Literary Terms Definitions
A question asked in order to create a dramatic effect or to make a point rather than to get an answer
What is a rhetorical question?
What is an oxymoron?
Similarity of structure in a pair or series of related words, phrases, or clauses
What is parallelism?
"Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny. Consume you, it will"
What is inversion?
Anaphora or parallelism?
"I’m sick and tired of you letting me down. I’m sick and tired of you making me mad. And I’m sick and tired of you doing such silly things!"
What is anaphora? (repetition of clauses in the beginning of sentence)
Repetition of the same sound beginning several words or syllables in sequence
What is alliteration?
"He's just a late bloomer"
What is a metaphor?
Sentence that completes the main idea at the beginning of the sentence and then builds and adds on
What is a cumulative sentence?
"My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man"
What is an imperative sentence?
Hortative or imperative sentence?
"Just try it at least once!"
What is a hortative sentence? (urges rather than calls to action)
Brief reference to a person, event, or place (real or fictitious) or to a work of art
What is an allusion?
"Perhaps he loves you now,
And now no soil nor cautel doth besmirch
The virtue of his will"
What is archaic diction?
A sentence in which the main clause is given at the end of the sentence in order to create interest or suspense
What is a periodic sentence?
"Every breath you take, Every move you make, Every bond you break, Every step you take, I'll be watching you"
What is anaphora?
Antimetabole or inversion?
"I mean what I say, and I say what I mean."
What is antimetabole? (repetition of words in reverse order)
Placement of two things closely together to emphasize similarities or differences
What is a juxtaposition?
"An English teacher has poor grammar"
What is irony?
Omission of conjunctions between coordinate phrases, clauses, or words
What is an asyndeton?
"We didn't land on Plymouth Rock; Plymouth Rock landed on us"
What is antimetabole?
Periodic or cumulative sentence?
"Severe weather systems and the melting of the polar ice caps are both signs of climate change."
What is a periodic sentence? (main clause at the end of the sentence to create suspense)
Using a word to act with two or more parts of the sentence
What is zeugma?
What is antithesis?
A sentence that exhorts, urges, entreats, implores, or calls to action
What is hortative sentence?
"She lived three doors down from me"
What is a synecdoche?
Zeugma or synedoche?
"Check out my new wheels."
What is zeugma? (part representing the whole)