AP Literature Poetry Terms Flashcards

8612951593	Archetype	an idealized model of a person, object, or concept from which similar instances are derived, copied, patterned, or emulated	0
8612955093	Free Verse	poetry that does not conform to a regular meter or rhyme scheme	1
8612958789	Interior Monolouge	writing that records the thinking that goes on inside a character's head; it is coherent as if character were talking	2
8612966258	Blank Verse	poetry written without rhymes, but which retains a set metrical patter, usually iambic pentameter	3
8612970780	Symbol	a person, place, thing, or event that has meaning in itself and that also stands for something more than itself	4
8612975342	Satire	work that uses mockery, humor, and wit to criticize and cause change in human nature and institutions	5
8612981099	In Medias Res	"in the midst of things" - standard of epic poetry where the action begins in the middle instead of at the beginning	6
8612989105	Mood	the emotional tone or background that surrounds a scene	7
8612992330	Apostrophe	calling out to an imaginary, dead, or absent person, or to a place or thing, or a personified abstract idea	8
8612997687	Deus ex Machina	any artificial device or coincidence used to bring about a convenient and simple solution to a plot	9
8613001006	Allusion	reference to someone or something that is known from history, literature, religion, politics, sports, science, or another branch of culture	10
8613005668	Antagonist	opponent who struggles against or blocks the hero, or protagonist, in a story	11
8613008305	Epigraph	a quotation or aphorism at the beginning of a literary work suggestive of the theme	12
8613011774	Local Color	a term applied to fiction or poetry which tends to place special emphasis on a particular setting, including its customs, clothing, dialect, and landscape	13
8613023290	Enjambment	the continuation of the sense and, therefore, the grammatical construction of a sentence beyond the end of a line of poetry	14
8613028235	Antihero	central character who lacks all the qualities traditionally associated with heroes; may lack courage, grace, intelligence, or moral scruples	15
8613037942	Consonance	in poetry, when words appearing at the ends of two or more verses have similar final consonant sounds but have final vowel sounds that differ, as with "stuff" and "off"	16
8613046925	Farce	a type of comedy in which ridiculous and often stereotyped characters are involved in silly, for-fetched situations	17
8613053362	Dramatic Irony	an occasion in a play, film, or other work in which a character's words or actions convey a meaning unperceived by the character by understood by the audience	18
8613059548	Litotes	a form of understatement in which the positive form is emphasizes through the negation of a negative form; ex: "Are you aware, Mrs. Bueller, that Ferris does not have what we consider to be an exemplary attendance record?"	19
8613068732	Dialect	a way of speaking that is characteristic of a certain social group or of the inhabitants of certain geographical area	20
8613078351	Alliteration	repetition of the same or similar consonant sounds at the beginning of words that are close together; Example: "The soul selects her own society"	21
8613083405	Onomatopoeia	the use of words whose sounds echo their sense	22
8613085329	Polysyndeton	sentence which uses a conjunction with NO commas to separate the items in a series; ex "X and Y and Z"	23
8613091654	Internal Rhyme	rhyme within a line of poetry instead of at the end	24
8613096563	Anticlimax	the intentional use of fancy language to describe the trivial or commonplace, or a sudden transition from a significant thought to a trivial one in order to achieve a humorous or satiric effect	25
8613103574	Euphemism	the substitution of a comfortable or inoffensive expression to replace one that might offend or suggest something unpleasant	26
8613108906	Verbal Irony	when the intended meaning of a statement differs from the apparent meaning	27
8613111602	Metaphor	a figure of speech that makes a comparison between tow unlike things WITHOUT the use of such specific words of comparison as like, as, than, or resembles	28
8613116994	Chiasmus	in poetry, a type of rhetorical balance in which the second part is syntactically balances against the first, but with the parts reversed; example: "flowers are lovely, love is flowerlike"	29
8613123918	Personification	a figure of speech in which an object or animal is given human feelings, thoughts, or attitudes	30
8613128304	Motif	a recurring image, word, phrase, action, idea, object, or situation used throughout a work (or in several works by one author), unifying the work by trying the current situation to previous ones, or new ideas to the theme	31
8613134576	Soliloquy	a long speech made by a character in a play while no other characters are on stage	32
8613137373	Euphony	harmony or beauty of sound which provided a pleasing effect to the ear, usually sought-for in poetry for effect	33
8613141132	Ambiguity	deliberately suggesting two or more different, and sometimes conflicting, meanings in a work	34
8613145656	Tone	the attitude a writer takes toward the subject of a work, the characters in it, or the audience, revealed through diction, figurative language, and organization	35
8613151831	Hyperbole	a figure of speech that uses an incredible exaggeration or overstatement, for effect; "If I told you once, I've told you a million times..."	36
8613160206	Simile	a figure of speech that makes an explicitly comparison between two unlike things, using words such as like, as, than, or resembles	37
8613163378	Kenning	a compound poetic phrase substituted for the usual name of a person or thing; ex. "Whale Road" for ocean	38
8613168265	Juxtaposition	poetic and rhetorical device in which normally unassociated ides, words, or phrases are placed next to one another, creating an effect of surprise and wit	39
8613176727	Cacophony	unpleasant sounds in the jarring juxtaposition of harsh letter or syllables which are grating to the ear, usually inadvertent, but sometimes deliberately used in poetry for effect	40
8613181045	Foreshadowing	the use of hints and clues to suggest what will happen later in a plot	41
8613186467	Catharsis	a sudden emotional breakdown or climax that consists of overwhelming feelings of great pity, sorrow, or laughter, or any extreme change in emotion	42
8613189987	Synechdoche	a figure of speech in which a part represents the whole; ex. "If you don't drive properly, you will lose your wheels"	43
8613195657	Diction	the choice of words, phrases, sentence structure, and figurative language in literary work; the manner or mode of verbal expression, particularly with regard to clarity and accuracy	44
8613207076	Asyndeton	commas used without conjunction to separate a series of words, thus exphasizing the parts equally: instead of X, Y, and Z ... the writer uses X, Y, Z	45
8613213955	Cliche	a word or phrase, often a figure of speech, that has become lifeless because of overuse	46
8613221460	Anaphora	repetition of a word, phrase, or clause at the beginning of two or more sentences in a row	47
8613223798	Allegory	story or poem in which character, settings, and events stand for other people or events or for abstract ideas or qualities	48
8613228837	Imagery	the use of language to evoke a picture or a concrete sensation of a person, a thing, a place, or an experience	49
8613232436	Hubris	excessive pride or ambition that leads to a character's downfall	50
8613235781	Tragic Flaw	in a tragedy, the quality within the hero or heroine which leads to his or her downfall	51
8613242288	Epistrophe	device of repetition in which the same expression (single word or phrase) is repeated at the end of two or more lines, clauses, or sentences	52
8613247293	Metonyme	a figure of speech in which a person, place, or thing, is referred to by something closely associated with it; "We requested from the crown support for our petition"	53
8613255454	Stream of Conciousness	a style of writing that portrays the inner (often chaotic) workings of a character's mind	54
8613259753	Foil	a character who acts as contrast to another character	55
8613261914	Assonance	the repetition of similar vowel sounds followed by different consonant sounds especially in words that are together; example: "Do not go gentle into that good night"	56
8613269457	Paradox	a statement which contains seemingly contradictory element or appears contrary to common sense, yet can be seen as true when viewed from another angle; ex. "Damn with faint praise"	57
8613276564	Oxymoron	a figure of speech the combines opposite or contradictory terms in a brief phrase; ex. "Jumbo shrimp"	58
8613281188	Aside	a comment made by a stage performer that is intended to be heard by the audience by supposedly not by other characters	59
8613285849	Couplet	two consecutive rhyming lines of poetry	60
8613288140	Genre	a category of literary work which may refer to both the content of a given work - tragedy, comedy, pastoral - and to its form, such as poetry, novel, or drama; this term also refers to types of popular literature, as in science fiction or detective story	61
8613300629	Frame Narrative	a story within a story within sometimes yet another story, as in, for example, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein or Heart of Darkness	62
8613307420	Suspension of Disbelief	a willingness of a reader or viewer to ignore minor inconsistencies or unbelievable behavior so as to enjoy a work of fiction	63
8613311342	Persona	the narrator in a non first-person novel; the author's creation - the voice "through which the author speaks"	64
8613317623	Parody	a work that makes fun of another work by imitation some aspect of the writer's style	65
8613321660	Exposition	in drama, the presentation of essential information regarding what has occurred prior to the beginning of the play	66
8613326866	Protagonist	the central character in a story, the one who initiates or drives the action	67
8613330311	Meter	the repetition of sound patterns that creates a rhythm in poetry	68
8613333592	Pun	a "play on words" based on the multiple meanings of a single word or on words that sound alike but mean different things	69
8613337525	Quatrain	a poem consisting of four lines, or four lines of a poem that can be considered as a unit	70