Literary Term 1
An unexplained reference to literary works, famous individuals, historical events, or philosophical ideas, or works of art. Authors use this element to layer associations and meanings from these sources onto their own work.
What is Allusion?
The act of creating and developing a character through their own words, the narrator's descriptions, their actions, and what other characters say about them.
What is characterization?
A person or an animal who takes part in the action of a literary work
What is character?
A struggle between opposing forces. This element forms the basis of stories, novels, and plays. The two kinds are external and internal
What is conflict?
Writing or speech not meant to be interpreted literally. It is often used to create vivid impressions by setting up comparisons between dissimilar things.
What is Figurative language?
The descriptive or figurative language used in literature to create word pictures for the reader. These mental pictures are created by details of sight, sound, taste, touch, smell, or movement.
What is Imagery?
A type of figurative language in which a nonhuman subject is given human characteristics.
What is personification?
This element is a work's atmosphere or the feeling created in the reader by a literary work or passage.
What is mood?
The repetition of sounds at the end of multiple words.
What is rhyme?
A structural element used in a literary work to insert clues that suggest events that have yet to occur. This technique helps to create suspense, keeping readers wondering about what will happen next.
What is foreshadowing?
A figure of speech in which one thing is spoken of as though it were something else. This element implies a comparison between the two things being compared.
What is metaphor?
The sequence of events in a literary work: exposition, rising action, turning point/climax. falling action, and resolution.
What is plot?
The perspective, or vantage point, from which the story is told.
What is point of view?
A poem's rhythmical pattern. This pattern is determined by the number and arrangements of stressed syllables, or beats, in each line.
What is meter?
The beat and pace of a poem created by the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables
What is rhythm?
A regular pattern of rhyming words in a poem. The rhyme scheme of a poem is indicated by using different letters of the alphabet for each new rhyme.
What is rhyme scheme?
The time and place of the action. Time can include not only the historical period—past, present, or future—but also a specific year, season, or time of day.
What is setting?
A figure of speech in which the words like or as are used to compare two apparently dissimilar items
What is simile?
The imaginary voice assumed by the writer of a poem. In many poems, this person is not identified by name.
What is speaker?
A central message or insight into life revealed through a literary work.
What is theme?
A means by which authors present material that occurred earlier than the present time of the narrative.
What is flashback?
A repeated grouping of two or more lines in a poem that often share a pattern of rhythm and rhyme
What is stanza?
The organization of a story or poem's various elements, including plot, characters, themes, rhyme, rhyme scheme, or stanzas.
What is structure?
A character, place, thing or event that stands for something else, often an abstract idea.
What is symbol/symbolism?
The writer’s attitude toward his or her audience and subject. It can often be described by a single adjective, such as formal or informal, serious or playful, bitter or ironic.
What is tone?