Literary Devices
A story, poem, or picture that can be interpreted to reveal a hidden meaning, often moral or political.
Allegory
The deliberate repetition of initial consonant sounds in nearby words (e.g., "wild and woolly").
Alliteration
A character who opposes the protagonist and creates conflict.
Antagonist
The literal dictionary meaning of a word (opposed to connotation).
Denotation
A comparison using "like" or "as".
Simile
A word or phrase that has an emotional or cultural association beyond its literal meaning.
Connotation
A stressed/unstressed syllabic pattern; name the five‑foot line commonly used in English dramatic verse.
Iambic pentameter
A brief speech by a character alone on stage, revealing inner thoughts to the audience.
Soliloquy (or dramatic monologue if speaker addresses implied listener)
A question asked for effect with no answer expected; often used to emphasize a point.
Rhetorical question
The repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive lines, clauses, or sentences.
Anaphora
A direct address to an absent or imaginary person, object, or abstract idea (e.g., "O Death!").
Apostrophe
A lyric poem of 14 lines, typically with a specific rhyme scheme and volta; name the two major national traditions for this form.
Sonnet — English (Shakespearean) and Italian (Petrarchan)
A tragic hero’s fatal error or mistake in judgment that leads to downfall.
Hamartia (tragic flaw/error)
A deliberate understatement that presents something as less important or severe than it is.
Understatement (litotes is a specific form)
A satirical imitation of a serious work or author meant to ridicule.
Parody
A lengthy comparison that extends across multiple lines or the entire work, creating an elaborate parallel between two things.
Extended Metaphor
A fixed-form poem of six stanzas with repeated end-words and a three-line envoy; known for its complexity of repetition.
Sestina
A work’s opening scene that begins in the middle of the action (Latin phrase).
In media res
A figure of speech in which a part stands for the whole or the whole for a part (e.g., "all hands on deck").
Synecdoche
A striking contrast or opposition of ideas expressed in balanced phrases (e.g., "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times").
Antithesis
A structural or interpretive method that breaks down and questions traditional assumptions about a text’s meaning, often focusing on underlying contradictions.
Deconstruction
The technique where a line of poetry runs over into the next line without terminal punctuation, creating a flowing thought across lines.
Enjambment
A narrator who cannot be fully trusted to present objective facts or motives; name a key consequence for readers.
Unreliable narrator — consequence: readers must question narrative truth and infer motives; complicates interpretation
A three-part deductive argument structure used in classical logic (often used in rhetorical analysis).
Syllogism
A complex, extended conceit associated with metaphysical poets that links seemingly disparate things in surprising ways.
Metaphysical conceit