Terms : Hide Images
| 4724327395 | Diction | The specific word choice of an author EX: "You can choose your friends but you sho' can't choose your family, an' they're still kin to you no matter whether you acknowledge 'em or not, and it makes you look right silly when you don't." | 0 | |
| 4724327396 | Detail | are items or parts that make up a larger picture or story. EX: Chaucer's "Prologue" to The Canterbury Tales is celebrated for its use of a few details | 1 | |
| 4724327397 | Syntax | sentence structure EX: complex sentences, long sentences, short sentences etc | 2 | |
| 4724327398 | Pacing | a stylistic device, which shows how fast a story unfolds EX: In his short story, "The Most Dangerous Game", Richard Connell creates exciting and tense feelings of anticipation and uncertainty throughout the story. Suspense is the key that makes the story powerful and keeps it fast paced. | 3 | |
| 4724327399 | Tone Shift | the tone of a work, or the attitude of the author, may change and shift as the speaker or narrator's perspective on a particular subject alters throughout the piece. EX: when tone changes from happy to sad, calm to angry | 4 | |
| 4724327400 | Imagery | the picture in your mind that the words from the page create; can be figurative, symbolic, or literal EX: Glittering white, the blanket of snow covered everything in sight | 5 | |
| 4724327401 | Connotation | Emotional meaning of a word EX: Dove implies peace. | 6 | |
| 4724327402 | Figurative Language | language that uses words or expressions with a meaning that is different from the literal interpretation EX: The poorest man is the richest, and the rich are poor. | 7 | |
| 4724327403 | Denotation | the explicit or dictionary meaning of a word EX: Home-literally means the physical place where you live | 8 | |
| 4724327404 | Point of View | the vantage point from which a story is told EX: first person, third person | 9 | |
| 4724327405 | Theme | The main idea of a work of literature; the message is the author sending to the reader EX: love and friendship, theme of war | 10 | |
| 4724327406 | Allegory | a figurative work in which a surface narrative carries a secondary, symbolic or metaphorical meaning EX: George Orwell, Animal Farm (Russian Revolution | 11 | |
| 4724330193 | Allusion | a reference to a famous event or person EX: If you take his place, you can expect World War II all over again. | 12 | |
| 4724330194 | Alliteration | the recurrence of initial consonant sounds EX: What a delicious day! | 13 | |
| 4724330407 | Ambiguity | A word, phrase, or statement which contains more than one meaning EX: Foreigners are hunting dogs - It is unclear whether dogs were being hunted or foreigners are being spoken of as dogs | 14 | |
| 4724331062 | Antagonist | a character or a group of characters which stand in opposition to the protagonist or the main character; EX: the opponent, competitor or rival- In The Hunger Games, the capital is Katniss' antagonist-and those who control the elements that make up the game. | 15 | |
| 4724331063 | Apostrophe | interrupts the discussion or discourse and addresses directly a person or personified thing, either present or absent EX: O books who alone are liberal and free, who give to all who ask of you and enfranchise all who serve you faithfully! | 16 | |
| 4724331295 | Analogy | compares two things for the purpose of explaining or clarifying some unfamiliar or difficult idea or object by showing how the idea or object is similar to some familiar one EX: Knowledge always desires increase: it is like fire, which must first be kindled by some external agent, but which will afterwards propagate itself. --Samuel Johnson | 17 | |
| 4724331296 | Anecdote | a short and interesting story or an amusing event often proposed to support or demonstrate some point EX: Picture a mother and a father discussing whether or not to get a dog for the family. The father says: You know, when I was a kid, my dog was my best friend. My childhood was better because of him. The mother contemplates his story—a.k.a. his anecdote—and then agrees that they should get a dog | 18 | |
| 4724331819 | aside | happens when a character's dialogue is spoken but not heard by the other actors on the stage. Asides are useful for giving the audience special information about the other characters onstage or the action of the plot. EX: Romeo speaks an aside in Act II, Scene ii of "Romeo and Juliet" when he is standing beneath the balcony where Juliet is speaking, unaware that anyone hears her. Juliet is professing her love for Romeo, and he says "Shall I hear more, or shall I speak at this?" | 19 | |
| 4724331820 | assonance | similar vowel sounds repeated in successive or proximate words containing different consonants EX: Go slow over the road. (repetition of the long o sound) | 20 | |
| 4724332029 | atmosphere | a type of feelings that readers get from a narrative based on details such as settings, background, objects and foreshadowing, etc. | 21 | |
| 4724332030 | attitude | can be referred as perspective or tone of the writer he adopts in a certain work. EX: when adjectives like "dead" and "depressing" are used gloomy attitude toward the story is developed | 22 | |
| 4724332426 | bildungsroman | a special kind of novel that focuses on the psychological and moral growth of its main character from his or her youth to adulthood Ex: Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird is a famous example of a Bildungsroman. The main character and narrator, Scout Finch, learns important—and sometimes difficult—lessons in her small hometown of Maycomb, Alabama. Under the guidance of her father, Atticus, she learns about the harsh realities of discrimination and the importance of empathy and equality. | 23 | |
| 4724332427 | cacophony | the use of words with sharp, harsh, hissing and unmelodious sounds EX: he grunted and in a gruff voice said, "Give me that trash and I'll throw it out!" | 24 | |
| 4724332821 | Caesura | a pause, metrical or rhetorical, occurring somewhere in a line of poetry EX: At length I heard a ragged noise and mirth Of thieves and murderers: there I him espied, Who straight, Your suit is granted, said, and died. | 25 | |
| 4724333179 | Characterization-Direct and Indirect | This kind of characterization takes a direct approach towards building the character. It uses another character, narrator or the protagonist himself to tell the readers or audience about the subject. 2. Indirect or implicit characterization This is a more subtle way of introducing the character to the audience. The audience has to deduce for themselves the characteristics of the character by observing his/her thought process, behavior, speech, way of talking, appearance, and way of communication with other characters and also by discerning the response of other characters | 26 | |
| 4724333409 | Climax | consists of arranging words, clauses, or sentences in the order of increasing importance, weight, or emphasis EX: At 6:20 a.m. the ground began to heave. Windows rattled; then they broke. Objects started falling from shelves. Water heaters fell from their pedestals, tearing out plumbing. Outside, the road began to break up. Water mains and gas lines were wrenched apart, causing flooding and the danger of explosion. Office buildings began cracking; soon twenty, thirty, forty stories of concrete were diving at the helpless pedestrians panicking below. | 27 | |
| 4724333751 | colloquialism | a local variation of language, as in a word or phrase, found within particular dialects EX: slang words | 28 | |
| 4724334078 | conceit | An elaborate, usually intellectually ingenious poetic comparison or image EX: an analogy or metaphor in which, say a beloved is compared to a ship, planet, etc. | 29 | |
| 4724334079 | conflict | The struggle between two opposing forces in a piece of literature, which the story is built around (the forces are the protagonist and the antagonist) EX: man vs man, man vs himself, man vs nature | 30 | |
| 4724334522 | consonance | refers to repetitive sounds produced by consonants within a sentence or phrase EX: Mike likes his new bike | 31 | |
| 4724334526 | enjambment | the running over of a sentence or thought into the next couplet or line without a pause at the end of the line (a run-on line) EX: Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds Or bends with the remover to remove. . . . --Shakespeare | 32 | |
| 4724334774 | 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. EX: when Oskar learns to accept his fathers death and accept that he needs his mother. | 33 | |
| 4724336465 | euphony | It can be defined as the use of words and phrases that are distinguished as having a wide range of noteworthy melody or loveliness in the sounds they create | 34 | |
| 4724336466 | flashback | allows the writer to present events that happened before the time of the current narration or the current events (memories, dreams, stories told) EX: when Oskar keeps flashing back to the story his dad told him the night before he died | 35 | |
| 4724336467 | foil | a character who directly contrasts the traits or qualities of another character. In most cases, the foil contrasts the main character EX: Tybalt in Romeo and Juliet | 36 | |
| 4724336697 | foreshadowing | To use details and images to hint at events to come in the narrative EX: storms foreshadow something bad to come | 37 | |
| 4724336698 | genre | a category of literary composition EX: poetry, short story, fantasy, drama | 38 | |
| 4724336699 | hyperbole | exaggerates conditions for emphasis or effect EX: There are a thousand reasons why more research is needed. | 39 | |
| 4724337296 | irony | a mode of expression, through words (verbal irony) or events (irony of situation), conveying a reality different from and usually opposite to appearance or expectation EX: In Romeo and Juliet, the audience/reader knows that Juliet has faked her death, but Romeo does not and he thinks she is really dead. (dramatic irony) | 40 | |
| 4724337297 | juxtaposition | to place side by side, especially for comparison or contrast EX: All is fair in love and war. | 41 | |
| 4724337892 | litotes | a form of understatement is generated by denying the opposite of the word which otherwise would be used EX: Heat waves are common in the summer. | 42 | |
| 4724337893 | metaphor | compares two different things by speaking of one in terms of the other EX: Then Jesus declared "I am the bread of life." John 6:35 | 43 | |
| 4724338155 | metonymy | another form of metaphor; the thing chosen for the metaphorical image is closely associated with the subject it is compared to EX: This land belongs to the crown. | 44 | |
| 4724338156 | mood | a literary element that evokes certain feelings or vibes in readers through words and descriptions. Usually, mood is referred to as the atmosphere of a literary piece, as it creates an emotional situation that surrounds the readers EX: gloomy, exciting | 45 | |
| 4724339033 | motif | any recurring element that has symbolic significance in a story EX: bad weather | 46 | |
| 4724339034 | objective | Point of View that gives only facts EX: These he placed outside his cavern door, as gifts to the poor peasants. (Simply says what he did) | 47 | |
| 4724341290 | onomatopoeia | is the use of words whose pronunciation imitates the sound the word describes EX: "buzz" "skidding of tires" | 48 | |
| 4724341291 | omniscient | The third person narrator who sees all and know all -even the thoughts- about the character of the story EX: In classic literature, a good example of third person omniscient is found in Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter; the story is told from several different characters' points-of-view and the narrator knows the thoughts, actions, and feelings of every character | 49 | |
| 4724341535 | oxymoron | a paradox reduced to two words used for effect, complexity, emphasis, or wit EX: cheerful pessimist, wise fool | 50 | |
| 4724341536 | parallelism | recurrent syntactical similarity EX: Mother was very busy gathering the laundry, dusting the furniture and washing the dishes. | 51 | |
| 4724341808 | parody | a satiric imitation of a work or of an author with the idea of ridiculing the author, his ideas, or work EX:(Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes) | 52 | |
| 4724341809 | paradox | a statement that appears to be self-contradictory or silly but may include a latent truth EX: "All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others." (Animal farm) | 53 | |
| 4724342395 | personification | a figure of speech in which a thing, an idea or an animal is given human attributes EX: The flowers danced in the wind. | 54 | |
| 4724342396 | plot elements | Introduction, rising action, climax, falling action, resolution | 55 | |
| 4724342397 | point of view | the vantage point from which a story is told EX: first person, third person | 56 | |
| 4724342783 | protagonist | the central character of a narrative, the character through whom the lesson of the story is learned EX: Oskar Schell | 57 | |
| 4724342784 | reliability | a quality of some fictional narratives whose word the reader can trust | 58 | |
| 4724343263 | repetition | a literary device that repeats the same words or phrases a few times to make an idea clearer EX: And miles to go before I sleep, and miles to go before I sleep." | 59 | |
| 4724343264 | sarcasm | a form of sneering criticism in which disapproval is often expressed as ironic praise EX: If you drop your lunch tray and a stranger says, "Well, that was really intelligent." | 60 | |
| 4724343450 | satire | a literary mode based on criticism of people and society through ridicule EX: A list of incongruous items, an oxymoron, metaphors | 61 | |
| 4724343451 | scansion | the process of analyzing a poem's meter | 62 | |
| 4724343692 | setting | the total environment for the action of a fictional work; setting includes time period, the place, the historical milieu, as well as the social, political, and perhaps even spiritual realities EX: New York City, 1980 | 63 | |
| 4724343693 | simile | is a comparison between two different things that resemble each other in at least one way EX: The soul in the body is like a bird in a cage. | 64 | |
| 4724343952 | stereotype | a conventional and oversimplified opinion or belief about a person or group of people who may share similar characteristics; taking one characteristic of an individual and spreading that characteristic over the group that individual belongs to EX: the jock, the nerd | 65 | |
| 4724344904 | subjective | point of view that is a personal view or opinion EX: When the lad saw all that wealth, he felt his heart burst with longing to grasp it. (Describes feelings) | 66 | |
| 4724344905 | symbol | something which stands for and represents itself but also stands for something much greater than itself figuratively EX: doves symbolize peace | 67 | |
| 4724345194 | synaesthesia | a technique adopted by writers to present ideas, characters or places in such a manner that they appeal to more than one senses like hearing, seeing, smell etc. at a given time EX "Sun is silent" Here, Dante binds the sense of sight (sun) with the sense of hearing(silent). | 68 | |
| 4724345195 | synecdoche | a type of metaphor in which the part stands for the whole EX: The farmer has two hundred head of cattle and three hired hands. | 69 | |
| 4724345442 | style | The manner of expression of a particular writer, produced by choice of words, grammatical structures, use of literary devices, and all the possible parts of language use EX: persuasive, narrative, expository | 70 | |
| 4724345443 | turning point (shift) | a moment when the course of events is changed EX: in "Romeo and Juliet," the turning point would be when Romeo killed Tybalt. Romeo and Juliet were doing fine until Romeo got himself banished for killing Tybalt. That started him down the path to his (and Juliet's) death. | 71 | |
| 4724345733 | understatement | deliberately expresses an idea as less important than it actually is, either for ironic emphasis or for politeness and tact EX: The 1906 San Francisco earthquake interrupted business somewhat in the downtown area. | 72 |
