Literary Terms Quarter 1
Terms
undefined, object
copy deck
- connotation
- an association that a word calls to mind in addition to the dictionary meaning of the word.
- plain style
- a type of writing in which uncomplicated sentences and ordinary words are used to make simple, direct statements. (Favored by puritans)
- hyperbole
- a deliberate exaggeration or overstatement, often used for comic effect
- diction
- a writers/speakers word choice
- forms of discourse
- narrative, corrective, paradoxical, inquizative, preparatory
- local color
- is the use in literary work of characters and details unique to a paticular geographical area. it can be created by the use of dialect and by descriptions of customs, clothing, mannesr, attitudes and landscape.
- personification
- giving nonhuman things human like charcteristics
- classicism
- an approach to literature and the other arts that stresses reasonm balance, clarity, ideal beauty and orderly form in imitation of the arts of acient Greece and Rome
- parable
- 1. a short allegorical story designed to illustrate or teach some truth, religious principle, or moral lesson. a statement or comment that conveys a meaning indirectly by the use of comparison, analogy, or the like.
- plot
- sequence of events in a lit work. in most fiction, the plot involves both characters and a central conflict. the plot usually begins with an exposition that introduces the setting, characters and the basic situation. this is followed by the inciting incident, which introduces the central conflict. the conflict then increases dring the development until it reaches its high point called the climax, then it the resolution or end occurs. any event after resolution is call the denouement.
- ambiguity
- the effect created when words suggest and support two or motr divergent interpertations. may be used to express experiences or truths that are complex or contradictory. derives from fact that words have multiple meanings
- pastoral
- peoms deal with rural settings, including sheoherds and rustic life. traditionally have presented idealized biew of rural life. ex: Robert Frost
- point of view
- is the perspective or vantage point from which a story is told
- irony
- contrast between what is stated and what is meant, or between what is expected to happen and what actually happens
- analogy
- extended comparison of relationships.
- essay
- a short nonfiction work about a particular subject
- Harlem Renaissance
- occured during the 1920s, was a time of african american artistic creativity centered in harlem. writers ei: Countee Cullen, Claude McKay, Jean Toomer, Langston Hughes
- incongruity
- the quality of disagreeing; being unsuitable and inappropriate
- exposition
- is writing or speech that explains, informs, or presents information
- flashback
- is a section of a literary work that interupts the chronological presentation of events to relate an event from an earlier time
- metaphor
- figure of speech in which one thing is spoken of as though it were something else. ex: "death is a long sleep"
- allegory
- is a story or tale with 2 or more levels of meaning-a literal level and one or more symbolic levels. the events, setting, and characters in an allegory are symbols for ideas and qualities
- oral tradition
- passing of songs, stories and poems from generation to generation by word of mouth
- naturalism
- a lit movement among novelists at the end of the nineteenth century and during the early decades of the 20th. tend to view people as hapless victims of immutable natural laws. ex: jack london
- conflict
- a struggle between opposing forces
- narrative
- is a story told in fiction, nonfiction, poetry or drama
- foil
- a character who provides contrast to another character
- allusion
- a reference to a well-known person, place, event, literary work or work of art. writers often make these to stories from the bible, to myths. ect. by using this method, writers can suggest complex ideas simply and easily
- parallel structure
- is the repetition of a grammatical structure.its used in poetry and in other writing to emphasize and to link related ideas.
- character
- a person or animal that takes part in the action of a literary work.
- denotation
- a word is its objective meaning, independent of other associations that the word brings to mind
- imagism
- a lit movement that flourished between 1912 and 1927. Led by Ezra Pound, Amy Lowell. they wrote short poems that used odrinary lang and free verse to create sharp, exact concentrated pictures.
- figure of speech
- is an expression or a word used imaginatively rather than literally
- aphorism
- the general truth or observation about life, usually stated concisely. whitty and wise.
- antagonist
- a character or force in conflict with a main character, or protaganist.
- novel
- a long work of fiction. has complicated plot, many characters both major and minor, significant theme and several varied settings
- paradox
- a statement that seems to be contradictory but that actually presents a truth.
- foreshadowing
- is the use of clues to suggest events that have yet to occur