Vocab
She salt-and-peppered the turkey, buttered, paprika-ed and nominally stuffed it.
What is in name only?
This genre aims to frighten or unsettle readers with supernatural forces or psychological terror.
What is horror?
This Japanese form features a 5–7–5 syllable pattern and often focuses on nature or seasonal imagery.
What is a haiku?
This element includes the time, place, and environment in which a story unfolds.
What is the setting?
A brief reference to a famous person, event, or work—such as “He met his Waterloo”—is known as this.
What is an allusion?
Standing with all the dignity I could muster, I said, “I’ll speak to my grandfather about it, sir, and let you know tomorrow.”
What is to gather together?
This genre retells myths, legends, and traditional stories passed down through cultural history.
What is folklore?
This type of poem is defined not by structure or rhyme but by its lack of both, relying heavily on rhythm and imagery.
What is free verse?
This element describes the organizational framework of a story, including chapters, acts, and scene arrangement.
What is structure?
This device exaggerates for emphasis, like saying “I’ve told you a million times.”
What is hyperbole?
I turned down law school and made a serendipitous decision to work on video games at Disney.
What is seeming to happen through good luck, by chance, or by “happy accident”?
This genre explores actual events, people, or facts, written to inform or explain reality.
What is nonfiction?
This 14-line poem, often written in iambic pentameter, appears in Shakespeare’s “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”
What is a sonnet?
This element occurs when opposing forces struggle, driving the story forward and shaping character decisions.
What is conflict?
When a story hints at future events, it's using this device.
What is foreshadowing?
Does my haughtiness offend you? Don't you take it awful hard ’Cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines Diggin’ in my own backyard.
What is in a proud or stuck up way?
Stories in this genre are set in the past and strive for accurate depiction of a particular time period.
What is historical fiction?
This long narrative poem celebrates heroic deeds, such as those found in “The Odyssey” and “Beowulf.”
What is an epic?
This element may be limited, objective, or omniscient, controlling what readers can know about characters’ thoughts.
What is point of view?
This device compares two unlike things using “like” or “as,” as in “her smile was like sunlight.”
What is a simile?
We conferred, then conscripted a machinist, who with our assistance hauled her ponderous cutters and blowtorches over the soft sand and set to work on the saucer.
What is forced to help?
This genre uses facts, analysis, and argument to explain or persuade, common in textbooks and reports.
What is expository writing?
This short, humorous poem from England has a distinctive AABBA rhyme scheme.
What is a limerick?
This element expresses a character’s background, emotions, and intentions, sometimes revealing secrets through subtext.
What is dialogue?
This device repeats initial consonant sounds, as in “slippery snakes slither silently.”
What is alliteration?