Literary Terms
Terms
undefined, object
copy deck
- Rising action
- confilict becomes clear and action rises as obstacles are presented.
- theme
- the central messager or insight into life revvealed through the literary work; it is a generalization about human beings or about life which can apply to everyone
- curtain
- End of a scene; closing of the curtain to depict the end of an act or scene.
- first person
- I, me, my
- allusion
- a reference to a statement, person, place, event that is known from literature
- static character
- a character who doesn't change throughtout the course of the story, play, or poem.
- Introduction
- situation and characters introduced
- round character
- a character who has many dimensions to his/her personality
- character
- person being played by an actor in a play.
- symbol
- perosn, place, thing or even which stands for both itself and for something beyond itself
- drama
- story written out to be acted on a stage by actors; contains dialogue and stage directions; play.
- Conclusion
- ending resolution
- props
- properties; objects or articles used in a play to add to the characters' portrayals
- flashback
- a section in literary work which interrupts the sequence of events to relate an event from an earlier time.
- playwright
- person who rwrites a play
- foreshadowing
- clues in a story which hints about things that are going to happen later in a story
- stage directions
- directions, instructions to how to preform on stage
- genre
- a division or type of litereater; a literary work beloings in one of three major genres: drama; prose; poetry
- cast(verb)
- to assign parts to the actors in a play
- upstage
- The part of a traditional stage farthest back from the audience. Also, to steal the scene away from another actor by moving upstage, forcing the donstage actor to turn his back on the audience.
- conflict
- a struggle or clash between opposing characters, forces, emotions.
- protagonist
- the main character in a work
- Act
- perform in a play;l major portion or segment of a play
- character
- an individual in a story, play or poem; four types: static, dynamic, flat round
- Contrast
- alternating humor and pathos, song and dialogue, tense and tranquil scenes.
- set
- artificicial setting for a scene in a play, including furniture, scenery, and other items to creat an illusion of another time and place.
- point of view
- the angle from which a narrator tells a story
- downstage
- the part of a traditional stage closest to the audience.
- antagonist
- the character that struggles aginast or blocks the protagonist
- scene
- subdivision of an act of a play where action takes plae in one stage settomg/
- stage left
- left side of stage as actor faces audience
- Irony
- lines having one meaning for the audience and another for the character to whom they are spoken.
- Suspense
- the feeling of not knowing for sure what will happen, but anticipating it.
- Dynamic character
- a character who changes in an important way
- characterization
- the art of creating a character; direct and indirect
- Internal conflict
- man vs. self (opposing needs or desires or emotins)
- simile
- a compariso between two unlike things useng like or as;
- third person
- he, him, her, they, etc.
- External conflict
- man vs man, society, natural forces
- curtain call
- the process ofactors taking their bows, receiving applause, and or being reintroduced to the audience at the end of a play
- stage right
- Right side of stage as actor faces audience.
- metaphor
- figure of speechthat makes a comparison between two seemingly unlinke things without using connectivewords.
- cast (noun)
- Group of characters in a play
- Climax
- high point o interest; turning point of play
- irony
- a contrast between expectation and reality; between what is said and what is meant
- flat character
- a character who mainatins only one or two personalities