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| 9552357670 | Abstract | Abstract style (in writing) is typically complex, discusses intangible qualities like good and evil, and seldom uses examples to support its points. | 0 | |
| 9552357671 | Aesthetic | Means "appealing to the senses." Aesthetic judgment is synonymous with artistic judgment. Aesthetics is the study of beauty. | 1 | |
| 9552357672 | Allegory | A story in which each aspect of the story has a symbolic meaning outside the tale itself. Many fables have an allegorical quality. For example, Aesop's fable The Ant and the Grasshopper isn't merely the story of a hardworking ant and a carefree grasshopper, but is also a story about different approaches to living, a story about the seasons of summer and winter, representing prosperity and hardship or youth and age. True allegories such as Pilgrim's Process is an allegory of the soul in which every part of the tale represents some feature of the spiritual world and the struggles of the individual to lead a Christian life. | 2 | |
| 9552357673 | Allusion | A reference to another work or famous figure. A classical allusion is a reference to Greek or Roman mythology. A topical allusion refers to a current event; a popular allusion refers to something from pop culture. | 3 | |
| 9552357674 | Analogy | A comparison, usually involving two or more symbolic parts, and are employed to clarify an action or relationship. Ex. Just as the mother eagle shelters her young from the storm by spreading her great wing above their heads, so does Acme Insurers of America spread an umbrella of coverage to protect its policy holders from the storms of life. | 4 | |
| 9552357675 | Anecdote | A short narrative. | 5 | |
| 9552357676 | Antecedent | The word, phrase, or clause that determines what a pronoun refers to. | 6 | |
| 9552357677 | Aphorism | A short and usually witty saying, such as: "A classic? That's a book that people praise and don't read." | 7 | |
| 9552357678 | Antihero | A protagonist (main character) who is markedly unheroic: morally weak, cowardly, dishonest, or any number of unsavory qualities. | 8 | |
| 9552357679 | Apostrophe | A figure of speech wherein the speaker talks directly to something that is nonhuman. | 9 | |
| 9552357680 | Atmosphere | The emotional tone or background that surrounds a scene. | 10 | |
| 9552357681 | Bathos/Pathos | When the writing of a scene evokes feelings of dignified pity and sympathy, pathos is at work. When writing strains for grandeur it cant support and tries to jerk tears from every little hiccup, that is bathos. | 11 | |
| 9552357682 | Black humor | This is the use of disturbing themes in comedy. Ros and Guil. | 12 | |
| 9552357683 | Bombast | This is pretentious, exaggeratedly learned language. When one tries to be eloquent by using the largest, most uncommon words, one falls into bombast. | 13 | |
| 9552357684 | Burlesque | Also called parody. One that takes a style or form, such as tragic drama for example, and exaggerates it into ridiculousness. A parody usually takes on a particular work for exaggeration. | 14 | |
| 9552357685 | Caricature | A portrait (verbal or otherwise) that exaggerates a facet of personality. | 15 | |
| 9552357686 | Catharsis | This is a term drawn from Aristotle's writing on tragic drama. Catharsis refers to the "cleansing" of emotion an audience member experiences, having lived vicariously through the experiences performed on stage. | 16 | |
| 9552357687 | Classic | Not to be confused with classical - Classic can mean typical, as in Oh, that was a classic blunder! It can also mean an accepted masterpiece, for example, Hamlet. Classical refers to the works of ancient Greece and Rome and the qualities of those arts. | 17 | |
| 9552357688 | Colloquialism | Everyday conversational English that isn't a part of accepted "school-book" English. For example, "I've got a wicked headache because I got toasted on the beach today, and now I'm crispy!" | 18 | |
| 9552357689 | Connotation | The denotation of a word is its literal meaning. The connotations are everything else that the word suggests or implies. For example, in the phrase, the dark forest, dark denotes a relative lack of light. The connotation is of danger, or perhaps mystery or quiet. | 19 | |
| 9552357690 | Decorum | In order to observe decorum, a character's speech must be styled according to her social station, and in accordance with the occasion. A bum should speak like a bum about bumly things, while a princess should speak only about higher topics and in a delicate manner. In Neoclassical and Victorian literature the authors observed decorum meaning they didnt not write about the indecorous. The bum wouldn't even appear in this type of literature. | 20 | |
| 9552357691 | Diction | Word choice. Whether to use wept or cried is a choice of diction. Syntax refers to the ordering and structuring or words. Shakespeare for example, often uses reversed syntax. Ex. His coward lips did from their color fly. | 21 | |
| 9552357692 | Dramatic Irony | When the audience knows something that the characters do not. Ex. The audience knows in the Pardoner's Tale that two of the men guarding the gold are going to murder the third man who ran for food and drink. | 22 | |
| 9552357693 | Epic | In a broad sense, an epic is simply a very long narrative poem on a serious theme in a dignified style. Epics typically deal with glorious or profound subject matter: a great war, a heroic journey, the fall of a man from Eden, etc... The mock-epic is a parody that deals with mundane events and ironically treats them as worthy of epic poetry. | 23 | |
| 9552357694 | Euphemism | A word or phrase that takes the place of a harsh, unpleasant, or impolite reality. The use of passed away for died, and let go for fired are euphemism. | 24 | |
| 9552357695 | Explicit | To say or write something directly and clearly (rare in literature). Its opposite is implicit which is to suggest or imply. | 25 | |
| 9552357696 | Farce | Extremely broad humor, in its modern sense. In earlier times, farce simply means a funny play; a comedy, and comedy used to mean any play - not always implying humor - in centuries past. | 26 | |
| 9552357697 | Foil | A secondary character whose purpose is to highlight the characteristics of a main character, usually by contrast. | 27 | |
| 9552357698 | Foreshadowing | an event or statement in a narrative that in miniature suggests a larger event to come. | 28 | |
| 9552357699 | Genre | a sub-category of literature. | 29 | |
| 9552357700 | Gothic | These novels first showed up in the middle of the 18th century as a sub-category of the Romantic novel. This type of literature emphasizes wild untamed isolated settings, some elements of magic or supernatural, violence, a sense of impending danger, and often feature castles, ghosts, demons, etc... | 30 | |
| 9552357701 | Hubris | The excessive pride or ambition that leads to the main character's downfall (from Aristotle) | 31 | |
| 9552357702 | Hyperbole | exaggeration or deliberate overstatement | 32 | |
| 9552357703 | Implicit | To say or write something that suggests and implies but never says directly or clearly. "Meaning" is present, but it is in the imagery or read "between the lines." | 33 | |
| 9552357704 | In medias res | Latin for "in the midst of things." A convention of epic poetry and some works of prose fiction. For example, the Iliad begins in medias res because the Trojan War has been going on for some time. | 34 | |
| 9552357705 | Interior Monologue | Does not apply to dramatic literature - only prose and poetry. Writing that records the mental talking that goes on inside of a character's head. It is related but not identical to stream of consciousness. Interior monologue tends to be coherent, as though the character were actually talking. | 35 | |
| 9552357706 | Inversion | Switching the customary order of elements in a sentence or phrase. (Yoda speak! - When 900 years old you reach, look as good, you will not.) | 36 | |
| 9552357707 | Meaning | What makes sense, or what is important to a work of literature. Explicit and implicit. | 37 | |
| 9552357708 | Metaphor/Simile | a metaphor is a comparison between two unlike things, and a simile is a metaphor that uses like or as. | 38 | |
| 9552357709 | Conceit | a startling or unusual metaphor, or a metaphor developed and expanded over several lines. Metaphysical conceit - describes the startling images and comparisons found in metaphysical poetry, | 39 | |
| 9552357710 | Nemesis | The protagonist's arch enemy or supreme and persistent difficulty | 40 | |
| 9552357711 | Objectivity / Subjectivity | An objective statement of subject matter is an impersonal or outside view of events. A subjective treatment uses the interior or personal view of a single observer and is typically covered with that observer's emotional responses. | 41 | |
| 9552357712 | Opposition | One of the most useful concepts in literary analysis. It means that a pair of elements contrast sharply. Not necessarily a conflict, but a pairing of images (or settings, appeals, etc...) whereby each becomes more striking and informative because it is placed in contrast to the other one. It creates mystery and tension. Oppositions can be obvious and can lead to irony, but don't have to every time they are seen. | 42 | |
| 9552357713 | Oxymoron | A phrase comprised of opposites, a contradiction. A calm frenzy. Jumbo shrimp. | 43 | |
| 9552357714 | Parable | a story that instructs, like a fable or allegory. | 44 | |
| 9552357715 | Paradox | A situation or statement that seems to contradict itself, but on closer inspection does not. Ex. Macbeth is foretold by the apparitions that "no one of woman born shall harm Macbeth." | 45 | |
| 9552357716 | Parallelism | repeated syntactical similarities used for effect. Ex. He came, he saw, he conquered. | 46 | |
| 9552357717 | Paraphrase | To restate phrases and sentences in your own words, or re-phrase. Not analysis or interpretation. Putting an idea directly into your own words. | 47 | |
| 9552357718 | Parody | The work that results when a specific work is exaggerated into ridiculousness. | 48 | |
| 9552357719 | Persona | The narrator in a first person novel. In a third-person novel, even though the author isn't a character, the reader gets some idea of the author's personality. However, it isn't really the author's personality because the author is manipulating the reader's impressions. This shadow-author is called the author's persona. | 49 | |
| 9552357720 | Personification | When an inanimate object takes on human shape. See anthropomorphism for differences. | 50 | |
| 9552357721 | Point of View | the perspective from which the action of a novel or narrative poem is told. ETS LIKES TO MENTION POINT OF VIEW ON QUESTIONS AND LIKES FOR STUDENTS TO MENTION POINT OF VIEW IN ESSAYS! | 51 | |
| 9552357722 | Omniscient Narrator | third person narrator who sees, like God, into each character's mind and understands the action going on. | 52 | |
| 9552357723 | Limited Omniscient Narrator | third person narrator who generally reports only what one character (usually the main character) sees, and who only reports the thoughts of that one privileged character. | 53 | |
| 9552357724 | Objective, or camera-eye, Narrator | a third person narrator who only reports on what would be visible to a camera. Does not know what the main character is thinking unless he/she speaks it. | 54 | |
| 9552357725 | First Person Narrator | a character in the story who tells the tale from his/her perspective. When the first person narrator is crazy, a liar, very young, or for some reason not entirely credible, the narrator is unreliable. | 55 | |
| 9552357726 | Stream of Consciousness | like the first person narration except the author places the reader inside the narrator's head and makes the reader privy to all of the character's thoughts. | 56 | |
| 9552357727 | Protagonist - | The main character of a novel or play. | 57 | |
| 9552357728 | Pun | The usually humorous use of a word in such a way to suggest two or more meanings. | 58 | |
| 9552357729 | Rhetorical Question | A question that suggests an answer. In theory, the effect of a rhetorical question is that it causes the listener to feel he/she has come up with the answer him/herself. | 59 | |
| 9552357730 | Satire | IMPORTANT FOR THE AP TEST! Exposes common character flaws to the cold light of humor. Attempts to improve things by pointing out the people's mistakes in the ope that once exposed, such behavior will become less common. Great satirical subjects - hypocrisy, vanity, and greed, especially where those all too common characteristics have become institutionalized in society. | 60 | |
| 9552357731 | Stock characters | standard or clichéd character types: the drunk, the miser, the foolish girl, etc... | 61 | |
| 9552357732 | Subjunctive Mood - | If I were you, I'd learn this one! A grammatical situation that involves the words if, and were. Subjunctive mood is used when a hypothetical situation is set up, and is often used to get away from the person, and into the it. I wish it were true. Would it were so. Were one not already the Duke... | 62 | |
| 9552357733 | Summary | A simple retelling of what has just been read. Goes beyond the paraphrase in that it covers much more material and is much more general. Summary includes all the facts. | 63 | |
| 9552357734 | Suspension of disbelief | The acceptance on a reader's part of the incidents of a plot or story. The reader is often asked to suspend disbelief in science fiction, mythology, and fantasy literature. If the reader is asked to suspend disbelief too often, if there are too many coincidences or improbably occurrence, the reader can no longer suspend disbelief and will lose interest. | 64 | |
| 9552357735 | Symbolism | A device in literature where an object represents an idea. | 65 | |
| 9552357736 | Syntax | Diction. Word Choice. | 66 | |
| 9552357737 | Technique | The methods, tools, the "how he/she does it" ways of the author. The elements are not techniques. For example, main idea is not a technique, but opposition is. | 67 | |
| 9552357738 | Theme | The main idea of the overall work; the central idea. The topic of discussion. | 68 | |
| 9552357739 | Thesis | The main position of an argument. | 69 | |
| 9552357740 | Tragic flaw | In a tragedy, this is the weakness of character in an otherwise good (or even great) individual that ultimately leads to his demise. | 70 | |
| 9552357741 | Utopia | An idealized place. Imaginary communities in which people are able to live in happiness, prosperity, and peace. | 71 | |
| 9552357742 | Zeugma | The use of a word to modify two or more words, but use for different meanings. He closed the door and his heart on his lost love. | 72 |
