AP Literature Key Terminology Flashcards

6665666124	Allegory	A prose or poetic narrative in which the characters, behavior, and even the setting demonstrates multilevels of meaning and significance.	0
6665677110	Alliteration	The sequential initial repetition of a similar sound, usually applied to consonants	1
6665681937	Allusion	A reference to a literary or historical event, person, or place.	2
6665687612	Anaphora	The regular repetition of the same word or phrase at the beginning of successive phrases or clauses.	3
6665692221	Anecdote	A brief story of tale told by a character in a piece of literature	4
6665695712	Antagonist	Any force that is in opposition to the main character, or protagonist	5
6665699205	Antithesis	The juxtaposition of sharply contrasting ideas in balanced or parallel words, phrases, grammatical structures, or ideas.	6
6665712602	Apostrophe	An address or invocation to something that is inanimate	7
6665718081	Archetype	Recurrent designs, patterns of action, character types, themes, or images which are identifiable in a wide range of literature	8
6665725828	Assonance	A repetition of identical or similar vowel sounds, usually those found in stressed syllables of close proximity	9
6666023162	Asyndeton	A style in which conjunctions are omitted, usually producing a fast-paced, more rapid prose. "I came, I saw, I conquered"	10
6666032176	Attitude	The sense expressed by the tone of voice and/or the mood of a piece of writing; the feelings the author holds towards his subject, the people in his narrative, the events, the setting or even the theme.	11
6666039869	Ballad	A narrative poem that is, or originally was, meant to be sung. (Repetition and refrain)	12
6666047801	Ballad Stanza	A common stanza form, consisting of a quatrain that alternates four-beat and three-beat lines; one and three are unrhymed iambic tetrameter and two and four are rhymed iambic trimeter	13
6666061447	Blank Verse	The verse from that most resembles common speech, consisted of unrhymed lines in iambic pentameter	14
6666069153	Caesura	A pause in a line or verse, indicated by natural speech patterns rather than due to specific metrical patterns	15
6666074473	Caricature	A depiction in which a character's characteristics or features are so deliberately exaggerated as to render them absurd	16
6666081596	Chiasmus	A figure of speech by which the order of the terms in the first of two parallel clauses is reversed in the second. "Pleasure is a sin, and sin is a pleasure"	17
6666090378	Colloquial	Ordinary language, the vernacular	18
6666092993	Conceit	A comparison of two unlikely things that is drawn out within a piece of literature, in particular an extended metaphor within a poem	19
6666103932	Connotation	What is suggested by a word, apart from what it explicitly describes, often referred to as the implied meaning of the word.	20
6666107995	Consonance	The repetition of a sequence of two or more consonants, but with a change in the intervening vowels. "clinging and clanging"	21
6666117913	Couplet	Two rhyming lines of iambic pentameter that together present a singe idea or connection.	22
6666121453	Dactylic	The metrical pattern, as used in poetry, in which each foot consisted of a stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables	23
6666129143	Denotation	A direct and specific meaning, often referred to as the dictionary meaning of a word	24
6666132549	Dialect	The language and speech idiosyncrasies of a specific area, region, or group of people	25
6666137705	Diction	The specific word choice an author uses to persuade or convey tone, purpose, or effect.	26
6666143527	Dramatic Monologue	A monologue set in a specific situation and spoken to an imaginary audience. Synonym for "soliloquy"	27
6666149636	Elegy	A poetic lament upon the death or a particular person, usually ending in consolation	28
6666153718	Enjambment	The continuation of a sentence from one line or couplet of a poem to the next	29
6666180728	Epic	A poem that celebrates, in a continuous narrative, the achievements of mighty heroes and heroines, often concerned with the founding of a nation or developing of a culture; it uses elevated language and grand, high style	30
6666191082	Exposition	That part of the structure that sets the scene, introduces and identifies characters, and establishes the situation at the beginning of a story or play	31
6666202051	Extended metaphor	A detailed and complex metaphor that extended over a long section of a work, also known as a "conceit"	32
6666206551	Falling Action	That part of plot structure in which the complications of the rising action are untangled. This is also known as "denouement"	33
6666212573	Farce	A play or scene in a play or book that is characterized by broad humor, wild antics, and often slapstick and physical humor	34
6666218383	Foreshadowing	To hint at or present an indication of the future beforehand	35
6666223521	Formal Diction	Language that is lofty, dignified, and impersonal. Such diction is often used in narrative epic poetry	36
6666227813	Flashback	Retrospection, where an earlier event is inserted into the normal chronology of the narrative	37
6666232742	Free Verse	Poetry that is characterized by varying line lengths, lack of traditional meter, and nonrhyming lines	38
6666448647	Genre	A type of class of literature such as epic or narrative or poetry or belles letters	39
6666452349	Hyperbole	Overstatement characterized by exaggerated language	40
6666454757	Iambic	A metrical form in which each foot consists of a unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one	41
6666457624	Imagery	Broadly defined, any sensory detail or evocation in a work; the use of figurative language to evoke a feeling	42
6666463280	Informal Diction	Language that is not as lofty or impersonal as formal diction, similar to everyday speech	43
6666468717	In medias res	"In the midst of things"; refers to opening a story in the middle of the action, necessitating filling in past details by exposition or flashback	44
6666472631	Irony	A situation or statement characterized by significant difference between what is expected or understood and what actually happens or is meant. Often humorous or sarcastic	45
6666477357	Jargon	Specialized or technical language of a trade, profession, or similar group.	46
6666481196	Juxtapostion	The location of one thing as being adjacent or juxtaposed with another.	47
6666487566	Limited POV	A perspective confined to a single character, whether a first person or third person; the reader cannot know for sure what is going on in the minds of the other characters	48
6666492340	Litote	A figure of speech that emphasizes its subject by conscious understatement. "not bad" for exceptional work	49
6666496618	Loose Sentence	A sentence grammatically correct, and usually stating its main idea, before the end	50
6666504249	Lyric	Originally designed poems meant to be sung to the accompaniment of a lyre; now any short poem in which the speaker expresses intense personal emotion	51
6666511653	Message	A misleading term for "theme". The central idea or statement of a story, or area of inquiry or explanation	52
6666520466	Metaphor	One thing pictured as if it were something else, suggesting a likeness or analogy between them.	53
6666524175	Meter	The more or less regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in a line of poetry	54
6677932758	Metonymy	A figure of speech in which an attribute or commonly associated figure is used to name or designate something	55
6677939539	Mood	A feeling of ambiance resulting from the tone of a piece as well as the writer/narrator's attitude and POV	56
6677945175	Motif	A recurrent device, formula, or situation that often serves as a signal for the appearance of a character or event	57
6677951529	Narrative Structure	A textual organization based on sequences of connected events, usually presented in a straightforward, chronological framework	58
6677960382	Narrator	The "character" who "tells" the story, also known as the persona	59
6677964541	Occasional Poem	A poem written about or for a specific occasion, public or private. An epithalamium is a wedding poem, for example	60
6677973926	Ode	A lyrical poem that is somewhat serious in subject and treatment, elevated in style and uses elaborate stanza structure	61
6677982669	Omniscient POV	A perspective that can be seen from all the character's views. Access to all perceptions and thoughts	62
6677988378	Onomatopoeia	A word capturing or approximating the sound of what it describes. "buzz"	63
6678013469	Overstatement	Exaggerated language, also called hyperbole	64
6678016029	Oxymoron	A figure of speech that combines two apparently contradictory elements, as in "wise fool"	65
6678019066	Parable	A short fiction that illustrates an explicit moral lesson through the use of an analogy	66
6678024684	Paradox	A statement that seems contradictory, but may actually be true. "fight for peace"	67
6678032708	Parody	A work that imitates another work for comic effect by exaggerating the style and changing the content of the original	68
6678037244	Parallel Structure	The use of similar forms of writing for nouns, verbs, phrases, or thoughts	69
6678045068	Pastoral	A poem that describes the simple life of country folk, usually shepherds	70
6678050516	Periodic Sentence	A sentence which is not grammatically correct until the end	71
6678054912	Persona	The voice or figure of the author who tells and structures the story and who may or may not share the values of the actual author	72
6678059233	Personification	Treating an abstraction or nonhuman object as if it were a person (giving it human qualities)	73
6678065548	Petrarchan Sonnet	Italian Sonnet; One octave and one sestet. abba abba cde cde rhyme scheme	74
6678071632	Plot	The arrangement of the narration based on the cause-effect relationship of the events	75
6678078421	Protagonist	The main character in a work, who may or may not be heroic	76
6678079733	Quatrain	A poetic stanza of four lines	77
6678082779	Realism	The practice in literature of attempting to describe nature and life without idealism and with attention to detail	78
6678087471	Refrain	A repeated stanza of line(s) in a poem or song	79
6678091202	Rising Action	The development of action in a work, usually at the beginning	80
6678093470	Rhyme	The repetition of the same or similar sounds, most often at the ends of lines	81
6678096073	Rhythm	The modulation of weak and strong (stressed and unstressed) elements in the flow of speech	82
6678100038	Sarcasm	A form of verbal irony in which apparent praise is actually harshly or bitterly critical	83
6678103745	Satire	A literary work that holds up human failings to ridicule and censure	84
6678107036	Scansion	The analysis of verse to show its meter	85
6678108614	Setting	The time and place of the action in a story, poem, or play	86
6678115605	Shakespearean Sonnet	Also called an English Sonnet; The quatrains, one couplet. abab cdcd efef gg rhyme scheme	87
6678125633	Shaped Verse	Another name for concrete poetry. Poetry that is shaped like an object	88
6678130381	Simile	A direct, explicit comparison to one thing or another, using the words "like" or "as"	89
6678135321	Soliloquy	A monologue in which the character in a play is alone and speaking only to themself	90
6678141156	Speaker	The person who is the voice of a poem	91
6678143015	Stanza	A section of a poem demarcated by extra line spacing	92
6678146069	Sterotype	A characterization based on conscious or unconscious assumptions that some one aspect, such as gender, age, etc are accompanied by certain characteristics or values	93
6678155219	Stock Character	One who appears in a number of stories or plays such as the cruel stepmother	94
6678159360	Style	A distinctive manner of expression	95
6678161155	Symbolism	A person, place, thing, event, or pattern in a literary work that designates itself and at the same time figuratively represents or "stands for" something else	96
6678169604	Synecdoche	When a part is used to signify a whole, as in "all hands on deck"	97
6678172574	Syntax	The way words are put together to form phrases, clauses, or sentences	98
6678177696	Terza Rima	A verse form consisting of three-line stanzas in which the second line of each rhymes with the first and third of the next.	99
6678183497	Theme	A generalized, abstract paraphrase of the inferred central of dominant idea or concern of a work	100
6678186750	Tone	The attitude a literary work takes toward its subject and theme	101
6678189050	Tragedy	A drama in which a character is brought to a disastrous end in his or her confrontation with a superior force	102
6678195787	Trochee	A metrical form in which each foot consists of stressed syllable followed by an unstressed one	103
6678198850	Turning Point	The third part of plot structure, the point at which the action stops rising and begins falling or reversing	104