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Allegory

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An extended narrative that carries a second meaning along with the surface story. The second meaning usually involves incarnations of abstract ideas. William Golding's "Lord of the Flies" is considered allegorical, and Cormac McCarthy's "The Road" may be read this way.

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Alliteration

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The repetition of accented consonant sounds either at the beginning of words (or a stressed syllable within a word) that are close to each other. E.g. the repetition of the "s", "th", and "w" consonants from Shakespeare's "Sonnet 30".

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Allusion

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A reference in literature to previous literature, history, mythology, pop culture, or the Bible. E.g. from T. Nashe's "Litany in Time of Plague", a reference to Helen of Troy.

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Ambiguity

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The quality of being intentionally unclear. Makes the situation able to be interpreted in more than one way. For example, when Hamlet says to Ophelia "get thee to a nunnery" is he literally urging her to go to a convent, or is he calling her a hoe?

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American Renaissance

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The writing of the period before the Civil War, beginning with Emerson and Thoreau and the Transcendentalist movement including Whitman, Hawthorne, and Melville. These writers are essentially Romantics of a distinctively American stripe.

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Anachronism

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In a literary work, something placed in an inappropriate period in time. E.g. a clock with hands in Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar". Often, but not always, a mistake on the part of the author.

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Anadiplosis

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Greek for "doubling". Repeating the last word of a clause at the beginning of the next clause. E.g. Nietzsche: "Talent is an adornment; an adornment is also a concealment."

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Analogy

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A comparison, usually extended, of two different things.

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Anaphora

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The repetition of an identical word or group of words in successive verses or clauses.

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Anastrophe

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The inversion of normal word order to achieve a particular effect, usually rhyme or meter. E.g. from A.E. Houseman's "To an Athlete Dying Young."

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Anecdote

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A brief account of a story about an individual or incident.

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Antagonist

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A character who functions as a resisting force to the goals of the protagonist without association of good or evil. E.g. the Creature in "Frankenstein" or Macduff in "Macbeth".

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Antimetabole

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Greek for "turning about". A rhetorical scheme involving repetition in reverse order: "One should eat to live, not live to eat." Or, "You like it; it likes you." This often overlaps with chiasmus, although this is limited to sentence structure.

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Anticlimax

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A drop, often sudden and unexpected, from a dignified or important idea or situation to one that is trivial or humorous. Also, a sudden descent from something sublime to something ridiculous. E.g. the ending of Faulkner's "As I Lay Dying".

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Antihero

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A protagonist who carries the action of the literary piece but does not embody the classic characteristics of courage, strength, and nobility. Frequently a pathetic, comic, or anti-social figure. Many scholars consider Winston Smith from "1984" to be this.

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Antithesis

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A rhetorical figure in which sharply opposing views are expressed within a balanced grammatical structure, as in the following example from Samuel Johnson in his characterization of the Reverend Zacariah smudge: "Though studiously he was popular; though argumentative, he was modest; though inflexible, he was candid; and though metaphysical, yet orthodox."

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Aporia

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An impasse or un-resolvable conflict between thought and language. E.g. "There is no God and his prophets" from "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy.

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Aphorism

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A short, pithy statement of truth or doctrine. E.g. from Pope's "An Essay on Man": "the proper study of mankind is man."

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Aposiopesis

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An abrupt breaking off in the middle of a sentence without the completion of the idea, often under the stress of emotion. E.g. Hamlet III, iv, 96-104.

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Apostrophe

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A figure of speech in which a person not present or a personified abstraction is directly addressed as though present. E.g. Walt Whitman's "O Captain, My Captain!" and May Sarton's "Lady with a Falcon".

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Apotheosis

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Elevation of someone to the status of a god. E.g. after Mr. Rochester proposes, Jane Eyre apotheosizes him when she says, "My future husband was becoming to me my whole world;".

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Archetype

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A character, situation, or symbol that is familiar to people from all cultures and eras because it occurs frequently in literature, myth, religion, or folklore. E.g. the wise old man, the goddess, the temptress, the crone, etc.; premised on Carl Jung's theories of the collective unconscious.

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Aside

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In a play, a character's short speech or remark heard by the audience but not by other characters. E.g. Hamlet's comment that he is "A little more than kin, and less than kind." (I, ii, 65)

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Assonance

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The repetition of similar vowels sounds, usually close together, to achieve a particular effect or euphony. E.g. Tennyson's "Lotus Eaters".

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Atmosphere

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The emotional tone pervading a section or a whole of a literary work.

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Attitude

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The author's feelings toward the topic he or she is writing about; often used interchangeably with "tone".

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Aubade

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A poem or song announcing/celebrating the coming of dawn.

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Ballad

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A narrative poem, usually simple and fairly short, originally designed to be sung. Historically, the balled was part of the oral tradition and was transmitted from singer to singer by word of mouth. It is distinguished by: simple, colloquial language; a story told through dialogue and action; a theme that is often tragic; the use of a refrain.

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Bathos

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Similar to anti-climactic, a sudden descent from the exalted to the ridiculous; excessive sentimentality or pathos; authors achieve this unintentionally--it is a derisive comment about the author's failure.

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Beat Generation

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Denotes a group of American Writers (especially poets) who became prominent in the 1950s. Their convictions and attitudes were unconventional, provocative, anti-intellectual, anti-hierarchical and anti-middle-class ('squares'). Allen Ginsberg's "Howl and other Poems" (1956) represents the disillusionment of the movement with modern society, materialism, militarism, and conformity.

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Bildungsroman

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A novel which is an account of the youthful development of a hero or heroine. E.g. "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" and "Jane Eyre".

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Blank Verse

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Poetry of unrhymed iambic pentameter. E.g. Robert Frost's "Birches".

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Bowdlerize

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To prudishly expurgate supposedly offensive passages. E.g. the crossing-the-stream scene from Hardy's "Tess of the D'Urbervilles".

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Bucolic

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Used to describe an idealized country setting; basically a synonym for pastoral.

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Burlesque

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A work designed to ridicule attitudes, style, or subject matter by handling either an elevated subject in trivial manner or a low subject with mock dignity. The term is used for various types of satirical imitation.

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Byronic Hero

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In literature, a rebel, proudly defiant in his attitude toward toward conventional social codes and religious beliefs; an exile or outcast hungering for an ultimate truth to give meaning to his life. Despite past transgressions he remains a sympathetic figure. Mr. Rochester from "Jane Eyre" is usually considered this.

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Cacophony

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Harsh, discordant sounds, unpleasant to the ear. E.g. from Tennyson's "Morte D'Arthur".

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Cadence

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The natural rise and fall of voice in reciting, reading, or speaking; flow of rhythm, inflection, or modulation in tone.

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Caesura

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A pause separating phrases within a line of poetry. E.g. from William Butler Yeat's "Sailing to Byzantium".

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Canon

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A body of writings established over time as having genuine literary merit.

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Caricature

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The exaggeration of features and mannerisms for satirical effect. Deliberately distorted imitation of a person.

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Carpe Diem

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Latin phrase meaning "seize the day", the idea of which (time is short and fleeting) was used frequently in 16th and 17th century poetry. E.g. Robert Herrick's "To The Virgins to Make Much of Time".

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Catastrophe

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Greek for "overturning"; the tragic denouement of a play or story. E.g. the Moor's murder of his wife Desdemona and his own suicide at the climax of Shakespeare's "Othello" or Darl's betrayal and forced incarceration in an insane asylum at the end of Faulkner's "As I Lay Dying".

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Catharsis

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Emotional cleansing or feeling of relief by the audience at the conclusion of a tragedy. In a sense, the tragedy, having aroused powerful feelings in the spectator, also has a therapeutic effect.

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Chiasmus

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A literary scheme involving a specific inversion of word order. It involves taking parallelism and deliberately turning it inside out, creating a "crisscross" pattern. E.g. Shakespeare's "Macbeth", "Fair is foul and foul is fair" and in Cormac McCarthy's "The Road" - "You forget what you want to remember and you remember what you want to forget." The overall novel structure of William Faulkner's "As I Lay Dying" may be said to employ this form.

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Cliché

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An expression that deviates enough from ordinary usage to call attention to itself and has been used so often that it is felt to be hackneyed or cloying. E.g. "He's fit as a fiddle" or "I saw the handwriting on the wall". They can also be overused and therefore trite literary phrases ("the cooling western breeze").

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Climax

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Currently, critics disagree on exact distinctions between this and a crisis. For this example, the point of greatest dramatic tension or emotional intensity in a plot is defined as this term. In a drama, this follows the rising action and precedes the falling action. It is the point at which the conflict reaches the greatest height, whereas crisis is used to describe multiple conflicts throughout the work where the outcome of protagonist is uncertain.

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Closed Form

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Type of poetry in which the structure (but not the content) is dictated or predetermined. E.g. a sonnet, a haiku, a sestina, etc.

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Coin

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To invent and put into use a new word or expression. Shakespeare is commonly credited with over 1700 uses of this, including "eyeball," "zany," and "swagger."

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Colloquial

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Words, phrases, or expressions used in everyday speech and writing. The following sentence employs this concept (shone in capitalized words): "The costumer, a SKETCHY DUDE with a SHIFTY look in eyes, as clearly UP TO NO GOOD."

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Comedy of Manners

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Concerned with the intrigues, regularly amorous, of witty and sophisticated members of an aristocratic society. E.g. Oscar Wilde's "The Importance of Being Earnest".

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Comic Relief

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Humorous element inserted into a somber or tragic work, especially a play, in order to relieve its tension, widen its scope, or heighten by contrast the tragic emotion. E.g. the porter's scene in "Macbeth" or the gravediggers' scene in "Hamlet".

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Conceit

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A far-fetched comparison between two seemingly unlike things; an extended metaphor that gains appeal from its unusual or extraordinary comparison. The term is often used interchangeably with 'metaphysical' preceding it.

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Confidant

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A character entrusted with the secrets and private thoughts of another character, usually the protagonist. E.g. Horatio is Hamlet's confidant.

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Connotation

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Associations a word calls to mind.

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Consonance

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The close repetition of identical consonant sounds before and after different vowels. E.g. "slip-slop"; "live-love"; "pitter-patter". E.g. the last stanza from W.H. Auden's "'O Where Are You Going' said Reader to Rider".

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Convention

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A device, principle, procedure or form which is generally accepted. E.g. an audience at a play accepts this concept of a representation of scenery and action.

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Couplet

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Two successive rhyming lines of the same number of syllables, with matching cadence. E.g. from John Greenleaf Whittier's "Snowbound".

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Crisis

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The turning point of uncertainty and tension resulting from earlier conflict in a plot. At these moments in a story, it is unclear if the protagonist will succeed or fail in his struggle.

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Deconstructionism

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As a contemporary literary theory, deconstructionism asserts that, rather than the traditional view that a text has only one fixed and stable meaning, any text carries a plurality of meaning. As such, whatever meaning that exists does not exist in the closed book, but only occurs when a reader begins to read.

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Denotation

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The dictionary or literal meaning of a word or phrase.

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Denouement

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The tying up of loose ends after the climax in a story, novel, or play. Also called "resolution".

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Dues Ex Machina

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Literally "god out the machine"; at a story's end, any unanticipated intervention that resolves a seemingly plot problem. E.g. Hamlet's rescue by merciful pirates.

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Diction

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A writer's choice of language to achieve a desired tone or effect, be it formal, informal, colloquial, elevated, etc.

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Didactic

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Story, speech essay, or play in which the author's primary purpose is to instruct, teach, or moralize.

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Direct Characterization

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Telling the attributes and qualities of a character. E.g. early in "Pride and Prejudice", Jane Austen tells us that "Mr. Bennet was so odd a mixture of quick parts, sarcastic humor, reserve, and caprice, that the experience of three-and-twenty Years had been insufficient to make his wife understand his character."

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Distortion

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Variation from expected or typical proportion or arrangement. Intentional variation from norms of harmony, balance, and order.

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Doggerel

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Rough, crudely written verse. This term is one of critical judgment rather than technical description. In Mark Twain's "Huck Finn", Emmeline Grangerford's "Ode on the Death of Stephen Dowling's Bots" is a classic example of this.

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Doppelganger

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A device by which a character is self-duplicated; the "divided self" or ghostly double. E.g. Victor Frankenstein and his creature.

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Dramatic Irony

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A form of irony that depends more on the structure of a play than the words; where the audience knows something vital that the character does not know. E.g. in "Oedipus Rex", the audience knows that, as was prophesized, Oedipus has killed his father and married his mother, but Oedipus does not know either of them are his parents.

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Dramatic Monologue

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A poem consisting of the words of a single character who reveals in his speech his own nature; discloses the psychology of the speaker at a particular moment. E.g. Robert Browning's "My Last Duchess" and "Porphyria's Lover."

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Dramatis Personae

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The characters in a play, usually listed on a page prior to the opening lines.

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Dynamic Character

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A character that changes during the course of a work.

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Dystopia

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Work in which a society in an attempt to perfect itself, instead goes terribly wrong; usually characterized by extreme mechanization and authoritarianism. E.g. George Orwell's "1984" and Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World". May be used interchangeably with "anti-utopia".

AP ENGLISH LITERATURE AND COMPOSITION: Literary Terms A-D – Flashcards

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