Parts of a Story
A struggle or clash between opposing characters, forces, or emotions.
An organizational device used in literature to create expectation or to set up an explanation of later developments.
Foreshadowing
The repetition of initial sounds in neighboring words.
Alliteration
A comparison of two unlike things in which a word of comparison (like or as) is used
Simile
To make understandable, plain or clear.
Explain
The turning point in a narrative; the moment when the conflict is at its most intense.
Climax
The method an author uses to reveal characters and their various traits and personalities (e.g., direct, indirect).
Characterization
An author’s choice of words and phrases, which combine to help create meaning and tone.
Diction
The comparison of two unlike things in which no words of comparison (like or as) are used
Metpahor
The author’s central thought; the chief topic of a text expressed or implied in a word or phrase; the topic sentence of a paragraph.
Main idea
The portion of a story following the climax in which the conflict is resolved.
Resolution
The use of a word or phrase to mean the exact opposite of its literal or usual meaning; incongruity between the actual result of a sequence of events and the expected result.
Irony
Descriptive or figurative language in a literary work using all five senses.
Imagery
An object or abstract idea given human qualities or human form
Personification:
The intent either to inform or teach someone about something, to entertain people or to persuade or convince his/her audience to do or not do something.
Author's purpose
A narrative device, often used at the beginning of a work that provides necessary background information about the characters and their circumstances.
Exposition
The prevailing emotions or atmosphere of a work
Mood
An exaggeration or overstatement (e.g., I had to wait forever.)
Hyperbole
An implied or indirect reference in literature to a familiar person, place, or event.
Allusion
A judgment based on reasoning rather than on a direct or explicit statement. A conclusion based on facts or circumstances; understanding gained by “reading between the lines.”
Inference
The part of a literary plot that is characterized by diminishing tensions and the resolution of the plot’s conflicts and complications.
Falling Action
A literary approach that ridicules or examines human vice or weakness.
Satire
Groups of letters placed after a word to alter its meaning or change it into a different kind of word, from an adjective to an adverb, etc.
Suffix
A form of extended metaphor in which objects, persons, and actions in a narrative are equated with meanings that lie outside the narrative itself. The underlying meaning may have moral, social, religious, or political significance
Allegory
Examine and judge carefully. To judge or determine the significance, worth or quality of something; to assess.
Evaluate