An On-Line Glossary of Literary Terms

 

Allegory: A narrative or description that has a second meaning beneath the surface one. Although the surface story or description may have its own interest, the author's major interest is in the ulterior meaning. Allegory is unlike an extended metaphor in that allegory involves a system of related comparison drawn out. It differs from symbolism in that it puts less emphasis on the images for their own sake and more on their ulterior meanings. Also, these meanings are more fixed. In allegory there is usually a one-to-one correspondence between the details and a single set of ulterior meanings. In complex allegories, the details may have more than one meaning, but these meanings tend to be definite. Meanings do not ray out from allegory as they do from a symbol. In Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy, Dante, symbolizing mankind, is taken by Virgil the poet on a journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise in order to teach him the nature of sin and its punishments and the way to salvation.

Alliteration: The repetition at close intervals of the initial consonant sounds of accented syllable or important words (for example, map-moon, kill-code, preach-approve). Important words and accented syllables beginning with vowels may also be said to alliterate with each other inasmuch as they all have the same lack of an initial consonant sound (for example, "Inebriate of air am I").

The following line from Robert Frost's poem, "Acquainted with the Night," provides us with an example of alliteration. "I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet." The repitition of the s sound creates a sense of quiet, reinforcing the meaning of the line. T. S. Eliot in "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" alludes (refers) to the biblical figure John the Baptist in the line, "Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter, . . ." In the New Testament, John the Baptist's head was presented to King Herod on a platter.

Allusion: A reference, explicit (clearly expressed) or implicit (implied), to something in previous literature or history. The term is reserved by some writers for implicit references only, but the distinction between the two kinds of references is not always clear-cut. Most anthologies, as The Norton Anthology of American Literature, provide footnotes for allusions, which students should always read to better understand the piece of literature.

Ambiguity: A statement which can contain two or more meanings. For example, when the oracle at Delphi told Croesus that if he waged war on Cyrus he would destroy a great empire, Croesus thought the oracle meant his enemy's empire. In fact, the empire Croesus destroyed by going to war was his own.

 

Anagnorisis: A recognition or discovery on the part of the hero and a change from ignorance to knowledge. In Shakespeare's Macbeth, Macbeth realizes that he has given up a lot and will never have friends and honor or the respect of others.

 

Analogue: A comparison between two similar things. In literature, a work which resembles another work either fully or in part. If a work resembles another because it is derived from the other, the original work is called the source, not an analogue of the later work.

Anapest: In a line of poetry, two unstressed syllables followed by one stressed syllable forming the pattern for the line or perhaps for the entire poem. Example: "The Assy´rian came dówn like a wólf on the fóld" (Byron, "The Destruction of Sennacherib").

 

Anecdote: A very short tale told by a character in a literary work. In Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, "The Miller's Tale" and "The Carpenter's Tale" are examples.

Antagonist character/force in fiction or drama in conflict with the protagonist; a person or force which opposes the protagonist in a literary work. In To Kill A Mockingbird, Bob Ewell is the antagonist. In Stephen Vincent Benet's The Devil and Daniel Webster, Mr. Scratch is Daniel Webster's antagonst at the trial of Jabez Stone. The cold, in Jack London's "To Build a Fire," is the antagonist which defeats the man on the trail. The antagonist is any force in conflict with the protagonist. An antagonist may be another person, an aspect of the physical or social environment, or a destructive element in the protagonist's own nature.

Antihero protagonist with attributes opposite of those traditionally heroic.

Aphorism: A brief statement which expresses an observation about life, usually intended as a wise observation. Benjamin Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanac contains numerous examples, one of which is "Drive thy business; let it not drive thee." This aphorism means that one should not allow the demands of business to take control of one's moral or worldly commitments.

Apostrophe: A figure of speech in which someone absent or dead or something nonhuman is addressed as if it were alive and present and could reply (for example, "Western wind, when wilt thou blow,/ The small rain down can rain?"). In these lines from John Donne's poem, "The Sun Rising," the poet scolds the sun for interrupting his nighttime activities: "Busy old fool, unruly sun, / Why dost thou thus, / Through windows, and through curtains call on us?"

Approximate rime (also known as imperfect rime, near rime, slant rime): A term used for words in a riming pattern that have some kind of sound correspondence but are not perfect rimes (for example, began-gun, flush-flash, arrayed-said) and sometimes used systematically in place of perfect rime.

Archetype universal symbol evoking deep responses in readers.

Artistic Unity: The condition of a successful literary work whereby all its elements work together for the achievement of its central purpose. In an artistically unified work nothing is included that is irrelevant to the central purpose, nothing is omitted that is essential to it, and the parts are arranged in the most effective order for the achievement of that purpose. One criticism about Huck Finn , for example, involves its ending: Is it relevant to the novel's purpose or is it contrived?

Aside: A brief speech in which a character turns from the person being addressed to speak directly to the audience; a dramatic device for letting the audience know what a character is really thinking or feeling as opposed to what the character pretends to think or feel.

Association: At the basic level, there is the most common definition of a word. We know that a strawberry is a sweet, red fruit, but the associations the word carries in our minds are much wider than this narrow definition. We'll have additional shared or private associations which may be national, cultural, or based on class or personal experience. We may think of strawberries being displayed in buffets, of strawberries and cream at Wimbledon, of the heat of summer, of romantic assignations, of back pain and sweat in the picking of strawberries in a field, of a record cover and a band, of the cold bite on the teeth, or of an accidental strawberry squashed and sticky between our toes. Poets depend on judging what is shared, what can be assumed, what can be recognised or inferred as the poet's experience, what is so personal and private that no reader can have access to the associations which prompt the use of the word. What association does is to enrich meaning - both explicit and implicit. "Your mind lay open like a drawer of knives": think how this makes us see the idea of "mind" differently.

Assonance: The repetition at close intervals of the vowel sounds of accented syllables or important words (for example, hat-ran-amber, vein-made).

Atmosphere: prevailing mood: the poet tries to make the reader feel or respond to the poem's themes.

Autobiography: A factual story of a person's life written by that person. William Colin Powell's My American Journey is an example. Ernest Hemingway's Nick Adams stories, one of which is "Big Two-Hearted River," are considered autobiographical.

 

Ballad: A story in poetic form, often about tragic love, and usually sung. Ballads were passed down from generation to generation by singers. Two old Scottish ballads are "Sir Patrick Spens" and "Bonnie Barbara Allan." Coleridge's, "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" is a 19th century English ballad. Here's the definition of "ballad" in C. Hugh Holman's Handbook to Literature: A form of verse to be sung or recited and characterized by its presentation of a dramatic or exciting episode in simple narrative form.... Though the ballad is a form still much written, the so-called popular ballad in most literatures belongs to the early periods before written literature was highly developed.... Certain common characteristics of these early ballads should be noted: the supernatural is likely to play an important part in events, physical courage and love are frequent themes, the incidents are usually such as happen to common people (as opposed to the nobility) and often have to do with domestic episodes, slight attention is paid to characterization or description, transitions are abrupt, action is largely developed through dialogue, tragic situations are presented with the utmost simplicity, incremental repetition is common....

 

Biography: A factual story of a person's life written by another author. Katherine Drinker Bowen's Yankee from Olympus, which details the life and work of the great jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., Is an example. A biographical work is supposed to be rigorously factual. However, since the biographer may be biased for or against the subject of the biography, critics, and sometimes the subject himself or herself, may come forward to challenge the trustworthiness of the material.

Blank Verse consists of unrhymed five-stress lines, as used by Marlowe, Shakespeare and Milton develops an inner cohesion that replaces the props provided by rhyme and stanza. It became the standard metre for English dramatic and epic poetry.

    This is a verse form commonly used in Elizabethan drama and in long narrative poems generally (the Prelude being our main example). The form consists of unrhymed iambic pentameter lines. "Of all English verse forms," writes M. H. Abrams in his A Glossary of Literary Terms, blank verse "is closest to the natural rhythms of English speech, yet the most flexible and adaptive to diverse levels of discourse; as a result it has been more frequently and variously used than any other type of verse."

Cacaphony/Euphony: Cacaphony is an unpleasant combination of sounds. Euphony, the opposite, is a pleasant combination of sounds. These sound effects can be used intentionally to create an effect, or they may appear unintentionally.

 

Caesura: A pause within a line of poetry which may or may not affect the metrical count (see meter). In scansion, a caesura is usually indicated by the following symbol: //. Here's an example by Alexander Pope: "Know then thyself,//presume not God to scan; / The proper study of Mankind//is Man." Here's the definition from C. Hugh Holman's A Handbook to Literature: "A pause or break in the metrical or rhythmical progress of a line of verse.... Usually the caesura has been placed near the middle of a verse. Some poets, however, have sought diversity of rhythmical effect by placing the caesura anywhere from near the beginning of a line to near the end." The pause is often underlined through the use of some form of punctuation.

Canon works generally considered by scholars as the most important to read and study

Canto: A subdivision of an epic poem. Each of the three books of Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy is divided into cantos. For example, in each of the cantos of The Inferno, Dante meets the souls of people who were once alive and who have been condemned to punishment for sin.

Carpe Diem: A Latin phrase which translates to "Sieze (catch) the day," meaning "Make the most of today." The phrase originated as the title of a poem by the Roman, Horace (65 B.C.E.-8B.C.E.), and caught on as a theme with such English poets as Robert Herrick and Andrew Marvell.

Catastrophe: The scene in a tragedy which includes the death or moral destruction of the protagonist. In the catastrophe at the end of Sophocles' Oedipus the King, Oedipus, discovering the tragic truth about his origin and his deeds, plucks out his eyes and is condemned to spend the rest of his days a wandering beggar. The catastrophe in Shakespearean tragedy occurs in Act 5 of each drama and always includes the death of the protagonist. Consider the fates of Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, King Lear, and Othello.

Catharsis: A term used by Aristotle to describe some sort of emotional release experienced by the audience at the end of a successful tragedy: the audience's release of emotions of pity and fear.

Chance: The occurrence of an event that has no apparent cause in antecedent events or in predisposition of character.

Character & Characterization: A character is a fictional representation of a person in a play or a story. Characterisation establishes the difference of one character from another. Characters' individual qualities emerge from what they say (dialogue), what they do, what may be shown of their unspoken thoughts or feelings, and what a narrator or other characters say about them. It may suit an author's purpose to sketch a character briefly or analyse it endlessly. In different writings the emphasis may be laid on a character's individuality, 'moral nature', or social determinants; but in any case the interaction and motivation of characters are the main focus of stories. Character is: (1.) Any of the persons involved in a story or play, and (2.) The distinguishing moral qualities and personal traits of a character. Developing (or dynamic) character is a character (sense 1) who during the course of a story undergoes a permanent change in some aspect of character (sense 2) or outlook. Flat character is a character (sense 1) whose character (sense 2) is summed up in one or two traits. Foil is a minor character whose situation or actions parallel those of a major character, and thus by contrast set off or illuminates the major character; most often the contrast is complimentary to the major character. Round character is a character (sense 1) whose character (sense 2) is complex and many sided. Static character is a character who is the same sort of person at the end of a story as at the beginning. Stock character is a stereotyped character: one whose nature is familiar to use from prototypes in previous literature. Character: A person or any thing presented as a person. Character may also refer to the personality of a character and may be developed through dialogue and action, through his or her words and deeds. A character might also be a spirit, object, animal, or natural force in a literary work. In a cartoon scene, firemen may be putting out a fire which a coyote has deliberately started, while a hydrant observes the scene fearfully. The firemen, the coyote and the hydrant would all be considered characters in the story. If a billowy figure complete with eyes, nose, and mouth representing the wind thwarts the efforts of the firemen, the wind, too, qualifies as a character. Animals who figure importantly in movies of live drama are considered characters. Mr. Ed, Lassie, and Tarzan's monkey Cheetah are examples.

Characterization: The method a writer uses to reveal the personality of a character in a literary work. Methods may include (1) what the character says about himself or herself; (2) what others reveal about the character; and (3) the character's own actions.

Classical Greek verse depended upon quantity, a long syllable being regarded as occupying twice the time taken up by a short syllable. Long and short syllables were combined in feet, examples of which are:

Classicism: A movement or tendency in art, music, and literature to retain the characteristics found in work originating in classical Greece and Rome. It differs from Romanticism in that while Romanticism dwells on the emotional impact of a work, classicism concerns itself with form and discipline.

Cliche tired and trite idea or phrase. Any word or phrase that has been overused is a cliche. Avoid clichés because they have lost their original meaning. "Roll out the red carpet" is an example.

Climax selection and arrangement of incidents in a story to shape action and give focus. It is the turning point or highest emotional point in a story. Everything in a story builds toward the climax. The turning point is called the technical climax. The highest emotional point is called the dramatic climax. In Shakespeare's Julius Caesar the climax occurs at the end of Marc Antony's speech to the Roman public. In the climax to the film Star Wars, the empire's death star is ready to destroy the rebel base. Luke Skywalker and rebel pilots attack the base, and after the deaths of some rebel pilots, Skywalker successfully fires his missile into the death star's vulnerable spot and destroys the death star, saving the rebel forces.

Coincidence: The chance concurrence of two events having a peculiar correspondence between them.

Comedy: A literary work which is amusing and ends happily, and which emphasizes human limitation rather than human greatness.. Modern comedies tend to be funny, while Shakespearean comedies simply end well. Shakespearean comedy also contains items such as misunderstandings and mistaken identity to heighten the comic effect. Comedies may contain lovers, those who interfere with lovers, and entertaining scoundrels. In modern Situation Comedies, characters are thrown into absurd situations and are forced to deal with those situations, all the while reciting clever lines for the amusement of a live or television or movie audience.

Commercial fiction: Fiction written to meet the taste of a wide popular audience which relies usually on tested formulas for satisfying such taste.

Conceit: A far-fetched simile or metaphor, a literary conceit occurs when the speaker compares two highly dissimilar things. In the following example from Act V of Shakespeare's "Richard II," the imprisoned King Richard compares his cell to the world in the following line: "I have been studying how I may compare / this prison where I live unto the world:"

 

Conclusion: Also called the "Resolution," the conclusion is the point in a drama to which the entire play has been leading. It is the logical outcome of everything that has come before it. The conclusion stems from the nature of the characters. Therefore, the decision of Dr. Stockmann to remain in the town at the conclusion of "An Enemy of the People" is consistent with his conviction that he is right and has been right all along. "...i'll be hanged if we are going away! We are going to stay where we are Katherine... This is the field of battle...this is where the fight will be. This is where I shall triumph!"

 

Concrete Poetry: A poem that visually resembles something found in the physical world. A poem about a wormy apple written so that the words form the shape of an apple.

Conflict: A clash of actions, desires, ideas, or goals in the plot of a story or drama. Conflict may exist between the main character and some other person or persons; between the main character and some external force--physical nature, society or "fate"; or between the main character and some destructive element in his or her own nature.

   It is the struggle between characters or opposing forces. The problems and complications in a story present the central conflict. The conflict can be internal or external. An internal conflict is a problem within a character. An external conflict is a problem caused by outside forces. In the plot of a drama, conflict occurs when the protagonist is opposed by some person or force in the play. In Henry Ibsen's drama An Enemy of the People, Dr. Thomas Stockmann's life is complicated by his finding that the public baths, a major source of income for the community, are polluted. In trying to close the baths, the doctor comes into conflict (external conflict) with those who profit from them, including his own brother, the mayor of the town. Another example occurs in the film Star Wars. Having learned that Princess Lea is being held prisoner by the evil Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker sets out to rescue her. In doing so, he becomes involved in the conflict between the empire and the rebels which Lea spoke of in her holograph message in the drama's exposition. Since Luke is the protgonist of Star Wars, the conflict (external conflict) in the drama crystallizes to that between Luke and Darth Vader

Connotation and Denotation: The connotation of a word is its implied or suggested meaning. The word freedom, for example, has a number of connotations. The word wall can mean an attitude or actions which prevent becoming emotionally close to a person. In Robert Frost's "Mending Wall," two neighbors walk a property line each on his own side of a wall of loose stones. As they walk, they pick up and replace stones that have fallen. Frost thinks it's unnecessary to replace the stones since thay have no cows to damage each other's property. The neighbor only says "Good fences make good neighbors." The wall, in this case, is both a boundary (denotation) and a barrier that prevents Frost and his neighbor from getting to know each other, a force prohibiting involvement (connotation). The denotation of a word is its dictionary definition. The word wall, therefore, denotes an upright structure which encloses something or serves as a boundary.

Consonance: The repetition at close intervals of the final consonant sounds of accented syllables or important words: near rhyme in which identical consonants are preceded by different vowels (for example, book--plaque--thicker).

Controlling metaphor metaphor that runs through a work and determines the form

Convention characteristic of a literary genre familiar to and accepted by an audience

Cosmic irony God, destiny, or fate dashing the hopes/expectations of characters

Couplet: Two successive lines, usually in the same meter, linked by rhyme.

Crisis turning point in the action of a story

Dactyl: In poetry, a metrical pattern consisting of one stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables .

Dactyllic (the noun is "dactyl"): a stressed syllable followed by two light syllables. Example: "Éve, with her básket, was/ Déep in the bélls and grass" (Ralph Hodgson, "Eve").

Defamiliarization: When something familiar, uninteresting and ignored is made strange, fresh, new and worthy of close scrutiny, or even wonder.

Denotation: The basic definition or dictionary meaning of a word.

Denouement resolution of the plot following the climax, literally means "unraveling"; that portion of a plot that reveals the final outcome of its conflicts or the solution of its mysteries.

Deus ex machina ("God of the machine"): The resolution of a plot by use of a highly improbable chance or coincidence (so named from the practice of some Greek dramatists having a God descend from heaven at the last possible minute--in the theater by means of a stage machine--to rescue the protagonist from an impossible situation).

Dialect: A way of speaking which is characteristic of a certain geographical area or a certain group of people.

Dialogue: In drama, a conversation between two or more characters. A monologue is a single character's extended speech. A soliloquy is a monologue in which a character presents his or her innermost thoughts aloud but only to himself or herself. One interesting type of dialogue, stichomythia, occurs when the dialogue takes the form of a verbal duel between characters, as in the dialogue between Hamlet and his mother, Gertrude. (William Shakespeare's Hamlet - Act 3, Scene 4) Dialogue in narrative may be given in direct speech ("It's five o'clock," she said), or indirect speech (She said it was five o'clock), or in a speech report (She told me the time), and supplemented by narration and commentary ("It's five o'clock," she whispered menacingly, lighting a cigar etc). Monologue is the uninterrupted speech of a single character. Interior monologue is a representation of what a character says to him/herself.

Diction: the writer's choice of words, phrases, sentence structures, and figurative language. Diction may be formal or informal, literal , or figurative. A writer or speaker can change diction depending upon the subject or audience. Since words have specific meanings and since one's choice of words can affect feelings, a writer's words can have great impact in a literary work. The writer, therefore, must choose his words carefully. Discussing his novel A Farewell to Arms during an interview, Ernest Hemingway stated that he had to rewrite the ending thirty-nine times. When asked what the most difficult thing about finishing the novel was, Hemingway answered, "Getting the words right."

 

Didactic Literature: Literature designed explicitly to instruct.

Didactic poetry: Poetry whose primary purpose is to teach or preach; prose may be didactic also.

Dilemma: A situation in which a character must choose between two courses of action, both undesirable.

Dimeter = two feet to a line

Direct presentation of character: That method of characterization in which the author, by exposition or analysis, tells us directly what a character is like, or has someone else in the story do so.

Discourse: The word discourse (adj: discursive) has a variety of uses. It can mean simply an extended piece of writing or speech on a particular subject: a treatise, discussion, sermon, etc. The word discourse in this sense now often has an archaic or even ironic flavour. Developing from this, a more specific notion of discourse refers to types of writing (e.g. Narrative, descriptive, dramatic) that can be found, usually interacting with each other, in texts. Discourse analysis (DA) in linguistics involves the study of extended stretches of language (behavioural units), usually conversations. The term discourse is used to emphasise the contrast with those branches of linguistics where the sentence, the word, or the speech sound is taken as the focus of analysis. In discourse analysis, linguists try to understand how conversation works, how it is structured, and what rules govern change of topic, change of speaker etc. They look at such things as how agreement or disagreement is expressed. Discourse analysis of writing investigates how rhetoric works, and looks at the interrelation of writer and reader in a text, etc. The notion of discourse is often linked to that of dialogue. The Russian theorist Bakhtin distinguished between repressive monological discourse and dialogical discourse. For Bakhtin, some kinds of discourse (i.e. Some texts) seek to impart a single world-view to the reader, presenting themselves as uniquely authoritative. He argued that we should see texts as having many competing voices within them, even if they were written by one person. The term discourse is used by a wide range of theorists (many influenced by the French thinker Foucault concerned with the relationship of language to social power, and with the construction of imposed realities. A discourse in this sense is a set of meaning-creating practices (which include linguistic practices) through which an institution or an individual seeks to reproduce, perpetuate and construct a particular view of reality, and repress and deny other competing realities. In this sense you might talk e.g. Of the discourse of Confucianism, or commercial advertising, or liberal politics.

Drama: The form--genre--of literature known as plays. Drama is meant to be performed by actors for an audience. The word drama can also be used to describe a situation that presents an emotional conflict. Comedies and tragedies are types of drama.

Dramatic convention: Any dramatic device which, although it departs from reality, is implicitly accepted by author and audience as a means of representing reality (for example, characters speaking in the language of the audience whatever the nationality they play, actors revealing their thoughts through soliloquies, etc.).

Dramatic exposition: The presentation through dialogue of information about events that occurred before the action of a play, or that occur offstage or between the staged actions; this may also refer to the presentation of information about individual characters' backgrounds or the general situation (political, historical, etc.) In which the action takes place.

Dramatic framework: The situation, whether actual or fictional, realistic or fanciful, in which an author places his or her characters in order to express the theme.

Dramatic irony discrepancy between what a character believes and what a reader/audience knows

Dramatic Monologue: In literature, the occurrence of a single speaker saying something to a silent audience. In Robert Browning's "My Last Duchess," the duke, speaking to a non-responding representative of the family of a prospective new duchess, reveals not only the reasons for his disapproval of the behavior of his former duchess, but aspects of his own personality as well.

Dynamic character one who undergoes some kind of a change because of an action in the plot

Editorializing: Writing that departs from the narrative or dramatic mode and instructs the reader how to think or feel about the events of a story or the behavior of a character.

Elegy: A lyric poem lamenting death.

End rhyme: Rhymes that occur at the ends of lines.

Enjambment one line that runs into another without pause to complete its meaning

Epic: In literature generally, a major work dealing with an important theme. Gone with the Wind, a film set in the antebellum (pre-Civil War) and Civil War South, is considered an epic motion picture. More formally, in poetry, a long work dealing with the actions of gods and heroes. John Milton's Paradise Lost is a book length epic poem consisting of twelve subdivisions called books. Homer's The Iliad and The Odyssey are epic poems, the former concerning the Greek invasion of Troy; the latter dealing with the Greek victory over the Trojans and the ten-year journey of Odysseus to reach his island home. Generally, an Epic will have the following conventions: (1) it is written in verse; (2) it has an invocation of the Muses; (3) it begins in medias res; (4) it covers a long timespan; (5) its action is significant for a people, nation, or culture.

 

Epigraph: A brief quotation which appears at the beginning of a literary work.

Epiphany: The revelation of a god to a particular character. Athena, for example, often reveals herself to Odysseus throughout the Odyssey (though she often begins in disguise). This convention is connected to the convention of supernatural machinery in the traditional epic. The term gets re-worked by James Joyce who makes it apply to the quotidian world. Here's what M. H. Abrams says of "epiphany" in his Glossary of Literary Terms: Epiphany means "a manifestation," and by Christian thinkers was used to signify a manifestation of God's presence in the created world. In the early draft of A Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man, entitled Stephen Hero (published posthumously in 1944), James Joyce adapted the term to secular experience, to signify a sense of a sudden radiance and revelation while observing a commonplace object. "By an epiphany [Stephen] meant a sudden spiritual manifestation." "Its soul, its whatness, leaps to us from the vestment of its appearance. The soul of the commonest object... Seems to us radiant. The object achieves its epiphany." Joyce's short stories and novels include a number of epiphanies.... "Epiphany" has become the standard term for the description, frequent in modern poetry and prose fiction, of the sudden flare into revelation of an ordinary object or scene. Joyce, however, merely substituted this word for what earlier authors had called "the moment." Thus Shelley, in his Defense of Poetry (1821), described the "best and happiest moments... Arising unforeseen and departing unbidden," "visitations of the divinity" which poetry "redeems from decay." William Wordsworth was a preeminent poet of what he called "moments," or in more elaborate instances, "spots of time." For instances of his short poems which represent a moment of revelation, see Wordsworth's "The Two April Mornings" and "The Solitary Reaper

Epithet: In literature, a word of phrase preceding or following a name which serves to describe the character.

Escape literature: Literature written purely for entertainment, with little or no attempt to provide insights into the true nature of human life or behavior.

Essay: A brief piece of writing that attempts to explain a subject, discuss a topic, or persuade an audience about a thesis. Most essays present the writer's personal views.

Euphemism: A mild word of phrase which substitutes for another which would be undesirable because it is too direct, unpleasant, or offensive. The word joint is a euphemism for the word prison. "W. C." Is a euphemism for bathroom.

Euphony smooth and musically pleasant language

Exposition: In drama, the presentation of essential information regarding what has occurred prior to the beginning of the play. In the exposition to William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, two servants of the house of Capulet discuss the feud between their master and the house of Montague, thereby letting the audience know that such a feud exists and that it will play an important role in influencing the plot. In the exposition to the film Star Wars, Luke Skywalker sees a 3D holograph projection of the Princess Lea warning that she is a prisoner of Darth Vader and begging for help.

Extended figure (also known as sustained figure): A figure of speech (usually metaphor, simile, personification, or apostrophe) sustained or developed through a considerable number of lines or through a whole poem.

Extended metaphor related metaphors providing a sustained comparison in all/part of a poem

Eye rhyme is a form of rhyme wherein the way words look (based on spelling) rather than sound is important. "Cough" and "tough" do not sound enough alike to constitute a rhyme. However, if these two words appeared at the ends of successive lines of poetry, they would be considered eye rhyme.

Fable: A brief tale designed to illustrate a moral lesson. Often the characters are animals as in the fables of Aesop.

Falling action: That segment of the plot that comes between the climax and the conclusion. The falling action is the series of events which take place after the climax. In Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, Cinna, the poet, is mistaken for Cinna, the conspirator, and killed. Antony and Octavius argue, Brutus and Cassius argue, the battle at Philippi is agreed upon, and the ghost of Caeser appears to Brutus.   See also: Freytag's Pyramid.

Fantasy: A kind of fiction that pictures creatures or events beyond the boundaries of known reality. Imaginative writing that takes the reader into an unrealistic, made-up world.

 

Farce: A type of comedy based on a humorous situation such as a bank robber who mistakenly wanders into a police station to hide. It is the situation which provides the humor, not the cleverness of plot or lines, nor the absurdities of the character as in situational comedy. Eugene Ionesco's "Les Chaises" (The Chairs), a one-act drama in which two old people isolated on an island prepare for visitors, is an example. The visitors are invisible, but the stage fills with chairs to accommodate them. In the end, a deaf-mute narrator "addresses" the couple.

 

Fiction: Literature with imagined characters and events. Short stories and novels are the most common forms of fiction.

 

Figurative Language: In literature, a way of saying one thing and meaning something else. The line by Robert Burns, "My luv is a red, red rose," is an example. Clearly the poet does not really mean that he has fallen in love with a red, aromatic, petalled, thorny-stemmed plant. He means that his love is as sweet and as delicate as a rose. While figurative language provides a writer with the opportunity to write imaginatively, it also tests the imagination of the reader and forces the reader to reach below the surface of a literary work into deep, hidden meanings.

 

Figure of speech: Broadly speaking, any way of saying something other than the ordinary way; more narrowly, a way of saying one thing and meaning another. The use of figurative language, which states something not literally true, in order to create an effect; it is a way of using language to suggest meanings other than denotative. Similes, metaphors and personification are figures of speech which are based on comparisons. Metonymy, synecdoche, synesthesia, apostrophe, oxymoron, and hyperbole are also figures of speech. See Tropes.

First person narration pov using "I" and presenting just one character's understanding of events

Flashback: A reference to an event which took place prior to the beginning of a story or play. In Ernest Hemingway's The Snows of Kilamanjaro, the protagonist, Harry Street, has been injured on a hunt in Africa. Dying, his mind becomes preoccupied with incidents in his past. During a flashback, Street remembers one of his wartime comrades dying painfully on barbed wire on a battlefield in Spain.

Flat character one with only one or two defining qualities

Foil one whose behavior/values contrast with those of another in order to highlight them. A character in a play who serves as a contrast to another character. In Shakespeare's Hamlet, Hamlet and Laertes are young men who behave very differently. While Hamlet delays in carrying out his mission to avenge the death of his father, Laertes is quick and bold in challenging the king about the death of his father. Much can be learned about each by comparing and contrasting the actions of the two.

Foot: The basic unit of measurement in a line of poetry. In scansion, a foot represents one instance of a metrical pattern.

 

Foreshadowing: In drama, a method used to build suspense by providing hints of what is to come.

Formal diction dignified, impersonal, elevated language conveying a lofty tone

Free verse: Nonmetrical verse. Poetry written in free verse is arranged in lines, may be more or less rhythmical, but has no fixed metrical pattern or expectation: unrhymed poetry with lines of varying lengths and without a specific metrical pattern.  Free verse, OR VERS LIBRE, avoids rhyme, stanza form, and any obvious rhythmical basis.

Genre kind or type; literary genres include poetry, fiction, drama, and essays. Genre is a term used to name and classify a particular form of literature. Drama is a genre of literature. Within drama, a subgenre may be tragedy or comedy.

Haiku: A Japanese poetic form which originated in the sixteenth century. A haiku in its Japanese language form consists of three lines: five syllables in the first and third lines, and seven syllables in the second line. A haiku translated may not contain the same syllabication. Designed to capture a moment in time, the haiku creates images.

 

Half rhyme occurs when the final consonants rhyme, but the vowel sounds do not (chill-Tulle; Day-Eternity).

 

Hamartia: A tragic flaw, weakness of character or error in judgment, which causes the downfall of the hero.

Heptameter: , seven feet

Hero/heroine central character engaging a reader's/audience's interest/empathy (heroine is archaic)

Heroic Couplet: This verse form consists of iambic pentameter lines with rhymed couplets. In the eighteenth century, when this verse form was most popular, poets tended also to write in closed couplets, which is to say that the end of each couplet, and even each line, tended to coincide with the end of a sentence or a self-sufficient unit of syntax. The form became the predominant English measure in the eighteenth century and is in some ways reflective of eighteenth-century ideals of order, balance, and closure. That sense of balance was also achieved by a strong caesura usually right in the center of each verse line

Hexameter: , six feet

Hubris: Arrogance or overweening pride which causes the hero's transgression against the gods; usually, the tragic flaw.

 

Hyperbole: A deliberate overstatement, an exaggeration to emphasize truth. Hyperbole is a figure of speech, a trope.

 

Iamb: A metrical pattern of one unstressed syllable followed by one stressed syllable.

Iambic (the noun is "iamb"): an unstressed followed by a stressed syllable. Example: "The Póet, géntle Créature ás he ís" (Wordsworth, Prelude, 1.135).

Ideology: A set of beliefs and attitudes shared by a group, class or society; a collection of 'truths' about what is normal, what is valuable, and what is right. 'Ideology' may be used to refer to consciously worked-out political positions (for example Marxist ideology, or libertarian ideology). It may also refer to a much more informal and unexamined endorsement of views, assumptions and prejudices generally taken for granted as being obvious, natural and universal, but actually associated with the power relations in society. It can be argued that all discourse has an ideological orientation in this informal sense, whether it recognizes and admits it or not.

Imagery: A word or group of words in a literary work which appeal to one or more of the senses: sight, taste, touch, hearing, and smell. The use of images serves to intensify the impact of the work.

Images are the things, as opposed to the ideas, in a piece of writing: an image is the representation in language of an object that might be perceived by the senses. In "The children's cries would grow more piercing with the dark; frightened, shrill and exalted with mystery and farewell", children, cries, and dark are images, but mystery and farewell (being abstract) are not. In "Her eyes shone like stars", eyes and stars are both images, even though the stars are metaphorical and not "really there'. Attention to the imagery of a play, poem etc, can reveal thematic patterns that point to meanings. We always respresent events by linking them with others so that associations are shared. Figurative language is distinguished from the literal by this process of associating things which are normally not considered together, and it helps us to see things freshly by defamiliarizing them. Imagery is the representation through language of sense experience. An image often suggests a mental picture (visual imagery), but it may also represent a sound (auditory imagery); a smell (olfactory imagery); a taste (gustatory imagery); touch, such as hardness, softness, wetness, or heat and cold (tactile imagery); an internal sensation, such as hunger, thirst, fatigue, or nausea (organic imagery); or movement or tension in the muscles or joints (kinesthetic imagery).

Implied metaphor comparison in which the terms are not explicitly explained

In medias res: This is the technical term for the epic convention of beginning "in the middle of things," rather than at the very start of the story. In the Odyssey, for example, we first learn about Odysseus' journey when he is held captive on Calypso's island, even though, as we find out in Books IX through XII, the greater part of Odysseus' journey actually precedes that moment in the narrative.

Indeterminate ending: An ending in which the central problem or conflict is left unresolved.

Indirect presentation of character: That method of characterization in which the author shows us a character in action, compelling us to infer what the character is like from what is said or done by the character.

Inference: A judgment based on reasoning rather than on direct or explicit statement. A conclusion based on facts or circumstances. For example, advised not to travel alone in temperatures exceeding fifty degrees below zero, the man in Jack London's "To Build a Fire" sets out anyway. One may infer arrogance from such an action.

Informal diction plain everyday language including slang, idiomatic expressions, etc.

Internal rhyme rhymed words included within a line

Interpretive literature: Literature that provides valid insights into the nature of human life or behavior.

Invocation: An invocation is any address to a deity, usually for help of some sort. The epic traditionally begins with an invocation to the Muse (a request for help in the telling of the tale). In fact, in an oral culture, the storyteller or "rhapsode" is considered merely a vessel through which the gods (and particularly the Muses) speak. (This is the reason Plato makes fun of oral storytellers in Ion.) There are traditionally nine Muses, each presiding over a different genre of literature. The traditional Muse of epic poetry is Calliope, although Homer does not address her by name in his invocation at the beginning of the Odyssey.

Irony literary device revealing a reality different from what appears to be true. It is any situation, or a use of language, involving some kind of incongruity or discrepancy. The listener/reader recognizes a discrepancy between what is said and the conditions in which it is said, and concludes that the speaker must mean something else, often the opposite. ("It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.") What looks like a straightforward statement is in fact a disguised quotation of a point of view the speaker/writer wants to make fun of. Situational or dramatic irony depends on a discrepancy between what someone intends or perceives, and what actually happens. It is ironic that Oedipus, in the Greek tragedy, is determined to find out who killed his father, only to discover that the murderer is himself. Irony can be traced through all periods of literature, from classical Greek and Roman epics and dramas to the good-humoured and subtle irony of Chaucer to the 20th- century writer’s method for dealing with nihilism and despair, as in Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot. The Greek philosopher Plato used irony in his dialogues, in which Socrates elicits truth through a pretence of naivety. Sophocles’ use of dramatic irony also has a high seriousness, as in Oedipus Rex, where Oedipus prays for the discovery and punishment of the city’s polluter, little knowing that it is himself. Eighteenth-century scepticism provided a natural environment for irony, with Swift using the device as a powerful weapon in Gulliver’s Travels and elsewhere. There are three kinds of irony: Verbal irony is a figure of speech in which what is said is the opposite of what is meant. Dramatic irony is an incongruity or discrepancy between what a character says or thinks and what the reader knows to be true (or between what a character perceives and what the author intends the reader to perceive). Irony of situation is a situation in which there is an incongruity between appearances and reality, or between expectation and fulfillment, or between the actual situation and what would seem appropriate. Irony takes many forms. In irony of situation, the result of an action is the reverse of what the actor expected. Macbeth murders his king hoping that in becoming king he will achieve great happiness. Actually, Macbeth never knows another moment of peace and finally is beheaded for his murderous act. In dramatic irony, the audience knows something that the characters in the drama do not. For example, the identity of the murderer in a crime thriller may be known to the audience long before the mystery is solved. In verbal irony, the contrast is between the literal meaning of what is said and what is meant. A character may refer to a plan as brilliant, while actually meaning that (s)he thinks the plan is foolish. Sarcasm is a form of verbal irony.

Limited omniscience third person narrator restricted to the perspective of one or two characters

Line sequence of words printed as a single entity on a page

Local Color: A detailed setting forth of the characteristics and environment of a particular locality enabling the reader to "see" the setting.

 

Lyric Poem: A short poem in which the poet expresses an emotion or illuminates some life principle. Emily Dickinson's "I Heard a Fly Buzz-When I Died" is a lyric poem wherein the speaker, on a deathbed and expecting death to appear in all its grandeur, encounters a common housefly instead.

Melodrama: A type of drama related to tragedy but featuring sensational incidents, emphasizing plot at the expense of characterization, relying on cruder conflicts (virtuous protagonist verses villainous antagonist), and having a happy ending in which good triumphs over evil.

Metaphor: A figure of speech in which a comparison is made between two unlike quantities without the use of the words "like" or "as. A metaphor is a figure of speech in which an implicit comparison is made between two things essentially unlike. It may take one of four forms: (1). That in which the literal term and the figurative term are both named; (2). That in which the literal term is named and the figurative term implied; (3). That in which the literal term is implied and the figurative term named; (4). That in which both the literal and the figurative terms are implied.

Metaphorical language: A metaphor is a figure of speech that associates two different things - by a statement that they are identical, by a statement that they are similar (this figure, using words such as 'like' and 'as', is called simile), or by substituting one for the other - which are not literally identical or normally comparable but which share some feature(s), often both unstated and surprising. Reading the simile 'Mr Bose's moustache lifted up like a pair of wings,' we do not suppose that his moustache really flew off his face, but that it became wing-shaped when he smiled - and by the associations of 'wings', the metaphor also suggests his feeling of liberation and joy at this point. The Bible says 'All flesh is grass', which is literally a lie, but conveys a metaphorical truth more strikingly and suggestively than a literal statement that human lives are insignificant, powerless, short-lived etc.

Meter: Here's an excerpt from M. H. Abrams' definition of "meter" in A Glossary of Literary Terms (fifth edition): In all sustained spoken English we feel a rhythm, that is, a recognizable through variable pattern in the beat of the stresses in the stream of sound. If this rhythm of stresses is structured into a recurrence of regular--that is, approximately equivalent--units, we call it meter. Compositions written in meter are known as verse.... We attend, in reading verse, to the individual line, which is a separate entity on the printed page. The meter of a line is determined by the pattern of stronger and weaker stresses in its component syllables; often, the stronger stress is called the "stressed" and the weaker one the "unstressed" syllable.... There are three major factors that determine where the stresses (in the sense of the relatively stronger stresses, or "accents") will fall in a line of verse: (1) Most important is the "word accent" in polysyllabic words; in the noun "accent" itself, for example, the stress falls on the first syllable. (2) There are also many monosyllabic words in the language, and on which of these--in the sentence or a phrase--the stress will fall depends on the grammatical function of the word (we normally put stronger stress on nouns, verbs, and adjectives, for example, than on articles or prepositions), and also on the "rhetorical accent," or the emphasis we give a word because we want to enhance its importance in a particular utterance. (3) Another determinant of stress is the prevailing "metrical accent," which is an expected pulsation, in accordance with the stress pattern which was established earlier in the metrical line or passage.

Metonymy: A figure of speech in which a word represents another object or idea to which it is related. For example, a ruling monarch may be referred to as the "crown" or the "sceptor."

Monometer: , one foot

Mood: The atmosphere or feeling generated by a literary work, partly by the description of objects or by the style of the descriptions. A work may create a mood of horror, mystery, holiness, or childlike simplicity, to name a few, depending on the author's treatment.

Moral: A rule of conduct or maxim for living expressed or implied as the "point" of a literary work. Rather than looking for a moral in literature, that is, what the work "teaches," look instead for its theme.

Motivation: The incentives or goals that, in combination with the inherent natures of characters, cause them to behave as they do. In poor fiction actions may be unmotivated, insufficiently motivated, or implausibly motivated.

Mystery: An unusual set of circumstances for which the reader craves an explanation; used to create suspense.

Myth: An unverifiable story based on a religious belief. The characters of myths are gods and goddesses, or the offspring of the mating of gods or godesses and humans. Some myths detail the creation of the earth, while others may be about love, adventure, trickery, or revenge. In all cases, it is the gods and goddesses who control events, while humans may be aided or victimized. It is said that the creation of myths was the method by which ancient, superstitious humans attempted to account for natural or historical phenomena. In Homer's, The Odyssey, the Greek hero, Odysseus, is thwarted in his attempt to reach home by an angry Poseidon, god of the sea. Poseidon, in his anger, kept Odysseus from reaching home for ten years after the war ended.

Narrative Poem: A poem which tells a story. Usually a long poem, sometimes even book length, the narrative may take the form of a plotless dialogue as in Robert Frost's "The Death of the Hired Man." In other instances the narrative may consist of a series of incidents, as in Homer's The Ilaid and The Odyssey, John Milton's Paradise Lost.

Narrative: Storytelling. Narrative has two aspects - content (the material of the story) and narrator (the storyteller). In writing, the narrator may be the author speaking in his/her 'own voice', the author adopting some role towards the reader (with values, experience and style which the author does not necessarily share), or a character - not always the main character - in the story. In 'embedded' narrative, one narrator's discourse is reported or interpreted by another's, which may in turn be embedded. Whether in fiction, history, journalism or gossip, no narrator is 'impersonal', though some pretend to be: the process of narrative - for example the selection of certain events for prominence in the plot - not only tells the story but also imposes a pattern on it. The narrator has a point of view of events and characters. He/she may show intimate knowledge of the thoughts of some character(s) while remaining 'estranged' from others. The story is always colored by the storyteller's perceptions and values. Our instinct is usually to trust narrators; but this is sometimes a mistake.

Narrator: In the broadest sense, anyone who recounts a narrative, either in writing or orally. In drama, the narrator introduces the action and provides a string of commentary between the dramatic scenes. In fiction and drama, the narrator may or may not be a major character in the action itself. Narrators may be reliable or unreliable.

Non-realistic drama: Drama that, in content, presentation, or both, departs markedly from fidelity to the outward appearances of life.

Novel: A long work of prose fiction. The novel narrates the actions of characters who are the invention of the author and who are placed in an imaginary setting. The fact that a historical or biographical novel uses historically real characters in real geographical locations performing verifiable acts does not alter the fictional quality of the work. Nor does it qualify a work labeled a novel by the author as a historical text.

Objective point of view detached third person narrator unable to see into the mind of any other character

Octameter: , eight feet

Ode: A poem in praise of something divine or expressing a noble idea.

Omniscient narrator third person narrator who sees into all characters' thoughts

Onomatopoeia: [Greek: ‘name-making’] figure of speech that copies natural sounds. Thus the word or name ‘cuckoo’ imitates the sound that the cuckoo makes. Such words as bang, crash, ripple, smash, splash, and thump are said to be onomatopoeic. Onomatopoeia works differently in different languages, the English bow, wow for a sound made by dogs being paralleled by the French oua, oua. Onomatopoeia may be built into prose or verse, as in ‘a sudden sizzling sound’, the s and z sounds used to suggest frying.

Overstatement (or hyperbole): A figure of speech in which exaggeration is used in the service of truth.

Oxymoron condensed paradox juxtaposing two contradictory words

Parable: A story that teaches a moral lesson. Christ's tale of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10: 30-7) is an example.

Paradox statement that initially appears contradictory but actually makes sense. It is a statement or situation containing apparently contradictory or incompatible elements, but may actually be well-founded or true.

Paradoxical situation: A situation containing apparently but not actually incompatible elements. The celebration of a fifth birthday anniversary by a twenty-year-old man is paradoxical but explainable if the man was born on February 29. The Christian doctrines that Christ was born of a virgin and is both God and man are, for the Christian believer, paradoxes (that is, apparently impossible but true).

Parallel Structure: A repetition of sentences using the same structure. This line from Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address provides an example: "The world will little not nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. "

Paraphrase: A restatement of the content of a poem designed to make its prose meaning as clear as possible.

Parody: A literary work that imitates the style of another literary work. A parody can be amusing or mocking in tone, such as a poem which exaggerates the use of alliteration in order to show the ridiculous effect of overuse of alliteration. (See Satire for related information.)

In literature and the other arts, a work that imitates the style of another work, usually with mocking or comic intent; it is related to satire.

 

Pastoral: A literary work that has to do with shephards and rustic settings. Christopher Marlowe's "The Passionate Shephard to His Love" and Robert Burns' "Sweet Afton" are examples.

 

Pathetic Fallacy: A fallacy of reason in suggesting that nonhuman phenomena act from human feelings, as suggested by the word "pathetic" from the Greek pathos; a literary device wherein something nonhuman found in nature-a beast, plant, stream, natural force, etc.-performs as though from human feeling or motivation. In Jack London's To Build a Fire, "The cold of space," London writes, "smote the unprotected tip of the planet, . . ." The word "smote" suggests nature deliberately striking the northern tip of the earth with severe cold. The poetry of William Wordsworth is replete with instances of pathetic fallacy-weeping streams, etc.

 

Pentameter = five feet to a line

Peripetia: Reversal of fortune.

Persona speaker created by a writer to tell as story or speak in a poem

Personification metaphor in which human characteristics are attributed to nonhuman things; a figure of speech in which human attributes are given to an animal, an object, or a concept. When something abstract or not human is describest in terms of a human or living thing: "The sky is not an enemy, / Destiny is our friend." "...letting the sea-waves coil / Their frothy tongues about his feet".

Picaresque Novel: A chronicle, usually autobiographical, presenting the life story of a rascal of low degree engaged in menial tasks who makes his living more through his wits than his industry. Episodic in nature, the picaresque novel is, in the usual sense of the term, structureless. Through the nature of the central character's various pranks and predicaments and by virtue of his associations with people of varying degree, the picaro affords the author an opportunity for satire on the social classes.

Picture poem concrete poem in which the lines form a specific shape related to the poem's content

Playwright (note the spelling): A maker of plays.

Plot Manipulation: A situation in which the author gives the plot a twist or turn unjustified by preceding action or by the character involved.

Plot selection/arrangement of incidents in a story to shape the action and give meaning. It is the organization of the events of a story. A story moves steadily forward in time from its very first event to its end: but the arrangements of the plot may speed up or slow down the passage of time, while some events are elided or left out and others are given a lot of space. A series of actions that occur in the order ABCDE may be 'plotted' as CDABE. A plot is sometimes placed alongside or within another plot. A plot is traditionally thought of as involving a character or characters in some conflict, with incidents more or less causally related, leading to a crisis or climax which involves the discovery of some truth and/or a significant change in a character's fortune. Plot is the structure of a story or the sequence of events in a story. The structure of a five-act play often includes the rising action, the climax, the falling action, and the resolution. The plot may have a protagonist who is opposed by an antagonist, creating what is called conflict. A plot may include flashback or a subplot which is a mirror image of the main plot. For example, in Shakespeare's, King Lear, the relationship between the Earl of Gloucester and his sons mirrors the relationship between Lear and his daughters.

Poetic diction elevated diction that differs significantly from common speech

Poeticizing: Writing that uses immoderately heightened or distended language to sway the reader's feelings.

Point of View: In literature, a speaker talks either in the first person from his or her own perspective, or in the third person from the perspective of an onlooker. The perspective used is called the Point of View. If the speaker knows everything including the actions, motives, and thoughts of all the characters, the speaker is referred to as omniscient (all-knowing). Limited omniscience occurs when the speaker is unable to know what is in any character's mind but his or her own. This is the angle of vision from which a story is told. The four basic points of view are as follows: Omniscient point of view is where the author tells the story, using the third person, knowing all and free to tell us anything, including what the characters are thinking or feeling and why they act as they do. Limited omniscient point of view is where the author tells the story, using the third person, but is limited to a complete knowledge of one character in the story and tells us only what that one character thinks, feels, sees, or hears. First person point of view is where the story is told by one of its characters, using the first person. Objective (or Dramatic) point of view is where the author tells the story, using the third person, but is limited to reporting what the characters say or do; the author does not interpret their behavior or tell us their private thoughts or feelings. Point of view is both spatial (like a camera-position) and interpretative (a matter of opinion). Narrative point of view may be first-personal (using 'I') or third-personal. One point of view may be embedded in another. An author's project is, as the novelist Joseph Conrad put it, "to make you see" - in other words, to have an effect on a reader's or audience's point of view. The interaction of points of view - the web of relationships between characters. Narrators, author, reader, and the community's point of view embodied in 'common sense' and generally accepted ideas and values - makes a text a complex act of communication.

Prologue opening speech or dialogue of a play or the introduction to any literary work

Prose meaning: That part of a poem's total meaning that can be separated out and expressed through paraphrase.

Prose poem: Usually a short composition having the intentions of poetry but written in prose rather than verse.

Prose: Non-metrical language; the opposite of verse.

Protagonist main character of a narrative who engages the reader's interest and empathy. The Protagonist is the hero or central character of a literary work. In accomplishing his or her objective, the protagonist is hindered by some opposing force, either human (The Joker is Batman's antagonist), animal (Moby Dick is Captain Ahab's antagonist in Herman Melville's Moby Dick), or natural (the sea is the antagonist confronting Captain Bligh in Nordhoff and Hall's Men Against the Sea).

Pun: A play on the multiple meanings of a word or on two words with the same sound but different meanings. The line below, spoken by Mercutio in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, is an example of a pun. Mercutio has just been stabbed, knows he is dying, and says: "Ask for me tomorrow and you shall find me a grave man."

Pyrrhic (the noun is also "pyrrhic"): two successive syllables with approximately equal light stresses, as in the second and fourth feet in this line: "My way is to begín with the begínning" (Byron, Don Juan). [Note: arguably, "way" in this line could well be considered a stressed syllable.]

Quality fiction: Fiction that rejects tested formulas in an attempt to give a fresh interpretation of life.

Quatrain: A four-line stanza which may be rhymed or unrhymed. A heroic quatrain is a four line stanza rhymed abab. John Donne's "A Valediction Forbidding Mourning" is a poem of nine heroic quatrains.

Realism: Though it is sometimes used simply as a praise term realism in literary history usually refers to a kind of fiction, developing in the 18th century and principally in the novel, that attempts to correspond closely to possible actual reality. (Realism therefore relies on a measure of agreement as to what reality is.) Realism seeks to be believed, or at least to be believable: for example, there is room for coincidences in realist stories or films, since these happen in actual life, but not for a coincidence every five minutes, since this would break the convention of verisimilitude or truth-seeming. The realist artist is committed to credibility, and typically uses an unembellished style, close to 'real' or 'ordinary' language, to represent coherently the experience of individuated modem people, of no great social rank or consequence, in carefully detailed material and social contexts, in real places. Some realist authors claim to be objective and even scientific, simply reflecting reality like a mirror or recording it like a camera. But a realist style of representation - for example, in depicting the horrors of war or poverty - can be a powerful ideological tool for changing or reinforcing attitudes.

Realistic drama: Drama that attempts, in content and in presentation, to preserve the illusion of actual, everyday life.

Refrain: A repeated word, phrase, line or group of lines, normally at some fixed position in a poem written in stanzaic form.

Resolution: The outcome or solution of the plot. The resolution comes after the climax of a story or play and establishes a new norm -- the way things are going to be from then on. Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet climaxes with the death of the two lovers. Their deaths resolve the feud between the two families. In the play's resolution, Lords Capulet and Montague swear to end their feud and build golden monuments to each other's dead child. In the resolution of the film Star Wars, Luke Skywalke, Han Solo, and Chewbacca are given medals by Princess Lea for destroying the death star and defeating the empire.

Rhetorical Poetry: Poetry using artificially eloquent language, that is, language too high-flown for its occasion and unfaithful to the full complexity of human experience.

Rhyme Scheme: The pattern of rhymes used in a poem. The four line stanza, or quatrain, is usually written so that the first line rhymes with the third and the second with the fourth. This rhyme scheme is noted as abab. In an English sonnet, the fourteen lines have a rhyme scheme of abab, cdcd, efef, gg.

Rhyme was introduced to Western European verse in late Latin poetry, and alliteration (repetition of the same initial letter in successive words) was the dominant feature of Anglo-Saxon poetry. Both these elements helped to make verse easily remembered in the days when it was spoken rather than written. Rhyme is the identity of sound, usually in the endings of lines of verse, such as wing and sing. Avoided in Japanese, it is a common literary device in other Asian and European languages. Rhyme first appeared in Europe in late Latin poetry but was not used in Classical Latin or Greek. Masculine (deny / apply), Feminine (yawning / morning), Polysyllabic ( dutiful / beautiful), Para-rhyme or half-rhyme (hall / hell), Internal, Sight (rough / bough. In end rhyme, the rhyme is at the end of the line. When one of the rhyming words occurs in a place in the line other than at the end, it is called internal rhyme

Rhythm recurrence of stressed and unstressed sounds in poetry; any wavelike recurrence of motion or sound. Rhythm is the recurrences of stressed and unstressed syllables at equal intervals, similar to meter. However, though two lines may be of the same meter, the rhythms of the lines may be different. For example, if one were to read the last two lines of Robert Frost's, "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" with equal speed, the lines would be the same in meter and rhythm. However, if one were to read the last line more slowly (as it should be read), the meter would be the same but the rhythm different. This is because while the meter of a line is identified by the pattern within each foot, the rhythm is accounted for by larger units than individual feet.

Rising Action: The part of a drama which begins with the exposition and sets the stage for the climax. In a five-act play, the exposition provides information about the characters and the events which occurred before the action of the play began. A conflict often develops between the protagonist and an antagonist. The action reaches a high point and results in a climax, the turning point in the play. We discover in the exposition of Shakespeare's Othello that the Moor, Othello, has married the Venetian maid, Desdamona. Her father objects strenuously to the marriage. At the same time, a messenger informs the Venetian council that the Turks are on their way to invade the island of Cypress. Othello, who is sent with troops to defend the island, brings Desdamona with him, planning a honeymoon to coincide with his military mission. One of Othello's officers, Iago, plants a seed of doubt about Desdamona's faithfulness in Othello's ear. This seed grows to the point where Othello becomes convinced that his wife is having an affair with his lieutenant, Michael Cassio. The play climaxes with the murder of Desdamona by Othello in a jealous rage.

Romance: In the Middle Ages, tales of exciting adventures written in the vernacular (French) instead of Latin. Medieval romances were tales of heroic or amorous adventures occurring in King Arthur's court. Chaucer's Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is an example of a medieval romance. Romance now applies to any fictional account of heroic achievements, colorful scenes, passionate love, or supernatural experiences.

Romantic comedy: A type of comedy whose likable and sensible main characters are placed in difficulties from which they are rescued at the end of the play, either attaining their ends or having their good fortunes restored.

Round character complex character displaying inconsistencies and internal conflicts

Saga: A story of the exploits of a hero, or the story of a family told through several generations. Stories of the exploits of Daniel Boone or Davey Crockett are sagas in the former sense. Alex Haley's Roots would be considered a saga in the latter sense.

Sarcasm: Bitter or cutting speech; speech intended by its speaker to give pain to the person addressed.

Satire: A kind of literature that ridicules human folly or vice with the purpose of bringing about reform or of keeping others from falling into similar folly or vice. Satire is any piece of literature designed to ridicule the subject of the work. While satire can be funny, its aim is not to amuse, but to arouse contempt. Jonathan swift's Gulliver's Travels satirizes the English people, making them seem dwarfish in their ability to deal with large thoughts, issues, or deeds. Satire is related to parody in its intention to mock, but satire tends to be more subtle and to mock an attitude or a belief, whereas parody tends to mock a particular work (such as a poem) by imitating its style, often with purely comic intent. The Roman poets Juvenal and Horace wrote Satires, and the form became popular in Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries, used by Voltaire in France and by Alexander Pope and Jonathan Swift in England. Both satire and parody are designed to appeal to the intellect rather than the emotions and both, to be effective, require a knowledge of the original attitude, person, or work that is being mocked (although much satire, such as Gulliver’s Travels by Swift, can also be enjoyed simply on a literal level).

Scansion: A close, critical reading of a poem, examining the work for meter. See Meter for more information.

Scene subdivision of an act in a play

Scornful comedy: A type of comedy whose main purpose is to expose and ridicule human folly, vanity, or hypocrisy.

Sentimentality: Unmerited or contrived tender feeling; that quality in a story that elicits or seeks to elicit tears through an oversimplification or falsification of reality.

Setting:; the physical and social context in which the action of a story or drama occurs. The time and place in which a story unfolds. The setting in Act 1, scene 1 of Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet," for example, is a public square in Verona, Italy. A drama may contain a single setting, Or the setting may change from scene to scene.

 

Short Story: A short fictional narrative. It is difficult to set forth the point at which a short story becomes a short novel (novelette), or the page number at which a novelette becomes a novel. Here are some examples which may help in determining which is which: Ernest Hemingway's "Big Two-Hearted River" is a short story; John Steinbeck's "Of Mice and Men" is a novelette; and Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter" is a novel.

Simile: A figure of speech which takes the form of a comparison between two unlike quantities for which a basis for comparison can be found, and which uses the words "like" or "as" in the comparison, as in this line from Ezra Pound's "Fan-Piece, for Her Imperial Lord:"clear as frost on the grass-bade,In this line, a fan of white silk is being compared to frost on a blade of grass. Not the use of the word "as."See Metaphor for more information.

Situational irony difference between what is expected to happen and what actually does

Slant rhyme near rhyme

Sonnet: A lyric poem of fourteen lines whose ryhme scheme is fixed. The rhyme scheme in the Italian form as typified in the sonnets of Petrarch is abbaabba cdecde. The Petrarchian sonnet has two divisions: the first is of eight lines (the octave), and the second is of six lines (the sestet). The rhyme scheme of the English, or Shakespearean sonnet is abab cdcd efef gg. (See Rhyme Scheme) The change of rhyme in the English sonnet is coincidental with a change of theme in the poem.The meter is iambic pentameter.
See Meter for more information.

Speaker voice used by an author to tell a story or poem

Spondaic (the noun is "spondee"): two successive syllables with approximately equal strong stresses, as in the first two feet of this line: "Góod stróng thíck stúpefy´ing íncense smóke" (Browning, "The Bishop Orders His Tomb").

Spondee: A metrical pattern characterized by two or more successively-placed accented syllables. In the following example from Shakespeare's "Othello," Othello's sleep has been disturbed by a fight. He angrily demands to know who started the fight that disturbed him. Not receiving an immediate answer he says:

Stanza: A major subdivision in a poem. A stanza of two lines is called a couplet; a stanza of three lines is called a tercet; a stanza of four lines is called a quatrain. Robert Frost's "Acquainted with the Night," consists of four rhymed tercets followed by a rhymed couplet. 

Static character unchanging character

Stereotype: An author's method of treating a character so that the character is immediately identified with a group. A character may be associated with a group through accent, food choices, style of dress, or any readily identifiable group characteristic. Examples are the rugged cowboy, the bearded psychiatrist, and the scarred villain. A criticism leveled at TV drama is that those who produce such dramas use outdated or negative qualities of groups to stereotype individuals. Ignoring the group's positive qualities, they perpetuate and strengthen the group's negative image in the minds of viewers. Some examples are: the Jewish accountant, the corrupt politician, the Black gambler in a zoot suit, and the voice on the phone in a Middle Eastern accent associated with a bomb threat. A well-known tobacco company uses the stereotype of the rugged cowboy in its cigarette ads.

Stock character stereotypical character

Style: distinctive and unique manner of arranging words to achieve particular effects

Style: Many things enter into the style of a work: the author's use of figurative language, diction, sound effects and other literary devices. Ernest Hemingway's style derives, in part, from his short, powerful sentences. The style of the Declaration of Independence can be described as elegant.

Suspense: Suspense in fiction results primarily from two factors: the reader's identification with and concern for the welfare of a convincing and sympathetic character, and an anticipation of violence. The following line from Elizabeth Spencer's "The Name of the Game" is an example of a suspense maker: "He was an innocent, this boy; the other boys were out to get him."

Symbol person/object/image/word/event evoking abstract meaning beyond the literary

Symbolism: A device in literature where an object represents an idea.

Synecdoche: A figure of speech wherein a part of something represents the whole thing. In this figure, the head of a cow might substitute for the whole cow. Therefore, a herd of fifty cows might be referred to as "fifty head of cattle." In Alfred Lord Tennyson's "Ulysses" Ulysses refers to his former companions as free hearts, free foreheads-

 

Synesthesia: One sensory experience described in terms of another sensory experience. Emily Dickinson, in "I Heard a Fly Buzz-When I Died," uses a color to describe a sound, the buzz of a fly:with blue, uncertain stumbling buzz

Syntax ordering of words into meaningful verbal patterns

Tetrameter = four feet to a line.

Theatre of the Absurd: A drama based on an absurd situation. In Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot, two characters spend the entire play waiting for someone named Godot, who is supposed to solve their problems, but who never appears. Instead, Godot's servant appears, but only to tell the two that Godot will not appear that day. The waiting commences again and is only broken by the occasional appearance of the servant who tells them that Godot will, once again, not appear that day.
Eugene Ionesco's Rhinoceros is another example.

 

Theme: An ingredient of a literary work which gives the work unity. The theme provides an answer to the question What is the work about? There are too many possible themes to recite them all in this document. Each literary work carries its own theme(s). The theme of Robert Frost's "Acquainted with the Night" is loneliness. Shakespeare's "King Lear" contains many themes, among which are blindness and madness. Unlike plot which deals with the action of a work, theme concerns itself with a work's message or contains the general idea of a work.

 

Tone author's implicit attitude toward the reader or the people/places/events in a work. Tone

tells us how the poet or speaker feels. Attitudes to the subject matter and to the audience implied in a literary piece: formal or intimate, solemn or playful, serious or ironic, condescending or obsequious. (Manner of expression; particular quality of language regarded as expressing a particular feeling or meaning. Here is one literary example: The tone of John Steinbeck's short novel "Cannery Row" is nonjudgemental. Mr. Steinbeck never expresses disapproval of the antics of Mack and his band of bums. Rather, he treats them with unflagging kindness.

 

Tragedy: According to A. C. Bradley, a tragedy is a type of drama which is pre-eminently the story of one person, the hero. "Romeo and Juliet" and "Antony and Cleopatra" depart from this, however, and we may view both characters in each play as one protagonist. The story depicts the trouble part of the hero's life in which a total reversal of fortune comes upon a person who formerly stood in high degree, apparently secure, sometimes even happy. The suffering and calamity in a tragedy are exceptional, since they befall a conspicuous person, e. G., Macbeth is a noble at first, then a king; Hamlet is a prince; Oedipus is a king. Moreover, the suffering and calamity spread far and wide until the whole scene becomes a scene of woe. The story leads up to and includes the death (in Shakespearean tragedy) or moral destruction (in Sophoclean tragedy) of the protagonist.

Tragic irony irony in which one is the instrument of his/her own downfall

Trimeter = three feet to a line

Trochaic (the noun is "trochee"): a stressed followed by an unstressed syllable. Example: "Thére they áre, my fífty mén and wómen" (Browning, "One Words More"). Note that most trochaic lines lack the final unstressed syllable; the technical term for such a line is "catalectic." Example: "Tíger! Tíger! Búrning bríght/ Ín the fórest óf the níght" (Blake, "The Tiger").

Trochee: A metrical pattern in a line of poetry characterized by one stressed syllable followed by one unstressed syllable. The opening line to Vachel Lindsay's "General William Booth Enters into Heaven" provides an example:
See Meter for more information.

 

Understatement: A statement which lessens or minimizes the importance of what is meant. For example, if one were in a desert where the temperature was 125 degrees, and if one wee to describe thermal conditions saying "It's a little warm today." That would be an understamement. In Shakespeare's "Macbeth," Macbeth, having murdered his friend Banquo, understates the number of people who have been murdered since the beginning of time by saying "Blood hath been shed ere now." The opposite is hyperbole. See Hyperbole for more information.

Unreliable narrator narrator whose interpretation of events runs contrary to the author's own

Verbal irony irony when a person says one thing but means another

Verse : Prose is written in sentences. Verse is written in sentences and also arranged in lines, and frequently the lines of verse establish a pattern of rhythm, called metre. Verse is a rhythmic pattern, which may depend on the length of syllables (as in Greek or Latin verse), or on stress, as in English.