Glossary of Literary Terms

* - Required for sophomores. (All terms are required for juniors and seniors.)
Action: the series of related incidents or occurrences in a story or play. RISING ACTION is the sequence of incidents or occurrences which culminate in the climax. FALLING ACTION, sometimes referred to as DENOUEMENT, is the final outcome and clarification of the major conflict and minor complications.
ALLEGORY: a narrative in verse or prose in which concrete characters and actions represent abstract ideas or moral qualities.
*ALLITERATION: the repetition of similar sounds, usually consonants or consonant clusters, in a group of words.
ALLUSION: a casual reference to a person, place, event, or artistic work that the author expects the reader to recognize.
*ANALOGY: an extended comparison showing the similarities between two things.
*ANECDOTE: a brief account, sometimes biographical, of an interesting or entertaining incident.
*ANTAGONIST: the character who directly opposes the main character in a story or play.
*ASIDE: words spoken by a character in a play, usually in an undertone, not intended to be heard by other characters on stage. The aside is often used to let the audience know what a character is really thinking or feeling.
BALLAD: a story told in verse and usually meant to be sung.
*BLANK VERSE: verse consisting of unrhymed iambic lines.
CHARACTER, DYNAMIC: a character who grows or develops during the action of a play or story.
CHARACTER, STATIC (stock character): one who remains the same during the action.
CHARACTER FOIL: a character who serves by contrast to set off the qualities of another character.
*CHARACTERIZATION: a portrayal of characters through what they say and do and through what other characters say about them.
*CLICHÉ: any trite or commonplace expression that is no longer effective because it has been used too often.
*CLIMAX: the decisive moment in the conflict of a story or play; the moment of highest interest.
*CONFLICT: the struggle between opposing forces, ideas, or significant characters that forms the basis of the plot of a story or play. There are two types of conflict, external and internal.
EXTERNAL CONFLICT: man vs. man, man vs. nature, man vs. society. INTERNAL CONFLICT: man vs. himself (this exists within the mind of the character, who must make a difficult decision or overcome a fear).
CONNOTATION: the implied or suggested meaning of a word or expression.
*COUPLET: in poetry, two consecutive lines of poetry that rhyme.
DENOTATION: the literal or dictionary meaning of a word. / *DIALOGUE: written conversation between two or more persons
*DRAMA: a story acted out, usually on a stage, by actors and actresses who take the parts of specific characters. Drama is generally divided into two types,
TRAGEDY AND COMEDY.
*DRAMATIC IRONY: the situation in which a character in a play speaks lines which are understood in a double sense by the audience but not by the other characters on stage.
ELEGY: a mournful poem, especially one that laments the dead.
EPIC: a long narrative poem that relates the deeds of a hero.
EPISODE: an incident or series of incidents which is complete in itself and is also a part of the total action of a story or play.
*ESSAY: an organized paper expressing a particular point of view.
*EXPOSITION: in fiction, the part where the author conveys the background material which the reader must know about the characters and events in order to understand the problem to be solved. In essay writing, exposition gives information, explains something, or develops an idea.
FABLE: a brief story or poem that is told to present a moral or practical lesson.
FANTASY: an imaginative work involving unreal characters, situations, and events.
*FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE: language that uses imaginative devices called “figures of speech.” Simile, metaphor, personification and irony are among the most common figures of speech.
*FLASHBACK: a device by which an author interrupts a play or story to reveal events that occurred at an earlier time.
*FORESHADOWING: the planting of important clues in play or story to prepare the reader for the events that are to come.
*FREE VERSE: verse without regular rhythm or rhyme.
*GENRE, LITERARY: the type of literature (short story, novel, drama, poetry, essay, etc.).
HYPERBOLE: a figure of speech employing obvious exaggeration.
IAMB: the most common metrical foot in English verse, consisting of an unaccented syllable followed by an accented one.
*IRONY: VERBAL IRONY is a mode of expression in which the author says one thing but means the opposite.
LYRIC POETRY: poetry that expresses a speaker’s personal thoughts or feelings.
*METAPHOR: a comparison between two unlike things with the intent of giving added meaning to one of them. A metaphor does not use “like” or “as.”
*METER: the measure of a rhythm established by a pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables.
*MOOD: the state of mind or feeling created in the reader by a literary work, such as a sentimental mood or a whimsical mood.
MORAL: the lesson to be learned from a literary work.
NARRATION: the recounting of an event or series of events.
*NARRATIVE POETRY: poetry that stresses plot, incident and action.
*NARRATOR: one who narrates or tells a story.
*ONOMATOPOEIA: the use of a word whose sound in some degree imitates or suggests its meaning.
OXYMORON: a device in which two apparently contradictory words are brought together to express a truth, as in “fiend angelical.”
PARADOX: a statement which, apparently contradictory, may be true.
PARODY: a work that mimics an author’s style or thought, usually by a humorous treatment of a trivial theme.
PENTAMETER: a line of verse containing five metrical feet.
*PERSONIFICATION: a figure of speech in which an animal, object, natural force, or idea is given personality or described as if it were human.
*PLOT: the series of interrelated events that make up the total action of a story or play. The major element in a plot is a CONFLICT or STRUGGLE of some kind that takes place between the characters and their environment or between desires in the characters’ own minds. A plot will introduce the characters, reveal the nature of their conflict, and show how the conflict is resolved.
*POINT OF VIEW: the outlook or position from which a short story or novel is presented by the author. FIRST PERSON point of view is the telling of the story by one of the characters, frequently the main character. OMNISCIENT point of view is the telling of the story by an outside observer who may have complete knowledge and understanding of the characters and their actions: on the other hand, the omniscient view may be limited and thus tell the story from the point of view of one character only.
*PROTAGONIST: the main character or force in a story or play.
PUN: a humorous use of a word involving two interpretations of the meaning.
QUATRAIN: in poetry, a stanza of four lines.
REALISM: a manner of writing in which things are presented as they actually exist in real life without romantic or idealistic coloring.
RESOLUTION; (solution): the final outcome of the conflict.
*RHYME: the repetition of sounds in two or more words or phrases or at the end of lines of poetry.
*RHYME SCHEME: the pattern in which rhymes are arranged in a poem.
*RHYTHM: the sense of flow and movement that comes with the rise and fall in emphasis. / ROMANTICISM: the attempt to present life as it should be or as the writer would like it to be.
*SATIRE: the use of wit, exaggeration, and ridicule to present a serious criticism of individuals, customs, or social or political institutions.
*SENTIMENT: an attitude based on emotion rather than reason.
SENTIMENTALISM: in plays or stories, an excessively emotional manner of writing intended to produce in the viewer or reader such feelings as sadness or tenderness.
*SETTING: the time and place in which the action of a story or play is presented.
*SIMILE: a comparison made between two dissimilar things through the use of a specific word of comparison such as “like,” “as,” than,” or “resembles.”
*SITUATION: the initial problem out of which the conflict of a story or play arises.
*SOLILOQUY: lines in a drama in which a character reveals his thoughts to the audience, but not to the other characters, by speaking as if to himself.
SONNET: a fourteen-line lyric poem written in iambic pentameter, usually rhyming.
*STANZA: an arrangement of 2, 3, 4 or more lines of verse in a fixed metrical and rhyming pattern.
*STEREOTYPE: (stock character): a commonplace character who always behaves in the same way and shows the same traits of character; a “type.”
STYLE: the distinctive manner in which a writer chooses and arranges words; for example, a formal, conversational, or ornate style.
SUSPENSE: a feeling of excitement or apprehension about the outcome of a story or play which keeps the reader interested.
*SYMBOL: a person or thing that exists and has meaning in itself and also suggests a further meaning, attitude, or value.
SYNECDOCHE: mentioning a part of something to represent the whole. ex. “all hands on deck.”
*THEME: the central thought or idea upon which a story or play is based. The theme is usually a comment about life or human nature.
*TONE: the feeling conveyed by the way the author writes about his subject.
*TRAGEDY: in general, a literary work in which the central character meets an unhappy or disastrous end.

G:\Learning Department\English Folder\Glossary Of Literary Terms.doc