Literary Devices
This device compares two unlike things using like or as.
What is a simile?
A 14-line poem written in iambic pentameter.
What is a sonnet?
The perspective from which a story is told.
What is point of view?
The central idea or message in a literary work.
What is a theme?
This 19th-century movement emphasized nature, emotion, and individualism.
What is Romanticism?
This term describes giving human qualities to nonhuman objects or ideas.
What is personification?
The pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in a poem.
What is meter?
A sudden realization or moment of insight for a character.
What is an epiphany?
A writer’s attitude toward their subject.
What is tone?
This movement reacted against Romanticism, focusing on everyday life and ordinary people.
What is Realism?
When a writer intentionally repeats a word or phrase for emphasis. Example: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times..."
What is anaphora?
A poem without rhyme but written in iambic pentameter.
What is blank verse?
When the narrator’s credibility is compromised.
What is an unreliable narrator?
A recurring element or symbol that reinforces a theme.
What is a motif?
This early 20th-century movement broke traditional forms and experimented with stream of consciousness.
What is Modernism?
A contradictory statement that reveals a deeper truth (e.g., “Less is more”).
What is a paradox?
A sonnet type that follows the ABBAABBA CDECDE rhyme scheme.
What is a Petrarchan sonnet?
A story that begins in the middle of the action.
What is in medias res?
This theme explores the loss of innocence and moral growth.
What is a Bildungsroman?
This late 18th- to early 19th-century movement valued reason, order, and balance over emotion.
What is Neoclassicism?
The technique where part represents the whole, like “all hands on deck.”
What is synecdoche?
The term for a poem’s organization of lines, stanzas, and rhythm.
What is prosody?
Informal, everyday speech, consisting of words, phrases, and idioms used in casual conversation but not in formal writing or speech.
What is colloquial language?
When a literary work presents two opposing ideas or forces to highlight human complexity.
What is justaposition? (Also called: Duality of Theme)
This late 19th-century movement depicted characters shaped by heredity, environment, and social conditions.
What is Naturalism?