AP Literature and Composition Literary Terminology Abstract Language: Language describing ideas and qualities rather than observable or specific things, people, or places. The observable or “physical” is usually described in concrete language. Allegory: A story, fictional, or nonfictional, in which characters, things, and events represent qualities or concepts. The interaction of these characters, things, and events is meant to reveal an abstraction or a truth. A figurative work in which a surface narrative carries a secondary, symbolic or metaphorical meaning. In The Faerie Queene, for example, Red Cross Knight is a heroic knight in the literal narrative, but also a figure representing Everyman in the Christian journey. Many works contain allegories or are allegorical in part, but not many are entirely allegorical. Alliteration: The repetition of initial identical consonant sounds, especially into or more neighboring words. Allusion: An indirect reference to something (usually a literary text) with which the reader is supposed to be familiar. Allusion is often used with humorous intent, to establish a connection between writer and reader, or to make a subtle point. Ambiguity: Having more than one meaning, used in verbal, written, and nonverbal communication. An event or situation that may be interpreted in more than one way. Anachronism: Out of time, placing something in a time where it does not belong. Anadiplosis – the repetition of the last word of one clause at the beginning of the following clause Analogy (analogous): The comparison of two things alike in some respects. When a writer uses an analogy, he or she argues that a claim reasonable for one case is reasonable for the analogous case. Analysis: Writing that carefully examines and explores a subject with the objective of gaining understanding. Anaphora: Repetition of a word, phrase, or clause at the beginning of two or more sentences in a row. This is a deliberate form of repetition and helps make the writer’s point more coherent. Anecdote: A short, relevant narrative detailing the particulars of an event. Anecdotes are often inserted into fictional or nonfictional texts as a way of developing a point or injecting humor. Annotation: Explanatory notes added to a text to explain, cite sources, or give bibliographical data.

Antagonist: The force against the protagonist, a person, nature, or the person’s psyche Antecedent: The noun to which the pronoun refers Anthropomorphism: Figurative language that gives human motivation, characteristics, or behavior to inanimate objects, animals, or natural phenomena. Antihero: a protagonist who is particularly graceless, inept, stupid, or dishonest. Antithesis: Figure of speech, which balances two strongly contrasting or opposite words, clauses, sentences, or ideas – the juxtaposition of contrasting ideas. Ex. “Our knowledge separates as well as unites; our orders disintegrate as well as bind; our art brings us together and sets us apart.” Ex. “There was no possibility of being hired at he town’s cotton gin or lumber mill, but maybe there was a way to make the two factories work for her.” – Maya Angelou, Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My Journey Now Anastrophe: Word order is reversed or rearranged in a sentence; inversion. In English, standard word order (syntax) usually follows the subject-verb-object pattern. Adjectives ordinarily precede nouns. Deviation from normal word order signals emphasis. Ex. “Unseen in the jungle, but present are tapirs, jaguars, many species of snake and lizard, ocelots, armadillos, marmosets, howler monkeys, toucans and macaws and a hundred other birds, deer bats, peccaries, capybaras, agoutis, and sloths. Also present in this jungle, but variously distant, are Texaco derricks and pipelines, and some of the wildest Indians in the world, blowgun-using Indians, who killed missionaries in 1956 and ate them.” Aphorism: a short witty statement Apostrophe: A figure of speech that directly addresses an absent or imaginary person or a personified abstraction, such as liberty or love. The effect may add familiarity or emotional intensity. Apposition (Appositive): The placing next to a noun another noun or phrase that explains it. Ex. “Pollution, the city’s primary problem, is an issue.” Effective writers can add words or phrases to a sentence to vary the style and draw emphasis to certain parts of the sentence. An appositive is one way; parenthesis is another. Archetype: A blocked off memory of our past or of pre-human experience, a type of struggle or character to which a culture relates without prior knowledge; any image, patter, or character type that occurs frequently in literature, mythology, religion, or folklore.

Aside: speech or a remark, made by a character on stage, which is by convention heard only by the audience or by select others on stage and not all. Assonance: repetition of a vowel sound within two or more words in close proximity. Asyndeton: Commas used (with no conjunction) to separate a series of words. The parts are emphasized equally when the conjunction is omitted; in addition, the use of commas with no intervening conjunction speeds up the flow of the sentence. Asyndeton takes the form of S, Y, Z as opposed to X, Y, and Z. Ex: “I came, I saw, I conquered.” “But in a larger sense we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground.” Attitude: The author’s or speaker’s feelings toward the subject; tone. Audience: The intended receiver(s) for a speaker or writer’s message Balance: The arranging of words or phrases so that two ideas are given equal emphasis in a sentence or paragraph; a rhythm created by repeating a pattern. Ballad: a narrative poem composed in short stanzas easily performed or sung; popular ballads tell a story embodying fold wisdom or depicting heroic adventures Blank Verse: unrhymed lines of iambic pentameter Bildungsroman: A coming of age novel, the story of a person’s development; Ex: Catcher in the Rye; Adventures of Huckleberry Finn; To Kill A Mockingbird A type of novel where the protagonist is initiated into adulthood through knowledge, experience, or both, often by a process of disillusionment. Understanding comes after the dropping of preconceptions, a destruction of a false sense of security, or in some way the loss of innocence. Some of the shifts that take place are these:

• ignorance to knowledge • innocence to experience • false view of world to correct view • idealism to realism • immature responses to mature responses

Burlesque: A work designed to ridicule a style, literary form, or subject matter either by treating the exalted in a trivial way or by discussing the trivial in exalted terms (that is, with mock dignity). Burlesque concentrates on derisive imitation, usually in exaggerated terms. Literary genres (like the tragic drama) can be burlesqued, as can styles of sculpture, philosophical movements, schools of art, and so forth. See Parody, Travesty.

Cacophony: harsh or discordant sound

Caesura: a pause or break in a line of poetry Canon: an accepted literary list Carpe Diem: Literally “seize the day,” a philosophy of living for the day and not thinking of tomorrow Catharsis: A moral and spiritual cleansing you receive when watching a protagonist overcome great odds to survive. Character – flat and round: Flat is often a caricature or a stereotypical figure, one who expresses a single quality or idea. A round character may be at least two-dimensional or more fully developed psychologically. Characterization (direct/indirect): Any technique used by the author to relay the characters personality to the reader; indirect = dress, thoughts of others about the character, etc./ direct = character’s actions, thoughts, words, etc. Chiasmus: Arrangement of repeated thought sin the pattern of XYYX. The grammatical structure of the first clause or phrase is reversed in the second, sometimes repeating the same words. Ex: “And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.” Chronological: In the order of time – first, second, third. The simplest way to structure a narrative. Coherence: The arrangement of ideas in such a way that the reader can easily follow from one point to the next. Colloquial: Informal conversation; it differs in grammar, vocabulary, syntax, imagery, or commutation. Not generally acceptable for formal writing, colloquialisms give a work a conversational, familiar tone. Colloquial expressions in writing include local or regional dialects such as y’all listen up, run this by her, no way Comedy: applied to plays and films in which the protagonist or protagonists overcome adversity to reach a successful conclusion. Conceit: A type of metaphor that is strikingly odd and thoughtful, ex. love compared to a motorcycle. A conceit displays intellectual cleverness due to the unusual comparison being made. An elaborate, usually intellectually ingenious poetic comparison or image, such as an analogy or metaphor in which, say a beloved is compared to a ship, planet, etc. The comparison may be brief or extended. See Petrarchan Conceit. (Conceit is an old word for concept.) See John Donne's "Valediction: Forbidding Mourning," for example: "Let man's soul be a sphere, and then, in this, / The Intelligence that moves, devotion is." Concession: Giving credit to a claim on the opposing side of an argument.

Confidant (male)/ Confidante (female): A person who partakes little in the action, is very close to the protagonist, and hears all of the intimate secrets of the protagonist. Connotation: Rather than the dictionary definition, the associations suggested by a word. Implied meaning rather than literal meaning or denotation. Consonance: Repetition of a consonant sound within two or more words in close proximity. Contrasts: A rhetorical strategy which juxtaposes two unlike words together… homologous and analogous, meaningful and meaningless, intrinsic and superficial, inheritance and convergence, intuition and imagination, etc. Controlling Image: An image or metaphor which runs throughout the work. Couplet: two-rhyming lines Conventional: Following certain conventions, or traditional techniques of writing. An over-reliance on conventions may result in a lack of originality. The five-paragraph theme is considered conventional. Conventions: The rules and standards of a language. Cumulative or Loose Sentence: Sentence which begins with the main idea and then expands on that idea with a series of details or other particulars. Deductive Reasoning: Reasoning from the general to the specific / Inductive Reasoning goes from the specific to the general Detail: Specifically described items placed in a work for effect and meaning. Denotation: The dictionary definition or literal meaning of the word. See Connotation. Denouement: the final outcome of the main dramatic complication in a literary work Deus Ex Machina: Literally “god in the machine”. Greek idea from when the gods would come on stage to rescue the hero; now it applies to anytime the hero(s) is saved by a miraculous or improbably event. Devices: speech, syntax, diction. These stylistic elements collectively produce an effect. Diction: Word choice, particularly as an element of style. Different types and arrangements of words have significant effects on meaning. An essay written in academic diction would be much less colorful, but perhaps more precise than street slang.

Didactic: A teaching type of tone, usually lesson-like or boring in nature (like driver’s ed. films). Digression: Insertion of material not closely related to the work or subject. Doppelganger: Literally “double goes.” A mysterious twin or a double fighting against your good work.

Dystopia: Literally “bad place.” An imaginary world which was constructed to be perfect yet failed. Present tendencies are carried out to their intensely unpleasant end.

Dramatic Irony: When the reader is aware of an inconsistency between a fictional or nonfictional character’s perception of a situation and the truth of that situation. In drama, this often occurs where the reader knows something that one or more of the characters does not know. Dramatic Monologue: a special kind of lyric poem in which the speaker reveals his or her character through an extended speech or a one-way dialogue. Unlike a soliloquy, a dramatic monologue is not addressed to the audience; instead, the reader is placed in the position of overhearing the speaker’s monologue or dialogue with another whose words are not revealed. Elegy: derives from the Greek elegos, meaning “lament”; a meditative poem lamenting a death. Ellipsis: The omission of one or more words. Emotional Appeal (pathos): When a writer appeals to an audience’s emotions and desires (often through pathos – evokes pity or sorry) to excite and involve them in the argument; writer uses vivid example sand details as well as language with strong connotations to arouse the audience’s feelings. Enjambment: (also called run-on line) The running over of a sentence or thought into the next couplet or line without a pause or piece of punctuation at the end helps to obscure a rhyme scheme; each line of verse does not end with a piece of punctuation; end-stopped line is the opposite Epic: long narrative poem “celebrating episodes of a people’s heroic tradition.” An extended narrative poem recounting actions, travels, adventures, and heroic episodes and written in a high style (with ennobled diction, for example). Epigram: any terse, witty, pointed statement; commonly used to describe a short poem notable for its concision of statement, pithiness, and wit. Epigraph: A quotation or aphorism at the beginning of a literary work suggestive of theme. Epiphany: A sudden understanding or realization which prior to this was not thought of or understood.

Epitaph: a short poem or verse written in memory of someone Epithet: a word or phrase used in place of a person’s name; it is characteristic of that person: Alexander the Great, Material Girl, Ms. Know-It-All Ethical Appeal (ethos): When a writer tries to persuade the audience to respect and believe him or her based on a presentation of image of self through the text. Reputation is sometimes a factor in ethical appeals, but in all cases the aim is to gain the audience’s confidence. The character or emotions of the writer reflected in the speech or writing (ethos) to show the writer is knowledgeable, responsible, and sincere reinforces the speaker’s sincerity, sense of fairness, and reliability. Euphemism: The substitution of a mild or less negative word or phrase for a harsh or blunt one, as in the use of "pass away" instead of "die." The basic psychology of euphemistic language is the desire to put something bad or embarrassing in a positive (or at least neutral light). Thus many terms referring to death, sex, crime, and excremental functions are euphemisms. Since the euphemism is often chosen to disguise something horrifying, it can be exploited by the satirist through the use of irony and exaggeration. Euphony: pleasing or sweet sound; especially : the acoustic effect produced by words so formed or combined as to please the ear Explication: The act of interpreting or discovering the meaning of a text. Explication usually involves close reading and special attention to figurative language. Expository: A mode of writing which is used to explain something. Extended definition: Writing that offers an in-depth definition of a term in order to increase understanding; it can cover several paragraphs and include personal definitions and experiences, similes and metaphors, quotations, and even verse. Fable: a brief tale, in either prose or verse, that offers a moral lesson. Some critics like to distinguish fables, which often feature animal characters, from parables and allegories, which more often employ human characters. Farce: a light dramatic composition marked by broadly satirical comedy and improbable plot; ridiculous or empty show Figurative Language (figures of speech): A word or words that are inaccurate literally, but describe by calling to mind sensation or responses that the thing described evokes. Figurative language may be in the form of metaphors or similes, both non-literal comparisons. Flashback: A device that allows the writer to present events that happened before the time of the current narration or the current events in the fiction. Flashback techniques include memories, dreams, stories of the past told by

characters, or even authorial sovereignty. (That is, the author might simply say, "But back in Tom's youth. . . .") Flashback is useful for exposition, to fill in the reader about a character or place, or about the background to a conflict. Foil: A character in a play who sets off the main character or other characters by comparison. In Shakespeare's "Hamlet" Hamlet and Laertes are young men who behave very differently. While Hamlet delays in carrying out his mission to avenge the death of his father, Laertes is quick and bold in his challenge of the king over the death of his father. Much can be learned about each by comparing and contrasting the actions of the two.

Foot: The basic unit of meter consisting of a group of two or three syllables. Scanning or scansion is the process of determining the prevailing foot in a line of poetry, of determining the types and sequence of different feet.

Types of feet: U (unstressed); / (stressed syllable)

Iamb: U / (re peat) Trochee: / U (old er) Anapest: U U / (in te rrupt) Dactyl: / U U (o pen ly) Spondee: / / (heart break) Pyrrhic: U U (seldom appears by itself)

Foreshadowing: A method used to build suspense by providing hints of what is to come.

Frame: A narrative structure that provides a setting and exposition for the main narrative in a novel. Often, a narrator will describe where he found the manuscript of the novel or where he heard someone tell the story he is about to relate. The frame helps control the reader's perception of the work, and has been used in the past to help give credibility to the main section of the novel. Examples of novels with frames:

• Mary Shelley Frankenstein • Nathaniel Hawthorne The Scarlet Letter

Free verse: Verse that has neither regular rhyme nor regular meter. Free verse often uses cadences rather than uniform metrical feet. Genre: A particular type or category of writing; tragedy, comedy, epic, short story, historical fiction, etc.

Gothic novel: A novel in which supernatural horrors and an atmosphere of unknown terror pervades the action. The setting is often a dark, mysterious castle, where ghosts and sinister humans roam menacingly. Horace Walpole invented the genre with his Castle of Otranto. Gothic elements include these:

• Ancient prophecy, especially mysterious, obscure, or hard to understand.

• Mystery and suspense • High emotion, sentimentalism, but also pronounced anger, surprise, and

especially terror • Supernatural events (e.g. a giant, a sighing portrait, ghosts or their

apparent presence, a skeleton) • Omens, portents, dream visions • Fainting, frightened, screaming women • Women threatened by powerful, impetuous male • Setting in a castle, especially with secret passages • The metonymy of gloom and horror (wind, rain, doors grating on rusty

hinges, howls in the distance, distant sighs, footsteps approaching, lights in abandoned rooms, gusts of wind blowing out lights or blowing suddenly, characters trapped in rooms or imprisoned)

• The vocabulary of the gothic (use of words indicating fear, mystery, etc.: apparition, devil, ghost, haunted, terror, fright)

Examples:

• Horace Walpole, The Castle of Otranto • William Beckford, Vathek • Anne Radcliffe, The Mysteries of Udolpho • Mary Shelley, Frankenstein • Daphne du Maurier, Rebecca

Hamartia: Greek, from hamartanein to miss the mark, err; tragic flaw

Heroic Couplet: Two lines of rhyming iambic pentameter. Most of Alexander Pope's verse is written in heroic couplets. In fact, it is the most favored verse form of the eighteenth century. Example:

u / u / u / u / u / 'Tis hard to say, if greater want of skill u / u / u / u / u / Appear in writing or in judging ill. . . . --Alexander Pope [Note in the second line that "or" should be a stressed syllable if the meter were perfectly iambic. Iambic= a two syllable foot of one unstressed and one stressed syllable, as in the word "begin." Pentameter= five feet. Thus, iambic pentameter has ten syllables, five feet of two syllable iambs.]

Historical novel: A novel where fictional characters take part in actual historical events and interact with real people from the past.

Homily: This term literally means “sermon,” but more informally, it can include any serious talk, speech, or lecture involving moral or spiritual advice.

Horatian Satire: In general, a gentler, more good humored and sympathetic kind of satire, somewhat tolerant of human folly even while laughing at it. Named after the poet Horace, whose satire epitomized it. Horatian satire tends to ridicule human folly in general or by type rather than attack specific persons. Compare Juvenalian satire.

Hubris: Greek hybris: exaggerated pride or self-confidence

Humours: In medieval physiology, four liquids in the human body affecting behavior. Each humour was associated with one of the four elements of nature. In a balanced personality, no humour predominated. When a humour did predominate, it caused a particular personality. Here is a chart of the humours, the corresponding elements and personality characteristics:

• blood...air...hot and moist: sanguine, kind, happy, romantic • phlegm...water...cold and moist: phlegmatic, sedentary, sickly, fearful • yellow bile...fire...hot and dry: choleric, ill-tempered, impatient, stubborn • black bile...earth...cold and dry: melancholy, gluttonous, lazy,

contemplative

The Renaissance took the doctrine of humours quite seriously--it was their model of psychology--so knowing that can help us understand the characters in the literature. Falstaff, for example, has a dominance of blood, while Hamlet seems to have an excess of black bile.

Hyperbole: Conscious exaggeration used to heighten effect. Not intended literally, hyperbole is often humorous. Ex: “Four hostile newspapers are more to be feared than a thousand bayonets.” – Napoleon Bonaparte Also called Overstatement.

Idiom: A phrase or an expression that means something different from what the words actually say. An idiom is usually understandable to a particular group of people (using over his head for didn’t understand).

In Medias Res: Literally, “in the midst of things,” starting a story in the middle of the action. Later the first part will be revealed.

Independent/ Dependent Clause: Ind – a sentence which stands alone; Dep – a sentence which needs to be joined with another sentence in order to make sense

Inference: To conclude by reason an idea, attitude, tone which is not directly stated by the author

Invective: Speech or writing that abuses, denounces, or attacks. It can be directed against a person, cause, idea, or system. It employs a heavy use of negative emotive language. Example:

• I cannot but conclude the bulk of your natives to be the most pernicious race of little odious vermin that nature ever suffered to crawl upon the surface of the earth. --Swift

Inversion or inverted: Variation of the normal word order (subject first, then verb, then complement) which puts a modifier or the verb as first in the sentence. The element that appears first is emphasized more than the subject.

Invocation: the act or process of petitioning for help or support; a prayer of entreaty (as at the beginning of a service of worship)

Irony: A mode of expression, through words (verbal irony) or events (irony of situation), conveying a reality different from and usually opposite to appearance or expectation. A writer may say the opposite of what he means, create a reversal between expectation and its fulfillment, or give the audience knowledge that a character lacks, making the character's words have meaning to the audience not perceived by the character. In verbal irony, the writer's meaning or even his attitude may be different from what he says: "Why, no one would dare argue that there could be anything more important in choosing a college than its proximity to the beach." An example of situational irony would occur if a professional pickpocket had his own pocket picked just as he was in the act of picking someone else's pocket. The irony is generated by the surprise recognition by the audience of a reality in contrast with expectation or appearance, while another audience, victim, or character puts confidence in the appearance as reality (in this case, the pickpocket doesn't expect his own pocket to be picked). The surprise recognition by the audience often produces a comic effect, making irony often funny.

An example of dramatic irony (where the audience has knowledge that gives additional meaning to a character's words) would be when King Oedipus, who has unknowingly killed his father, says that he will banish his father's killer when he finds him.

Irony is the most common and most efficient technique of the satirist, because it is an instrument of truth, provides wit and humor, and is usually at least obliquely critical, in that it deflates, scorns, or attacks.

The ability to detect irony is sometimes heralded as a test of intelligence and sophistication. When a text intended to be ironic is not seen as such, the effect can be disastrous. Some students have taken Swift's "Modest Proposal" literally. And Defoe's contemporaries took his "Shortest Way with the Dissenters" literally and jailed him for it. To be an effective piece of sustained irony, there must be some sort of audience tip-off, through style, tone, use of clear exaggeration, or other device.

Juvenalian Satire: Harsher, more pointed, perhaps intolerant satire typified by the writings of Juvenal. Juvenalian satire often attacks particular people, sometimes thinly disguised as fictional characters. While laughter and ridicule are still weapons as with Horatian satire, the Juvenalian satirist also uses withering invective and a slashing attack. Swift is a Juvenalian satirist.

Juxtaposition: Placing two ideas side by side to show differences; this often creates a new, often ironic meaning. Ex. “Just remember, we’re all in this alone.” – Lily Tomlin

Lampoon: A crude, coarse, often bitter satire ridiculing the personal appearance or character of a person.

Literary quality: A judgment about the value of a novel as literature. At the heart of this issue is the question of what distinguishes a great or important novel from one that is less important. Certainly the feature is not that of interest or excitement, for pulp novels can be even more exciting and interesting than "great" novels. Usually, books that make us think--that offer insight into the human condition--are the ones we rank more highly than books that simply titillate us.

Litotes: understatement in which an affirmative is expressed by the negative of the contrary (as in "not a bad singer" or "not unhappy")

Logical appeal (logos): When a writer appeals to the reader’s sense of logic (logos) to make a case for his side of an argument; includes reasons and other types of evidence, such as facts, statistics, and expert opinions to support a position statement.

Loose Sentence/ Periotic Sentence: a type of sentence in which the main idea comes first, followed by extra information. Too many may make for a rambling essay. Period sentence is where the reader must read to the end or the period to get to the main idea.

Lyric: A short poem wherein the poet expresses an emotion or illuminates some life principle.

Malapropism: the usually unintentionally humorous misuse or distortion of a word or phrase; the use of a word sounding somewhat like the one intended but ludicrously wrong in the context

Melodrama: a work (as a movie or play) characterized by extravagant theatricality and by the predominance of plot and physical action over characterization

Metaphor: Saying one thing in terms of something else. A direct comparison of two things, often unrelated.

Meter: The rhythmic pattern produced when words are arranged so that their stressed and unstressed syllables fall into a more or less regular sequence, resulting in repeated patterns of accent (called feet). See feet and versification.

Metonymy: Literally means “changed label” or “substitute name.” The substitution of the name of an object with a word closely associated with it. Ex. The White House for the Presidency ; bowing to the sceptered isle. (Great Britain)

Microcosm: Literally “small world:” representing an entire idea through a small situation or conflict.

Miracle and Morality Plays: Miracle play is a medieval drama based on Biblical events (creation, the Flood, the life of Christ, and so on) or on the life of a saint or martyr. The term is also used for any type of religious drama in the medieval period. A Morality play is a type of allegorical drama (15th century) making a moral or religious point. It gives appreciable shape to abstract concepts.

Mock Epic: Treating a frivolous or minor subject seriously, especially by using the machinery and devices of the epic (invocations, descriptions of armor, battles, extended similes, etc.). The opposite of travesty.

Mock heroic: ridiculing or burlesquing heroic style, character, or action; lampoons the motifs and conventions of the traditional epic by treating an insignificant or mundane action as though it were an heroic event.

Mood/Atmosphere: The emotional feeling of the setting, something like tone but specifically related to setting. Often created through syntax and diction.

Moral: The lesson drawn from a fictional or nonfictional story. A heavily didactic story.

Motif: A simple device that serves as a basis for an expanded narrative; the motif is a recurring feature in the work.

Narration: Writing that tells a story or recounts an event.

Narrative Devices: The ordering of events, withholding information until a climactic moment, and all tools the storyteller uses to progress the story line.

Narrative Technique: The “style” of the story, concentrates on the writer’s order of events and details.

Objective: A tone of fairness and even discussion of a subject; it usually suggests that there is distance between the author and the subject being discussed. Be careful, this tone can also be cold and impersonal. Hard news journalism is frequently prized for its objectivity; although even fictional stories can be told without a writer rendering personal judgment.

Ode: type of lyric poem, spoken by a single voice. Typically marked by its serious tone, exalted themes, dignified language, and imaginative thoughts.

Oedipus/ Electra Complex (female equivalent): psychoanalytic term, employed by Sigmund Freud, for a child’s attraction to the parent of the opposite sex and resentment toward or jealousy of the parent of the same sex. Freud named the complex after Oedipus in Sophocles’ tragedy Oedipus the King, who unwittingly kills his father and married his mother.

Onomatopoeia: The use of a word who pronunciation suggests its meaning. “Buzz,” “hiss,” “slam,” and “pop” are examples.

Oversimplification: When a writer obscures or denies the complexity of the issues in an argument.

Oxymoron: A rhetorical antithesis; a self-contradictory combination of words Juxtaposing two contradictory terms, like “wise fool,” “eloquent silence,” “war for peace,” “black light,”, “controlled chaos.”

Parable: a simple story illustrating a moral or religious lesson

Paradox: A seemingly contradictory statement which is actually true. This rhetorical device is often used for emphasis or simply to attract attention. Ex. “The miniature metal toy cars of the 1960s are no longer playthings,” “The Child is father of the Man,” “It was the best of time, it was the worst of times,” “Nowadays the people know the price of everything, and the value of nothing.”

Parallelism: Sentence construction which places in close proximity two or more equal grammatical constructions. The effects of parallelism are numerous, but frequently, they act as an organizing force to attract the reader’s attention, add emphasis and organization, or simply provide a musical rhythm. Ex. “All this waste happens before any lid is popped, any can is opened, or any seal is broken.”

Parody: A satiric imitation of a work or of an author with the idea of ridiculing the author, his ideas, or work. The parodist exploits the peculiarities of an author's expression--his propensity to use too many parentheses, certain favorite words, or whatever. The parody may also be focused on, say, an improbable plot with too many convenient events. Fielding's Shamela is, in large part, a parody of Richardson's Pamela. Pastoral: A literary work that has to do with shepherds and rustic settings. Christopher Marlowe's "The Passionate Shephard to His Love" and Robert Burns' "Sweet Afton" are examples. Pedantic: Bookish and scholarly in tone, often boring and dull due to little interest on the part of the listener.

Persona: The person or mask created by the author to tell a story. Whether the story is told by an omniscient narrator or by a character in it, the actual author of the work often distances himself from what is said or told by adopting a persona--a personality different from his real one. Thus, the attitudes, beliefs, and degree of understanding expressed by the narrator may not be the same as those of the actual author. Some authors, for example, use narrators who are not very bright in order to create irony.

Personification: A figure of speech in which something nonhuman is given human characteristics. Ex. “And what I remember next is how the moon, the pale moon with its one yellow eye… stared through the pink plastic curtain.” – Sandra Cisneros, “One Holy Night”

Petrarchan Conceit: The kind of conceit (see above) used by Italian Renaissance poet Petrarch and popular in Renaissance English sonnets. Eyes like stars or the sun, hair like golden wires, lips like cherries, etc. are common examples. Oxymorons are also common, such as freezing fire, burning ice, etc.

Point of view or perspective: A piece of literature contains a speaker who is speaking either in the first person, telling things from his or her own perspective, or in the third person, telling things from the perspective of an onlooker. The perspective used is called the Point of View, and is referred to either as first person or third person. If the speaker knows everything including the actions, motives, and thoughts of all the characters, the speaker is referred to as omniscient (all-knowing). If the speaker is unable to know what is in any character's mind but his or her own, this is called limited omniscience Other ways of telling the story are: an acquaintance of one of the characters in the story, or a chronicler of past events, or an uninvolved eyewitness, or a commentator on social trends, or a defender of a popular figure, etc.

Polysyndeton: Sentence which uses and or another conjunction (with no comma) to separate the items in a series. Polysyndeton appears in the form of X and Y and Z, stressing equally each member of the series. It makes the sentence slower and the items more emphatic than in the asyndeton.

Position paper: Writing that takes a particular stance on a noteworthy issue (based on extensive analysis), aiming to inform and explain rather than persuade.

Premise: A statement or point that serves as the basis of a discussion or debate.

Prose: Writing or speaking in the usual or ordinary form; technically anything that isn’t poetry or drama is prose.

Protagonists: The hero or central character of a literary work. In accomplishing his or her objective, the protagonist is hindered by some opposing force either human (one of Batman's antagonists is The Joker), animal (Moby Dick is Captain Ahab's antagonist in Herman Melville's "Moby Dick"), or

natural (the sea is the antagonist which must be overcome by Captain Bligh in Nordhoff and Hall's "Men Against the Sea," the second book in the trilogy which includes "Mutiny on the Bounty").

Pseudonym: A "false name" or alias used by a writer desiring not to use his or her real name. Sometimes called a nom de plume or "pen name," pseudonyms have been popular for several reasons.

Pun: A play on words wherein a word is used to convey two meanings at the same time. The line below, spoken by Mercutio in Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet," is an example of a pun. Mercutio has just been stabbed, knows he is dying and says:

Ask for me tomorrow and you shall find me a grave man.

Mercutio's use of the word "grave' renders it capable of two meanings: a serious person or a corpse in his grave.

Quatrain: A four-line stanza which may be rhymed or unrhymed

Realism: Being as close to reality as possible. Realistic works depict the reality of the harsh world and the effects upon the luckless protagonist.

Refrain: a regularly recurring phrase or verse especially at the end of each stanza or division of a poem or song

Repetition: Word, sound, phrase, idea; used for emphasis. Always pay attention to repetition in writing. The author is trying to tell you something.

Rhetoric: The art of effective communication, especially persuasive discourse. Rhetoric focuses on the interrelationship of invention, arrangement, and style to create felicitous and appropriate discourse. Rhetorical Modes are exposition, argumentation, description, narration.

Rhetorical Features: All of the parts of tone: diction, imagery, details, language, and sentence structure.

Rhetorical Shift: Changing from one tone, attitude, or distance to another.

Rhetorical Question: A question that is not meant to be answered but provided to provoke reflective thought

Rhyme: The similarity between syllable sounds at the end of two or more lines. Some kinds of rhyme (also spelled rime) include:

• Approximate rhyme: rhyme that is close but not exact (again and rain) • Couplet: a pair of lines rhyming consecutively. • End rhyme: the rhyme is at the end of the line

• Eye rhyme: words whose spellings would lead one to think that they rhymed (slough, tough, cough, bough, though, hiccough. Or: love, move, prove. Or: daughter, laughter.)

• Feminine rhyme: two syllable rhyme consisting of stressed syllable followed by unstressed.

• Internal rhyme: When one of the rhyming words occurs in a place in the line other than at the end

• Masculine rhyme: similarity between terminally stressed syllables. • Half rhyme: occurs when the final consonants rhyme, but the vowel

sounds do not (chill-Tulle; Day-Eternity)

Rhythm: Recurrences of stressed and unstressed syllables at equal intervals, similar to meter.

Ridicule: Words intended to belittle a person or idea and arouse contemptuous laughter. The goal is to condemn or criticize by making the thing, idea, or person seem laughable and ridiculous. It is one of the most powerful methods of criticism, partly because it cannot be satisfactorily answered ("Who can refute a sneer?") and partly because many people who fear nothing else--not the law, not society, not even God--fear being laughed at. (The fear of being laughed at is one of the most inhibiting forces in western civilization. It provides much of the power behind the adolescent flock urge and accounts for many of the barriers to change and adventure in the adult world.) Ridicule is, not surprisingly, a common weapon of the satirist.

Romance: An extended fictional prose narrative about improbable events involving characters that are quite different from ordinary people. Knights on a quest for a magic sword and aided by characters like fairies and trolls would be examples of things found in romance fiction.

Sarcasm: A form of sneering criticism in which disapproval is often expressed as ironic praise. (Oddly enough, sarcastic remarks are often used between friends, perhaps as a somewhat perverse demonstration of the strength of the bond--only a good friend could say this without hurting the other's feelings, or at least without excessively damaging the relationship, since feelings are often hurt in spite of a close relationship. If you drop your lunch tray and a stranger says, "Well, that was really intelligent," that's sarcasm. If your girlfriend or boyfriend says it, that's love--I think.)

Satire: A literary mode based on criticism of people and society through ridicule. The satirist aims to reduce the practices attacked by laughing scornfully at them--and being witty enough to allow the reader to laugh, also. Ridicule, irony, exaggeration, and several other techniques are almost always present. The satirist may insert serious statements of value or desired behavior, but most often he relies on an implicit moral code, understood by his audience and paid lip service by them. The satirist's goal is to point out the hypocrisy of his target in the hope that either the target or the audience will return to a real following of the code. Thus, satire is inescapably moral even when no explicit values are promoted in the work, for the satirist works within the framework of

a widely spread value system. Many of the techniques of satire are devices of comparison, to show the similarity or contrast between two things. A list of incongruous items, an oxymoron, metaphors, and so forth are examples.

Scansion: A close, critical reading of a poem, examining the work for meter.

Sentence Structure: Analyzing sentence structure asks that you look at sentence length, simple, compound, complex; unusual phrases, repetition ,altered word order

Sestina: a lyrical fixed form consisting of six 6-line usually unrhymed stanzas in which the end words of the first stanza recur as end words of the following five stanzas in a successively rotating order and as the middle and end words of the three verses of the concluding tercet

Setting: The total environment for the action of a fictional work. Setting includes time period (such as the 1890's), the place (such as downtown Warsaw), the historical milieu (such as during the Crimean War), as well as the social, political, and perhaps even spiritual realities. The setting is usually established primarily through description, though narration is used also. Simile: A comparison of two things using “like” or “as” (figurative language) Soliloquy: In drama, a moment when a character is alone and speaks his or her thoughts aloud. In the line "To be, or not to be, that is the question:" which begins the famous soliloquy from Act 3, scene 1 of Shakespeare's "Hamlet" Hamlet questions whether or not life is worth living, and speaks of the reasons why he does not end his life.

Sonnet: A fourteen line poem, usually in iambic pentameter, with a varied rhyme scheme. The two main types of sonnet are the Petrarchan (or Italian) and the Shakespearean. The Petrarchan Sonnet is divided into two main sections, the octave (first eight lines) and the sestet (last six lines). The octave presents a problem or situation which is then resolved or commented on in the sestet, a stanza or a poem of six lines. The most common rhyme scheme is A-B-B-A A-B-B-A C-D-E C-D-E, though there is flexibility in the sestet, such as C-D-C D-C-D.

The Shakespearean Sonnet, (perfected though not invented by Shakespeare), contains three quatrains and a couplet, with more rhymes (because of the greater difficulty finding rhymes in English). The most common rhyme scheme is A-B-A-B C-D-C-D E-F-E-F G-G. In Shakespeare, the couplet often undercuts the thought created in the rest of the poem.

Spatial: The distance between characters, ideas, and things within the story. Careful, a character can be close physically to a person but emotionally distant. Therefore, language, and in movies and theater body language, explains the distance.

Spondee: A metrical pattern characterized by two or more successively-placed accented syllables. In the following example from Shakespeare's "Othello," Othello's sleep has been disturbed by a fight. He angrily demands to know who started the fight that disturbed him. Not receiving an immediate answer he says:

This is the first instance in the play where Othello shows that he can be ruled by his emotions. The spondee in the first three feet (followed by an iamb in the remaining feet) reminds the reader of a bowstring being drawn back before the arrow flies, or of a bull pawing the ground before charging. This is the use of literary devices: to draw the reader's attention to some noteworthy phenomenon within the literary work, either to illuminate or to intensify.

Stanza: A major subdivision in a poem. A stanza of two lines is called a couplet; a stanza of three lines is called a triplet; a stanza of four lines is called a quatrain; five lines is a quintet; six lines is a sestet; seven lines is a septet; eight lines is a octave.

Stream of Consciousness: * phrase used by William James in 1890 to describe the unbroken flow of thought and awareness of the waking mind * a special mode of narration that undertakes to capture the full spectrum and the continuous flow of a character's mental process * sense perceptions mingle with conscious and half-conscious thoughts and memories, experiences, feelings and random associations * in a literary context used to describe the narrative method where novelists describe the unspoken thoughts and feelings of their characters without resorting to objective description or conventional dialogue * Eduard Dujardin's Les lauriers sont coupés credited by Joyce as the first example of this technique * ‘interior monologue' an alternate term

Style: The manner of expression of a particular writer, produced by choice of words, grammatical structures, use of literary devices, and all the possible parts of language use. Some general styles might include scientific, ornate, plain, emotive. Most writers have their own particular styles.

Stylistic Devices: When analyzing stylistic devices, the reader must find the best combination of the elements of language to discuss: tone, syntax, attitude, figures of speech, repetition in tone, especially connotations.

Subjective: Expressing in a personal manner your convictions, beliefs, and ideas. When this subjective response occurs, it is likely to be emotional.

Subordinate Clause: Like all clauses, this word group contains both a subject and a verb (plus any accompanying phrases or modifiers), but unlike the independent clause , the subordinate clause cannot stand alone; it does not express a complete thought. Also called “dependent’ clause, the subordinate clause depends on a main clause, sometimes called an independent clause, to complete its meaning. Easily recognized key words and phrases usually begin these clauses—for examples: although, because, unless, if, even though, since, as soon as, while, who, when, where, how, and that.

Subplot: A subordinate or minor collection of events in a novel or drama. Most subplots have some connection with the main plot, acting as foils to, commentary on, complications of, or support to the theme of, the main plot. Sometimes two opening subplots merge into a main plot.

Symbol: Something that on the surface is its literal self but which also has another meaning or even several meanings. For example, a sword may be a sword and also symbolize justice. A symbol may be said to embody an idea. There are two general types of symbols: universal symbols that embody universally recognizable meanings wherever used, such as light to symbolize knowledge, a skull to symbolize death, etc., and constructed symbols that are given symbolic meaning by the way an author uses them in a literary work, as the white whale becomes a symbol of evil in Moby Dick. Ex. “hourglass = time passing” and “dove = peace”

Synecdoche: A figure of speech wherein a part of something represents the whole thing. In this figure, the head of a cow might substitute for the whole cow. Therefore, a herd of fifty cows might be referred to as "fifty head of cattle." In Alfred Lord Tennyson's "Ulysses" Ulysses refers to his former companions as free hearts, free foreheads- Ex. “Idle hand are the devil’s playground.” (Hands represent the person.”

Synopsis: A summary of the main points of a story or essay

Syntax: The physical arrangement of words in a sentence

Syntactic Permutation: Sentence structures that are extraordinarily complex and involved. Often difficult for a reader to follow

Theater of the Absurd: story lines focus on the ideas of a spiritual alienation; feeling “out of tune” with the universe in which one exists. Often the reader is confronted with seemingly unintelligible plots and characters who speak and behave irrationally.

Theme: the insight into human life/ experiences gained from reading a story

Thesis statement: a statement of the purpose, intent, or main idea of an essay. Often this sentence is the last sentence of the introductory paragraph.

Tone: The writer's attitude toward his readers and his subject; his mood or moral view. A writer can be formal, informal, playful, ironic, and especially, optimistic or pessimistic. While both Swift and Pope are satirizing much the same subjects, there is a profound difference in their tone.

Tragedy: According to A. C. Bradley, a tragedy is a type of drama which is pre-eminently the story of one person, the hero. "Romeo and Juliet" and "Antony and Cleopatra" depart from this, however, and we may view both characters in each play as one protagonist. The story depicts the trouble part of the hero's life in which a total reversal of fortune comes upon a person who formerly stood in high degree, apparently secure, sometimes even happy. The suffering and calamity in a tragedy are exceptional, since they befall a conspicuous person, e. g., Macbeth is a noble at first, then a king; Hamlet is a prince; Oedipus is a king. Moreover, the suffering and calamity spread far and wide until the whole scene becomes a scene of woe. The story leads up to and includes the death (in Shakespearean tragedy) or moral destruction (in Sophoclean tragedy) of the protagonist.

Aristotelian Definition of Tragedy Aristotelean defined tragedy as "the imitation of an action that is serious and also, as having magnitude, complete in itself." It incorporates "incidents arousing pity and fear, wherewith to accomplish the catharsis of such emotions." The tragic hero will most effectively evoke both our pity and terror if he is neither thoroughly good nor thoroughly evil but a combination of both. The tragic effect will be stronger if the hero is "better than we are," in that he is of higher than ordinary moral worth. Such a man is shown as suffering a change in fortune from happiness to misery because of a mistaken act, to which he is led by his hamartia (his "effort of judgment") or, as it is often literally translated, his tragic flaw. One common form of hamartia in Greek tragedies was hubris, that "pride" or overweening self-confidence which leads a protagonist to disregard a divine warning or to violate an important law Definition of a Tragic Hero A tragic hero has the potential for greatness but is doomed to fail. He is trapped in a situation where he cannot win. He makes some sort of tragic flaw, and this causes his fall from greatness. Even though he is a fallen hero, he still wins a moral victory, and his spirit lives on.

TRAGIC HEROES ARE: BORN INTO NOBILITY: RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR OWN FATE ENDOWED WITH A TRAGIC FLAW DOOMED TO MAKE A SERIOUS ERROR IN JUDGEMENT EVENTUALLY, TRAGIC HEROES FALL FROM GREAT HEIGHTS OR HIGH ESTEEM REALIZE THEY HAVE MADE AN IRREVERSIBLE MISTAKE FACES AND ACCEPTS DEATH WITH HONOR MEET A TRAGIC DEATH FOR ALL TRAGIC HEROES THE AUDIENCE IS AFFECTED BY PITY and/or FEAR

Tragicomedy: a drama or a situation blending tragic and comic elements

Transition: A word or phrase that links different ideas. Dominant technique (rhetorical device)using words like first, second, then, later, etc. to tie paragraph parts together. Another type of transition is the repeating of certain key words or ideas from the previous paragraph.

Travesty: A work that treats a serious subject frivolously-- ridiculing the dignified. Often the tone is mock serious and heavy handed.

Trochee: A metrical pattern in a line of poetry characterized by one stressed syllable followed by one unstressed syllable. The opening line to Vachel Lindsay's "General William Booth Enters into Heaven" provides an example:

Understatement (litotes): A statement which lessens or minimizes the importance of what is meant. For example, if one were in a desert where the temperature was 125 degrees, and if one wee to describe thermal conditions saying "It's a little warm today." that would be an understatement. In Shakespeare's "Macbeth," Macbeth, having murdered his friend Banquo,

understates the number of people who have been murdered since the beginning of time by saying "Blood hath been shed ere now."

Universal: A topic or an idea that applies to everyone; great to use this method in construction a conclusion in an essay

Unreliable narrator: one who gives his or her own understanding of a story, instead of the explanation and interpretation the author wishes the audience to obtain. This type of action tends to alter the audience’s opinion of the conclusion. An author quite famous for using unreliable narrators is Henry James. James is said to make himself an inconsistent and distorting “center of consciousness” in his work, because of his frequent usage of deluding or deranged narrators. They are very noticeable in his novella The Turn of the Screw, and also in his short story, “The Aspern Papers.” The Turn of the Screw is a story based solely on the consistency of the Governess’s description of the events that happen. Being aware of unreliable narrators are essential, especially when you have to describe the characters and their actions to others, since the narrator, unreliable as they are, abandons you without the important guidance to make trustworthy judgments.

Usage: The way in which people use language; language is generally considered to be standard (formal and informal) or nonstandard.

Utopian novel: A novel that presents an ideal society where the problems of poverty, greed, crime, and so forth have been eliminated. Examples:

• Thomas More, Utopia • Samuel Butler, Erewhon • Edward Bellamy, Looking Backward

Verisimilitude: How fully the characters and actions in a work of fiction conform to our sense of reality. To say that a work has a high degree of verisimilitude means that the work is very realistic and believable--it is "true to life.". Verse: a line of poetry.

Versification or Verse: Is a metric line of poetry. It is named according to the kind and number of feet composing it. See list below.

• Monometer: 1 foot • Dimeter: 2 feet • Trimeter: 3 feet • Tetrameter: 4 feet • Pentameter: 5 feet • Hexameter: 6 feet • Heptameter: 7 feet • Octameter: 8 feet • Nonameter: 9 feet

The most common verse in English poetry is iambic pentameter. See foot for more information.

Villanelle: a chiefly French verse form running on two rhymes and consisting typically of five tercets and a quatrain in which the first and third lines of the opening tercet recur alternately at the end of the other tercets and together as the last two lines of the quatrain

Voice: a term used to discuss a discernible authorial presence, even in works in which the author is not the narrator or speaker. The author’s notable or signature “style.”