6719121188 | Dramatic Monologue | When a single speaker in literature says something to a silent audience. | 19 | |
| 6719121189 | Elegy | A type of poem that meditates on death or mortality in a serious, thoughtful manner. | 20 | |
| 6719121191 | Enjambment | The continuation of a syntactic unit from one line or couplet of a poem to the next with no pause. | 21 | |
| 6719121194 | Euphemism | A word or phrase that takes the place of a harsh, unpleasant, or impolite reality. | 22 | |
| 6719121195 | Euphony | When sounds blend harmoniously. | 23 | |
| 6719121198 | Feminine rhyme | Lines rhymed by their final two syllables. Properly, the penultimate syllables are stressed and the final syllables are unstressed. | 24 | |
| 6719121200 | Foot | The basic rhythmic unit of a line of poetry, formed by a combination of two or three syllables, either stressed or unstressed. | 25 | |
| 6719121206 | Hyperbole | Exaggeration or deliberate overstatement. | 26 | |
| 6719121209 | Interior Monologue | Refers to writing that records the mental talking that goes on inside a character's head; tends to be coherent. | 27 | |
| 6719121211 | Irony | A statement that means the opposite of what it seems to mean; uses an undertow of meaning, sliding against the literal a la Jane Austen. | 28 | |
| 6719121212 | Lament | A poem of sadness or grief over the death of a loved one or over some other intense loss. | 29 | |
| 6719121217 | Masculine rhyme | A rhyme ending on the final stressed syllable (regular old rhyme) | 30 | |
| 6719121222 | Metonymy | A word that is used to stand for something else that it has attributes of or is associated with. | 31 | |
| 6719121226 | Onomatopoeia | Words that sound like what they mean | 32 | |
| 6719121228 | Oxymoron | A phrase composed of opposites; a contradiction. | 33 | |
| 6719121230 | Paradox | A situation or statement that seems to contradict itself, but on closer inspection, does not. | 34 | |
| 6719121232 | Paraphrase | To restate phrases and sentences in your own words. | 35 | |
| 6719121233 | Parenthetical phrase | A phrase set off by commas that interrupts the flow of a sentence with some commentary or added detail. | 36 | |
| 6719121237 | Personification | When an inanimate object takes on human shape. | 37 | |
| 6719121238 | Plaint | A poem or speech expressing sorrow. | 38 | |
| 6719121240 | Omniscient | A third person narrator who sees into each character's mind and understands all the action going on. | 39 | |
| 6719121241 | Limited Omniscient | A Third person narrator who generally reports only what one character sees, and who only reports the thoughts of that one privileged character. | 40 | |
| 6719121242 | Objective | A thrid person narrator who only reports on what would be visible to a camera. Does not know what the character is thinking unless the character speaks it. | 41 | |
| 6719121243 | First person | A narrator who is a character in the story and tells the tale from his or her point of view. | 42 | |
| 6719121244 | Stream of Consciousness | Author places the reader inside the main character's head and makes the reader privy to all of the character's thoughts as they scroll through her consciousness. | 43 | |
| 6719121248 | Refrain | A line or set of lines repeated several times over the course of a poem. | 44 | |
| 6719121250 | Rhapsody | An intensely passionate verse or section of verse, usually of love or praise. | 45 | |
| 6719121252 | Satire | Attempts to improve things by pointing out people's mistakes in the hope that once exposed, such behavior will become less common. | 46 | |
| 6719121253 | Soliloquy | A speech spoken by a character alone on stage, meant to convey the impression that the audience is listening to the character's thoughts. | 47 | |
| 6719121260 | Symbolism | A device in literature where an object represents an idea. | 48 | |
| 6719121262 | Theme | The main idea of the overall work; the central idea. | 49 | |
| 6719121263 | Thesis | The main position of an argument. The central contention that will be supported. | 50 | |
| 6719121270 | Ode | A poem in praise of something divine or noble | 51 | |
| 6719121271 | Iamb | A poetic foot -- light, heavy | 52 | |
| 6719121272 | Trochee | A poetic foot -- heavy, light | 53 | |
| 6719121279 | Pentameter | A poetic line with five feet. | 54 | |
| 6719121280 | Tetrameter | A poetic line with four feet | 55 | |
| 6719121281 | Trimeter | A poetic line with three feet | 56 | |
| 6719369246 | 2nd Person | Rare, narrator talks to the person as if they are a part of the story. | 57 | |
| 6719376789 | 3rd Person | told by a narrator who is not a part of the story and uses pronouns such as he she and it to describe | 58 | |
| 6719384071 | Verbal Irony | person says the opposite of what is meant | 59 | |
| 6719389578 | Situational Irony | difference between what is expected to happen and what actually happens | 60 |
