Literary Terms for AP Literature & Composition Flashcards

4129794538	abstract	Typically complex, discusses intangible objects. Rarely uses examples to support points.	0
4129798058	academic	Dry, theoretical. Heavy on analysis.	1
4129837498	accent	The stressed (loudest) portion of a word or phrase.	2
4129840838	aesthetic	Appealing to the senses.	3
4129844664	aesthetics	The study of beauty.	4
4129845183	allegory	A story in which each aspect of the story has a symbolic meaning beyond the plot.	5
4129853003	alliteration	The repetition of initial consonant sounds.	6
4129855976	allusion	A reference to another work or an event.	7
4129858196	anachronism	Misplaced in time. ex: If the actor playing Brutus doesn't take off his digital watch.	8
4129861964	analogy	A comparison that is used to clarify an action or relationship.	9
4129864440	anecdote	A short narrative.	10
4129865436	antecedent	The word, phrase, or clause that a pronoun refers to or replaces. ex: In the sentence: "The principal asked the children where they were going" the word "they" is the pronoun and "children" is the antecedent.	11
4129876338	anthropomorphism	When inanimate objects, animals, or natural phenomena are given human characteristics, behavior, or motivation. This is often confused with personification.	12
4129879860	anticlimax	When an action produces far smaller results than one had been led to expect. This is often comedic.	13
4129882627	antihero	A protagonist that is unheroic: morally weak, cowardly, dishonest, etc.	14
4129887420	aphorism	A short and usually witty saying. Similar to an epigram.	15
4129890452	apostrophe	An address to someone not present or to a personified object or idea.	16
4129891478	archaism	The use of deliberately old-fashioned language. Often used to create a feeling of antiquity.	17
4129894479	aside	A speech or comment made by an actor to the audience. Similar to a soliloquy.	18
4129896110	aspect	A trait or characteristic.	19
4129897048	assonance	The repeated use of vowel sounds. ex: Old king Cole was a merry old soul.	20
4129898777	atmosphere	The emotional tone or background that surrounds a scene.	21
4129900222	ballad	A long, narrative poem in regular meter/rhyme. Typically has a naive folksy quality (which distinguishes itself from an epic).	22
4129903548	bathos	Insincere or overly sentimental quality of writing/speech intended to evoke pity.	23
4129907274	pathos	When writing evokes feelings of pity and sympathy.	24
4129908486	black humor	The use of disturbing themes in comedy. Dark humor.	25
4129909561	bombast	Pretentious, exaggeratedly learned language. When one tries to be eloquent by using too many words out of a thesaurus, one falls into this.	26
4129913508	burlesque	The same thing as a parody.	27
4129917733	cacophony	Deliberately harsh, awkward sounds in poetry.	28
4129923383	cadence	The beat/rhythm of a poem.	29
4129923964	canto	This divides long poetry in the same way that chapters divide a book.	30
4129926958	caricature	A portrait (verbal or otherwise) that exaggerates a facet of personality.	31
4130312535	catharsis	The "cleansing" of emotion an audience member experiences having lived vicariously through the experiences in the play.	32
4130316124	chorus	In drama, this is the group of people who stand outside the main action on stage and comment on it.	33
4130317415	classic	This can mean "typical" as well as an "accepted masterpiece."	34
4130318974	classical	This refers to the arts of ancient Greece and Rome.	35
4130320626	coinage	A new word, invented on the spot.	36
4130322175	colloquialism	A word or phrase used in everyday conversational English that isn't a part of accepted "schoolbook" English.	37
4130324210	complex/dense	Suggesting that there is more than one possibility in the meaning of words, ideas, images, etc.	38
4130327487	conceit	In poetry, this refers to a startling or unusual metaphor, or one developed and expanded upon over several lines.	39
4130334418	controlling image	When the image dominates and shapes the entire work.	40
4130336528	connotation	This is everything that a word suggests or implies.	41
4130337750	denotation	This is the literal definition of a word.	42
4130338332	consonance	The repetition of consonant sounds within words (not at the beginning of words). ex: "A flock of sick, black-checkered ducks."	43
4130343577	couplet	A pair of lines that end in rhyme.	44
4130344302	decorum	In order to observe this, a character's speech must be styled according to his/her social station and in accordance with the occasion.	45
4130347017	diction	The author's choice of words.	46
4130348114	syntax	The author's choice of how words are ordered in a sentence.	47
4130349559	dirge	A song for the dead. Typically slow, heavy, and melancholy.	48
4130350534	dissonance	The grating of incompatible sounds.	49
4130350961	doggerel	Crude, simplistic verse, often in sing-song rhyme. Limericks are an example of this.	50
4130351858	dramatic irony	When the audience knows something that the characters in the drama do not.	51
4130352853	dramatic monologue	When a single speaker in literature says something to a silent audience.	52
4130353672	elegy	This is a type of poem that meditates on death in a serious manner.	53
4130356280	elements	Each type of literature has a different set of these.	54
4130357195	enjambment	The continuation of a syntactic unit from one line or couplet of a poem to the next with no pause.	55
4130358291	epic	This is a very long narrative poem on a serious theme in a dignified style.	56
4130360261	epitaph	Lines that commemorate the dead at their burial place.	57
4130361325	euphemism	A word or phrase that takes the place of a harsh, unpleasant, or impolite reality. ex: "passed away" instead of "died" "let go" instead of "fired"	58
4130368486	euphony	This is when sounds blend harmoniously.	59
4130369750	explicit	This is to say or write something directly and clearly.	60
4130371300	farce	Today this refers to extremely broad humor. A long time ago, this referred to a comedic play.	61
4130374373	feminine rhyme	Lines rhymed by their final two syllables. Not the same as a double rhyme. ex: If the 1st line ends with "running" and the 2nd ends with "gunning."	62
4130382471	foil	A secondary character whose purpose is to highlight the characteristics of the main character, usually by contrast.	63
4130386288	foot	The basic rhythmic unit of a line of poetry. This is formed by a combination of two or three syllables, stressed or unstressed.	64
4130388668	foreshadowing	An event or statement in a narrative that suggests (barely) a larger event that comes later.	65
4130389813	free verse	This is poetry written without a regular rhyme scheme or metrical pattern.	66
4130390499	genre	A subcategory of literature.	67
4130391825	gothic	This was a creepy mood that was awfully popular in the 18th Century.	68
4130398163	hubris	This is excessive pride or ambition that leads to the main character's downfall.	69
4130399946	hyperbole	Exaggeration or deliberate overstatement.	70
4130400484	implicit	To be this is to say or write something that merely suggests.	71
4130404454	in medias res	This is Latin for "in the midst of things." ex: When "The Iliad" begins, the Trojan war has laready been going on for 7 years.	72
4130406726	interior monologue	From novels and poetry, not dramatic literature. This refers to writing that records the mental talking that goes on inside of a character's head.	73
4130408495	inversion	Switching the customary order of elements in a sentence or phrase.	74
4130410887	irony	One definition: a statement that means the opposite of what it seems to mean. Another definition: an undertow of meaning, sliding against the literal meaning of the words.	75
4130422319	lament	A poem of sadness or grief over the death of a loved one or over some other intense loss.	76
4130423625	lampoon	A satire.	77
4130423970	loose sentence	This type of sentence is complete before its end. ex: Jack loved Barbara despite her irritating snorting laugh, her complaining, and her terrible taste in shoes.	78
4130426184	periodic sentence	This type of sentence is not grammatically complete until it has reached its final phrase. ex: Despite Barbara's irritation at Jack's peculiar habit of picking between his toes while watching MTV and his terrible haircut, she loved him.	79
4130429461	lyric	A type of poetry that explores the poet's personal interpretation and feelings about the subject of the poem.	80
4130431606	masculine rhyme	This is a simple, regular rhyme.	81
4130433073	meaning	This can be literal and concrete, or have foundations in emotions or feelings.	82
4130435289	melodrama	This is a form of drama in which the good guy is really good, the bad guy is really bad, and the heroine is really pure.	83
4130438420	metaphor	This is a comparison or analogy that states one thing is another.	84
4130444240	simile	This is the same thing as a metaphor, it just doesn't equate two things.	85
4130445565	metonym	A word that is used to stand for something else that it has attributes of or is associated with. ex: "a herd of 50 cows" to "50 head of cattle"	86
4130449835	motif	This is a recurring symbol.	87
4130450236	nemesis	The protagonist's archenemy or supreme and persistent difficulty.	88
4130452291	objectivity	This is when one analyzes something without any bias.	89
4130453247	subjectivity	This is when one analyzes something by using their opinions.	90
4130455390	omniscient narrator	This is a 3rd-person narrator who sees and understands all action that occurs.	91
4130460293	onomatopoeia	Words that sound like what they mean.	92
4130461122	opposition	When you compare two elements that contrast sharply, not necessarily conflict.	93
4130465026	oxymoron	This is a phrase composed of opposites. A contradiction. ex: A calm frenzy.	94
4130466381	parable	Like a fable or an allegory, this is a story that instructs.	95
4130466787	paradox	A situation or statement that seems to contradict itself but upon closer inspection does not.	96
4130470567	parallelism	This is repeated syntactical similarities used for effect.	97
4130470857	paraphrase	This is to restate phrases and sentences in your own words.	98
4130472070	parenthetical phrase	A phrase set off by commas that interrupts the flow of a sentence with some commentary or added detail. ex: Jack's three dogs, including that miserable little spaniel, were with him that day.	99
4130518569	parody	A work that makes fun of another work by exaggerating many of its qualities to ridiculousness.	100
4130519309	pastoral	A poem set in tranquil nature. Usually about shepherds.	101
4130519937	persona	An individual's characteristic pattern of thinking, feeling, and acting.	102
4130523133	personification	Giving an inanimate object human qualities or form. ex: The darkness of the forest became the figure of a beautiful, pale-skinned woman in night-black clothes.	103
4130524433	plaint	A poem or speech expressing sorrow.	104
4130525303	point of view	The perspective from which the action of a novel or narrative poem is presented.	105
4130526808	limited omniscient narrator	This is a third-person narrator that generally reports only only what one character sees and thinks.	106
4130528093	objective narrator	This is a third-person narrator who only reports on what would be visible to a camera. This narrator knows no thoughts of any characters unless they are said aloud.	107
4130529756	first-person narrator	This is a narrator who is a character in the story and tells the tale form his/her point of view.	108
4130530696	stream of consciousness	This type of narration is similar to first-person, but all the author does is place the reader into the mind of a character.	109
4130532903	prelude	This is an introductory poem to a longer work of verse.	110
4130533583	protagonist	The main character of a novel or play.	111
4130533946	pun	The usually humorous use of a word in such a way to suggest two or more meanings.	112
4130534348	refrain	A line or set of lines repeated several times over the course of a poem.	113
4130534742	requiem	A song of prayer for the dead.	114
4130535135	rhapsody	An intensely passionate verse or section of verse, usually of love or praise.	115
4130535888	rhetorical question	A question that suggests an answer.	116
4130536306	satire	This genre of writing exposes common character flaws to the cold light of humor.	117
4130541558	soliloquy	A speech spoken by a character alone on stage.	118
4130543156	stanza	A group of lines in verse, roughly analogous in function to the paragraph in prose.	119
4130543875	stock characters	Standard or cliched character types, such as the drunk, the miser, and the foolish girl.	120
4130545174	subjunctive mood	A hypothetical situation, usually wishful thinking. ex: "If I were you..."	121
4130548319	suggest	To imply, infer, and/or indicate.	122
4130549635	summary	A simple retelling of what you read.	123
4130550001	suspension of disbelief	This is the acceptance on an audience's/reader's part of the incidents of a plot.	124
4130551842	symbolism	A device in literature where an object represents an idea.	125
4130552293	synecdoche	A figure of speech in which a part represents the whole.	126
4130552800	technique	The methods, tools, and actions of the author.	127
4130553561	theme	The main idea of the overall work. It is the topic of discourse or discussion.	128
4130554594	thesis	The main position of an argument.	129
4130555623	tragic flaw	In a tragedy, this is the weakness of character in an otherwise good individual that ultimately leads to his/her demise.	130
4130556969	travesty	A grotesque parody.	131
4130557348	truism	An obvious truth. ex: A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.	132
4130561674	utopia	An idealized place.	133
4130562273	zeugma	A figure of speech in which a word applies to two or more words in different senses. ex: John and his license expired last week.	134