Top 25 Literary Devices – Flashcards
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allegory
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story, play, or picture in which characters are used as symbols; fable
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alliteration
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the repetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of words
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allusion
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An expression designed to call something to mind without mentioning it explicitly; an indirect or passing reference.
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anachronism
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placing an event, person or item in a wrong historical period
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anaphora
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repetition of same word or phrase in the begginng -you are a fighter you are a winner you are amazing
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antithesis
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A statement in which two opposing ideas are balanced, direct opposite, contrast
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apostrophe
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a figure of speech in which one directly addresses an absent or imaginary person, or some abstraction
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assonance
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the repetition of vowel sounds
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chiasmus
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a statement consisting of two parallel parts in which the second part is structurally reversed
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euphemism
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A mild, indirect, or an okay term substituting for a harsh, blunt, or offensive term
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hyperbole
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obvious exaggeration
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inversion
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the reversal of the normal order of words- verb ahead of subject
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irony
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the use of words to convey the opposite of their literal meaning; or, incongruity between what is expected and what actually happens
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Litotes
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a type of understatement in which an idea is expressed by negating its opposite
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metaphor
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a figure of speech comparing to unlike things without using like or as
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metonymy
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substituting the name of one object for another object closely associated with it, rhetorical strategy of describing something indirectly by referring to things around it
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onomatopoeia
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using words that imitate the sound they denote
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oxymoron
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a figure of speech that combines two contradictory terms -random order -original copy -clearly misunderstood
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paradox
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a statement that has self-contradiction -war is peace
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personification
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A figure of speech in which an object or animal is given human feelings, thoughts, or attitudes "hiya!"
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pun
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a humorous play on words -I would like to go to Holland someday. Wooden shoe?
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rhetorical shift
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a change in tone or attitude; key words include "but," "however," "even though," "although," "yet"
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simile
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comparison using like or as
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synecdoche
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using a part of something to represent the whole thing -your ABC's!
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understatement
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the deliberate representation of something as lesser in magnitude than it actually is
