3
Terms
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- rising action
- complicatiosn in conflict and situations (may introduce new ones as well)
- theme
- the insight about human life that is revealed in a literary work
- paradox
- a statement that appears self- contradictory, but that reveals a kind of truth.
- satire
- a type of writing that ridicules the shortcomings of people or institutions in an attempt to bring about a change
- polysyndeton
- sentence which uses a conjunction with NO commas to separate the items in a series. instead of X , Y , and , Z....this results in X and Y and Z.... Kurt Vonnegut uses this device
- implied metaphor
- does not state explicitly the two terms of the comparison: " I like to see it lap the miles" is an example in whihc the verb lap implies a comparison between "it" and some animal that " laps" up water.
- parody
- a work that makes fun of another work by imitating some aspect of the writer's style
- vernacular
- the language spoken by the people who live in a particular locality
- periodic
- sentence that places the main idea or central complete thought at the end of the sentence after all introductory elements.
- loose sentence
- one in which the main clause comes first, followed by further dependent grammatical units. see periodic sentence. Hawthorne: " Hester gazed after him a little while, looking witha half-fantastic curiosity to see whether the tender grass of early spring would not be blighted beneathe him, and show the wavering track of this footseps, sere and brown, across its cheerful verdure."
- onomatopoeia
- the use of words whose sounds echo their sense."Pop." " Zap"
- Exposition
- introduces characters, stituation, and setting
- point of view
- the vantage point from which the writer tells the story
- lyric poem
- a poem that does not tell a story but expresses the personal feelings or thoughts fo the speaker. a ballad tells a story.
- telegraphic sentence
- a sentence shorter than five words in lenght
- paratactic sentence
- simply juxtaposes clause or sentences. i am tired: it is hot
- stream of consciousness
- a style of writing that portrays the innter (often chaotic) workings of a character's mind
- personification
- a figure of speech in which an object or animal is given human feelings, thoughts, or attitudes.
- rhythm
- a rise and fall of the voice produced by the alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables in language
- tragedy
- in general, a story in whihc a heroic character either dies or comes to some other unhappy end
- verbal irony
- occurs when someone says one thing but really means something else
- rhetoric
- are of effective communication especially persuasive discourse
- climax
- that point in a plot that creates the greatest intensity, suspense, or interest. also called turning point
- sterotype
- a fixed idea or conception of a character or an idea which does not allow for any individuality, often based on religious, social, or racial prejudices.
- mixed metaphor
- is a metaphor that has gotten out of control and mixes its terms so that they are visually or imaginatively incompatible. " The president is a lame duck who is running out of gas."
- oxymoron
- a figure of speech that combines opposite or contradictory terms in a brief phrase. " Jumbo shrimp" "Pretty ugly." " Bitter-sweet."
- protagonist
- the central character in a story, the one who initiates ordrives the action. usually the hero or anti-hero; like a tragic hero, like John Proctor of The Crucible, there is always a hamartia, or tragic flaw in his character which will lead to his downfall.
- third person point of view
- an unknown narrator, tells the story, but this narrator zooms in to focus on thoughts and feelings of only one.....(cut off)
- litotes
- is a form of understatement in whihc the positive form is emphasized through the negation of a negative form : Hawthorne - - - "...the wearers of petticoat and farthingale...stepping forth into the public ways, and wedging their not unsusbstantial personas, if occasion were, into the throng...."
- parable
- a relatively short story taht teaches a moral or lesson about how to lead a good life.
- juxtaposition
- poetic and rhetorical device in which normally unassociated ideas,words or phrases are placed next to one another, creating an effect of surprise and wit. Ezra Pound: " the apparition of these faces in the crowd;/ Petals on a wet, black bough."(is also a form of contrast by which writers call attention to dissimilar ideas or mages or metaphors) Martin Lurther King: "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
- objective point of view
- a narrator who is totally impersonal and objective tells the story, with no comment on any characters or events
- metonymy
- a figure of speech in which a person, place or thing , is referred to by......(cut off).... current situation to previous ones, or new ideas to the theme. Kurt Vonnegut uses " So it goes" throughtout Slaughterhouse-Five to remind the reader of the senselessness of death.
- local color
- a term applied to fiction or poetry whihc tends to place special emphasis on a particular setting, including its customs, clothering, dialect, and landscape.
- romance
- in general, a story in which an idealized hero or heroine undertakes a quest and is sucessful.
- soliloquy
- a long speech made by a character in a play while no other characters are on stage
- parallel structure(parallelism)
- the repetition of words or phrases taht have similar grammatical structures
- pun
- a "play on words" based on the multiple meanings of a single word or on words taht sound alike but mean different things
- extended metaphor
- is a metaphor that is extended or developed as far as the writer wants to take it. (onceit if it is quite elaborate).
- style
- a distinctive way in which a writer uses language: a writer's distinctive use of diction, tone, and syntax
- syntactic permutation
- sentence structures that are extraordinarily complex and incolved. often difficult for a reader to follow
- metaphor
- a figure of speech that makes a comparison between two unlike things without the use of such specific words of comparison as like, as, than, or resembles.
- dead metaphor
- is a metaphor that has been used so often that the comparison is no longer vivid: " The head of the house", " the seat of the government", "a knotty problem" are all examples
- quatrain
- a poem consisting of four lines,or four lines of a poem that can be considered as a unit
- synecdoche
- a figure of speech in which a part represents the whole. " If you don't drive properly, you will lsoe your wheels." The wheels represtn the entire car.
- understatement
- a statement that says less than what is mean. Ex: During the second war with Iraq, American troops complained of a fierce sand storm that made even the night-vision equipment useless. A British commando commented about the storm: " It's a bit breezy."
- koan
- is a paradox used in Zen Buddhism to gain intuitive knowledge: " What is the suond of one hand clapping?"
- situational irony
- takes place when there is a discrepancy between.....(cut off)
- tricolon
- sentence of three parts of equal importance and lenght, usually three independent clauses
- simile
- a figure of speech that makes an explicitly comparison between two unlike things, using words such as like, as, than, or resembles
- motivation
- the reasons for a character's behavior
- plot
- the series of related events in a story or play, sometimes called the storyline
- tall tale
- an outrageously exaggerated, humorous story taht is obviously unbelieveable.
- refrain
- a word, phrase, line or group of lines that is repeated, for effect, several times in a poem
- resolution
- the conclusion of a story, when all or most of the conflicts have been settled, often called denouement
- rhetorical question
- a question asked for an effect, not actually requiring an answer
- unity
- unified parts of the writing are related to one central idea or organizing principle. it is depended upon coherence
- syntactic fluency
- ability to create a variety of sentence structures, appropriately complies, and or simple and varied in length
- tone
- the attitude a writer takes toward the subject of a work, the characters in it, or the audience, revealed through diction, figurative language, and organization
- first person point of view
- one of the characters tells the story