Figures of Speech
Literary Terms
Elements of Fiction
Roots, Prefixes and Suffixes
Poetry
100

A deliberate exaggeration for various effects – comic, tragic, etc. When Frost writes that the beauty of Spring “is only so an hour”, he emphasizes how very brief the life of precious things seems.

What is Hyperbole?

100

A gap or mismatch between what is said and what is intended. For example, between what a character or group might see or think, and what the author wishes us to see or think. A powerful tool for a writer to expose hypocrisies and lack of awareness.

What is Irony?

100

The main character that the story follows.

What is the protagonist?

100

It means "life" and is found in your science text book.

What is "bio"?

100

The blocks of lines into which a poem is organised. In traditional forms of poetry each stanza follows a scheme governing metre, lines and rhymes.

What is "Stanza"?

200

The use of words that imitate or suggest the sounds associated with them, such as “murmur” or “buzz”.

What is Onomatopoeia?

200

 The mental pictures created by language (both metaphorical and literal) that appeal to the senses.

What is Imagery?

200

The sequence of events in a story.

What is plot?

200

This two letter combo means "do again".

What is "re"?

200

Stanza or group of four lines in a poem. They can have different rhyme schemes. Shakespeare’s sonnets often contain three of these and a couplet.

What is "Quatrain"?

300

Where human feelings or sensations are attributed to an inanimate object.

What is Personification?

300

An association suggested by a word, useful when discussing diction. The "flavor" of a words as opposed to or in addition to its dictionary meaning.

What is Connotation?

300

The sense of anticipation that builds as a story continues.

What is suspense?

300

This prefix means "self".

What is "auto"?

300

Objects that represent or evoke an idea or concept of wider, abstract significance, as roses represent love, walls divisions, often with understood meanings. For example dove = peace.

What is "symbol'?

400

 A comparison between two unlike things that are seen as alike in some aspect, without the use of ‘like’ or ‘as’.

What is metaphor?

400

An exclamatory passage where the speaker or writer breaks off in the flow of a narrative or poem to address a dead or absent person, a particular audience, or object. Hint: there is a punctuation mark with the same name.

What is Apostrophe?

400

It can be happy or sad or confusing. But we are not looking for "ending".

What is outcome?

400

Similar to the French, this means "bad".

What is "mal"?

400

Repetition of a phrase or lines in a work of literature, often at the end of a stanza.

What is "Refrain"?

500

When a part is substituted for the whole such as in "All hands on deck!" where the hands represent the sailors. Is it  Metonymy, Litotes, or Simile?

What is Metonymy?

500

An indirect reference to an event, person, place, another work of literature, etc. that gives additional layers of meaning to a text or enlarges its frame of reference. Robert Frost’s poem “Out, Out”, about a boy’s accidental death, alludes to Macbeth’s line about life: “Out, out, brief candle”.

What is Allusion?

500

Action that took place before the story began and influences the character's actions or situation. Hint: ante_____ action

What is antecedent action?

500

This combo is found in words related to "stars".

What is "astro"?

500

The organization of lines of verse into regular patterns of stressed and unstressed syllables, to achieve a rhythmic effect. “Iambic” and “trochaic” are useful to know.

What is "Meter"?

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