Handbook of Literary Terms

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Handbook of Literary Terms

Allusion—A reference to a statement, a person, a place, or an event from literature, history, religion, mythology, politics, sports, or science.

Alliteration—The repetition of the same or very similar consonant sounds in words that are close together. Example

Handbook of Literary Terms

Autobiography—The story of a person’s life, written or told by that person.

Atmosphere—The overall mood or emotion of a work of literature.

Handbook of Literary Terms

Biography—The story of a real person’s life, written or told by another person.

Handbook of Literary Terms

Character—A person or animal who takes part in the action of a story, play, or other literary work. CharacterizationStatic vs. dynamic characterMotivation

Conflict—A struggle or clash between opposing characters or opposing forces. External and internal conflict

Handbook of Literary Terms

Connotation—The feelings and associations that a word suggests.

Handbook of Literary Terms

Denotation—The literal, dictionary definition of a word.

Description—The kind of writing that creates a clear image of something, usually by using details that appeal to one or more of the senses: sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch.

Handbook of Literary Terms

Dialogue—A conversation between two or more characters. Uses of dialogueMonologue

Dialect—A way of speaking that is characteristic of a particular region or group of people. More about dialect

Handbook of Literary Terms

Drama—A story written to be acted for an audience. (A drama can also be appreciated and enjoyed in written form.) Structure of a drama

Handbook of Literary Terms

Essay—A short piece of nonfiction prose that examines a single subject. Personal essayFormal essay

Handbook of Literary Terms

Fiction—A prose account that is made up rather than true. More about fiction

Fiction—A prose account that is made up rather than true.

Fable—A brief story in prose or verse that teaches a moral or gives a practical lesson about how to get along in life.

Handbook of Literary Terms

Figure of Speech—A word or phrase that describes one thing in terms of something else and is not literally true. Figures of speech include

•Simile•Metaphor•Personification

Flashback—An interruption in the action of a plot to tell what happened at an earlier time.

Handbook of Literary Terms

Folk Tale—A story with no known author that originally was passed on from one generation to another by word of mouth.

Foreshadowing—The use of clues to suggest events that will happen later in the plot.

Free Verse—Poetry without a regular meter or rhyme scheme.

Handbook of Literary Terms

Imagery—Language that appeals to the senses.

Irony—In general, a contrast between expectation and reality. Types of irony include

•Verbal irony•Situational irony•Dramatic irony

Handbook of Literary Terms

Main Idea—The most important idea expressed in a paragraph or in an entire essay.

Metamorphosis—A marvelous change from one shape or form to another one.

Metaphor—An imaginative comparison between two unlike things in which one thing is said to be another thing. A metaphor is an important type of figurative language.Extended metaphor

Handbook of Literary Terms

Mood—The overall emotion created by a work of literature.

Motivation—Any force that drives or moves a character in a literary work to behave in a particular way.

Myth—A story that explains something about the world and typically involves gods or other superhuman beings.

Handbook of Literary Terms

Nonfiction—Prose writing that deals with real people, events, and places without changing any facts. Popular forms of nonfiction are the

•autobiography•biography•essay

Handbook of Literary Terms

Novel—A fictional story that is usually more than one hundred book pages long. A novel uses all the elements of storytelling:

•Plot•Character•Setting•Theme•Point of view

Handbook of Literary Terms

Onomatopoeia—The use of words whose sounds echo their sense. Buzz, rustle, bark, and tweet are all examples of onomatopoeia. Onomatopoeia is an important element in creating the music of poetry. Example

Handbook of Literary Terms

Personification—A figure of speech in which a nonhuman or nonliving thing or quality is talked about as if it were human or alive.

Plot—The series of related events that make up a story. Plot is what happens in a short story, novel, play, or narrative poem.Elements of plot Plot diagram

Handbook of Literary Terms

Poetry—A kind of rhythmic, compressed language that uses figures of speech and imagery designed to appeal to emotion and imagination. MeterRhymeFree verseNarrative poemLyric poem

Handbook of Literary Terms

Point of View—The vantage point from which a story is told. The most common points of view are

•Omniscient•Third-person limited•First person

Handbook of Literary Terms

Refrain—A group of words repeated at intervals in a poem, song, or speech.

Rhyme—The repetition of accented vowel sounds and all sounds following them in words close together in a poem.Example Types of rhyme

Handbook of Literary Terms

Rhythm—A musical quality produced by the repetition of stressed and unstressed syllables or by the repetition of certain other sound patterns.

Handbook of Literary Terms

Setting—The time and place in which the events of a work of literature take place.

Short Story—A fictional prose narrative that is usually ten to twenty book pages long.Plot in a short story

Simile—A comparison between two unlike things, using a word such as like, as, than, or resembles. The simile is an important type of figure of speech.

Handbook of Literary Terms

Stanza—In a poem a group of consecutive lines that forms a single unit.

Suspense—The uncertainty or anxiety you feel about what will happen next in a story.

Speaker—The voice talking in a poem—not always the same as the poet.

Handbook of Literary Terms

Symbol—A person, a place, a thing, or an event that has its own meaning and stands for something beyond itself.

Handbook of Literary Terms

Theme—The truth about life revealed in a work of literature.More about theme

Tone—The attitude that a writer takes toward the audience, a subject, or a character.

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