Ap Lit. Flashcards

Front 1

APOSTROPHE

Back 1

A figure of speech; a noun, idea, or deceased person is addressed as if present and capable of understanding.

Example: "To Autumn"

Front 2

BALLAD

Back 2

A short, narrative poem written in "song-like" stanzas.

Example: "La Belle Dame sans Merci"

Front 3

CAESURA

Back 3

A break/pause in a line of poetry; based on the natural rhythm of the language.

Example: Prologue to The Centerbury Tales"

Front 4

CONCEIT

Back 4

An elaborate (and long) figurative device of a fanciful kind; metaphor, simile, hyperbole, or oxymoron.

Example: "The Guitar"

Front 5

COUPLETS

Back 5

Two successive lines linked by rhyme; usually in the same meter.

Example: Shakespeare, general.

Front 6

ELEGY

Back 6

(Versus the speech EULOGY) A poem of mourning.

Front 7

ENJAMBMENT

Back 7

Running on; The end of a line runs into the beginning of the next for a specific effect.

Example: "The Schoolchildren"

Front 8

EPIC

Back 8

A long, narrative poem about a warrior or hero.

Example: "Beowulf;" "Odyssey."

Front 9

HEROIC COUPLET

Back 9

A rhymed decasyllabic; almost always in iambic pentameter.

Example: "Mac Flecknoe"

Front 10

METONYMY

Back 10

Figure of speech; significant detail of an experience represents the whole experience.

Example: "The White House"

Front 11

ODE

Back 11

A lyric poem with an elaborate stanza-structure; formal.

Example: "Ode on a Grecian Urn"

Front 12

ENGLISH-SHAKESPEAREAN SONNET

Back 12

ababcdcdefefgg; three quatrains of thought/examples/metaphors with a closing couplet.

Example: "That Time of Year"

Front 13

ITALIAN-PETRARCHAN SONNET

Back 13

abbaabba + any sestet arrangement (cdcdcd; ceded); Octave presents situation, sestet presents conclusion.

Front 14

STANZA

Back 14

A poem-paragraph.

Front 15

SYNECHDOCHE

Back 15

Figure of speech; a part is used a whole; has to be attached to the whole poem.

Front 16

VILLANELLE

Back 16

A poem with five three-lined stanzas (tercets) and a final quatrain; repetition of a line.

Example: "Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night."

Front 17

ALLITERATION

Back 17

Close repetitions of the initial consonant sounds of accentuated syllables or important words.

Front 18

ASSONANCE

Back 18

Close repetitions of vowel sounds of accented syllables of important words.

Front 19

BLANK VERSE

Back 19

An unrhymed iambic pentameter

Example: Shakespearean tragedies

Front 20

CONSONANCE

Back 20

Close repetition of final consonant sounds of accented syllables or important words.

Front 21

FEET METER

Back 21

Iambic: inter

Trochee: enter

Anapest: intervene

Dactyl: enterprise

Spondee: True - blue

Front 22

FREE VERSE

Back 22

Non-metrical verse; no fixed metrical pattern.

Front 23

ALLEGORY

Back 23

A story in verse or prose with two meanings: a surface meaning and underlying meaning; considered a system of comparisons; emphasis is on the meanings vs the images; meanings are fixed.

Front 24

ALLUSION

Back 24

A reference to another work of art, person, or event. Considered an ideal to the reader to share a comparison with the author.

Example: "Heart of Darkness;" "Sula;" "Hamlet"

Front 25

ANALOGY

Back 25

Comparing two things that are alike.

Front 26

ARCHETYPE

Back 26

Image, story pattern, or character type that has societal/unconscious connections with the reader, and tend to be universal.

Example: Wicked With VS Princess, Don Juan VS Virgin, etc.

Front 27

CONNOTATION

Back 27

The suggestion of a word, disregarding the textbook meaning.

Example: Cockroach; disgusting connotation but a scientific textbook meaning.

Front 28

DICTION

Back 28

The word choice of a writer.

Front 29

DIDACTIC

Back 29

A boring in nature teacher-like tone.

Example: (how you always fell asleep in Eby's class. :( )

Front 30

DENOTATION

Back 30

The literal meaning of a word, disregarding the words connotation.

Example: Death; looking at the scientific definition and ignoring the highly emotive feeling toward it.

Front 31

EPIPHANY

Back 31

A revelation, changes the world-veiw of the person. A sudden insight of joy, light, or love.

Example: Reading "Of Mice & Men" for the first time.

Front 32

ETHOS (ETHICS)

Back 32

The character, emotions, dispositions, and/or attitude of an author reflected through their writing.

Example: Peter Schaffer in "Equus" believes that society, and not the individual, creates the boundaries of madness or insanity.

Front 33

FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

Back 33

Writing that uses metaphors, smiles, symbols, personification, onomatopoeia, synecdoche, and metonymy.

Example: Works of literary merit (Persuasion, Sula, Equus, Hamlet, etc.)

Front 34

HYPERBOLE

Back 34

To, for emphasis' sake, over exaggerate.

Example: Izzy Ochocki is as talented as Laura Osness.

Front 35

IMAGERY

Back 35

The use of language to represent objects, actions, feelings, thoughts, ideas, states of mind, and any sensory details.

Example: "Meeting at Night" by Robert Browning

Front 36

IRONY

Back 36

A mode of expression that is unexpected; to detect it is seen as a sign of intelligence. One should say the opposite of what one means. VERBAL is when the author says the opposite of how she feels. SITUATIONAL is when something unexpected occurs (picker pocket). DRAMATIC is when the audience has knowledge that the character does not.

Front 37

LITOTES

Back 37

Often a double-negative and the opposite of hyperbole; an understatement.

Example: "Well, Izzy isn't not good when it comes to AP Lit..."

Front 38

MOOD (ATMOSPHERE)

Back 38

Like tone, but specifically related to setting.

Example: Rain at a funeral.

Front 39

OXYMORON

Back 39

A self-contradictory collection of words.

Example: Jumbo Shrimp; Baby Man.

Front 40

PARADOX

Back 40

An oxymoron that contains a conflicting and opposite truth.

Example: "The saddest man laughs the most."

Front 41

POINT OF VIEW

Back 41

Position of the narrator in relation to their story. OMNISCIENT; third person, most flexible, narrator freedom. The limited of this; third person by one character. FIRST; character driven, no author interaction. OBJECTIVE; Narrator can go as they wish but only hear/see characters.

Example: "Persuasion" was objective because you saw a lot of characters but didn't hear a lot of thought.

Front 42

SETTING

Back 42

Combo. of place, time, and environment. Determines atmosphere and tone.

Front 43

SIMILE

Back 43

Comparison between two things using "like, as, than, similar to, resembles, or seems."

Example: Taylor Swift is like a snake.

Front 44

STREAM OF CONCSIOUSNESS

Back 44

Writing reflects a flow of thoughts, memories, and feelings; way to make meaning of a fragmented world.

Example: "Sula" by Toni Morrison; Nel's train of thought after Sula's betrayal.

Front 45

SYNTAX

Back 45

The physical arrangement of words in a sentence or line.

Front 46

THEME

Back 46

Controlling idea of a piece of writing; comment about life.

Front 47

TONE

Back 47

The reflection of an authors attitude, manner, mood, or moral outlook on their work.

Example: Jane Austen's writing is formal and optimistic.

Front 48

ANTAGONIST

Back 48

Character fighting against the protagonist.

Example: Sula to Nel in Toni Morrison's "Sula."

Front 49

BILDUNGSROMAN

Back 49

A novel with coming of age, education, or upbringing subjects.

Examples: Sula; Equus.

Front 50

CONFLICT

Back 50

Tension of opposition between characters, either internal or external.

Example: Hamlet and Claudius, Sule and Nel, Frank and Dora.

Front 51

FORESHADOW

Back 51

The technique or arranging of events and information that the audience will be prepared for later events in a narrative.

Examples: Polonius stating how he played Ceaser, and how Brutus killed him, and then he died being stabbed by Hamlet.

Front 52

MOTIF

Back 52

A dominant idea that reoccurs in a work. Could be a character, image, or verbal pattern.

Example: Yellow vs Gold in Gatsby.

Front 53

PROTAGONIST

Back 53

The principle character in a work of literature, equated to being the hero.

Example: Dysart (?) in Equus.

Front 54

DRAMATIC MONOLOGUE

Back 54

One imaginary speaker addressing an imaginary audience.

Example: Hamlet's Soliloquies.

Front 55

IAMB

Back 55

An unaccented symbol followed by an accented.

Example: rehearse

Front 56

ONOMATOPOEIA

Back 56

Words that mimic sounds.

Example: POP! BAM!

Front 57

RYTHM

Back 57

Any wavelike reoccurrence of motion or sound.

Front 58

CATHARSIS

Back 58

Aristotle; "Tragedy through pity and fear..."

Example: Oedipus(?)

Front 59

HAMARTIA

Back 59

Judgement simply rooting in prejudice/ignorance.

Example: Frank about his son Alan and his passions/problems.

Front 60

TRAGEDY

Back 60

Aristotle; "For drama, to imitate a serious and action that holds grounding."

Example: Hamlet, Equus.

Front 61

SOLILOQUY

Back 61

A speech in which a character is alone on stage talking about their thoughts.

Example: Dysart talking about his dreams and how he feels about his work.

Front 62

ASIDE

Back 62

A few words or short passage that is spoken as an undertone or to the audience.

Example: Chorus' in Greek Tragedies or Shakespeare.

Front 63

PLOT

Back 63

The main events of a play, novel, movie, etc.

Front 64

CHARACTER

Back 64

The mental and moral qualities in an individual in a work.

Examples: Hamlet in "Hamlet," Alan in "Equus."

Front 65

METAPHOR

Back 65

A figure of speech in which a word or phrase is applied to an object or action to which it is not literally applicable; a thing regarded as representative or symbolic of something else, especially something abstract.

Example: She roared at him.

Front 66

SYMBOL

Back 66

A mark or character used as a conventional representation of an object, function, or process.

Example: Dysart is a symbol for maturity and restrictiveness.

Front 67

PERSONIFICATION

Back 67

The attribution of a personal nature or human characteristics to something nonhuman, or the representation of an abstract quality in human form.

Example: The air breathed in the smoke from the fire.

Front 68

QUATRAIN

Back 68

A stanza of four lines, having alternate rhymes.

Example: "Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening" by Robert Frost.

Front 69

SPEAKER

Back 69

In poetry, the speaker is the voice behind the poem—the person we imagine to be saying the thing out loud.

Example: like in TPS-FASST; you need to understand the speaker to better understand the themes.

Front 70

PENTAMETER

Back 70

A line of verse consisting of five metrical feet, or (in Greek and Latin verse) of two halves each of two feet and a long syllable.

Example: Holy Sonnet XIV by John Donne

Front 71

EXPOSITION

Back 71

A literary device used to introduce background information about events, settings, characters etc. to the audience or readers. The word comes from the Latin language and its literal meaning is “a showing forth.” Exposition is crucial to any story, for without it nothing makes sense.

Example: Toni Morrison's narrative in "Sula."

Front 72

HERO

Back 72

A hero (masculine) or heroine (feminine) is a person or main character of a literary work who, in the face of danger, combats adversity through impressive feats of ingenuity, bravery or strength, often sacrificing their own personal concerns for a greater good.

Example: Beowulf, Odyssey.

Front 73

ANTI-HERO

Back 73

...fascinating characters who have appeared in literature, in film, and on stage for centuries. An antihero is a protagonist or other notable figure who is conspicuously lacking in heroic qualities. A protagonist is the lead character in a story, the one we root for, the one we follow.

Example: Sula (?)

Front 74

PATHETIC FALLACY

Back 74

A literary term for the attributing of human emotion and conduct to all aspects within nature. It is a kind of personification that is found in poetic writing.

Example: clouds seem sullen, when leaves dance, or when rocks seem indifferent.

Front 75

SATIRE

Back 75

A technique employed by writers to expose and criticize foolishness and corruption of an individual or a society by using humor, irony, exaggeration or ridicule. It intends to improve humanity by criticizing its follies and foibles.

Example: The Onion.

Front 76

VERISIMILITUDE

Back 76

The extent to which the literary text is believable, or the extent to which it imitates life. Even when stories are far-fetched, such as with science fiction, readers must be willing to "suspend disbelief" and think that the story could actually occur.

Front 77

FOIL

Back 77

Two characters that contrast each other.

Examples: Nel and Sula.

Front 78

DENOUEMENT

Back 78

A literary device which can be defined as the resolution of the issue of a complicated plot in fiction. Majority of the examples of denouement show the resolution in the final part or chapter that is often an epilogue.

Example: Dysart in Equus, Horatio/War Leader in Hamlet.

Front 79

EXPOSITORY

Back 79

Non-fiction writing.

Example: articles.

Front 80

LOGOS

Back 80

A literary device that can be defined as a statement, sentence or argument used to convince or persuade the targeted audience by employing reason or logic. In everyday life, arguments depend upon pathos and ethos besides logos.

Example: Statistics, Facts, etc.

Front 81

PATHOS

Back 81

A quality of an experience in life or a work of art that stirs up emotions of pity, sympathy and sorrow.

Example: Perhaps Hamlet's argument for wanting to avenge his father and kill Claudius.

Front 82

REPITITION

Back 82

A literary device that repeats the same words or phrases a few times to make an idea clearer. There are several types of repetitions commonly used in both prose and poetry.

Example: Repeating a phrase for emphasis. "The Bells"

Front 83

TRANSITION

Back 83

Words and phrases that provide a connection between ideas, sentences and paragraphs. Transitions help to make a piece of writing flow better. They can turn disconnected pieces of ideas into a unified whole and prevent a reader from getting lost in the reading.