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67 Cards in this Set
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Alliteration
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The repetition of two or more consonant sounds in successive words in a line of verse or prose. Alliteration can be used at the beginning of words (“cool cats” – initial alliteration) or internally on stressed syllables (“In kitchen cups concupiscent curds” – which combined initial and internal alliteration).
E: One could argue that the effect of this is at least twofold - it emphasizes Othello's status as the Moor (thus highlighting Othello's blackness), and draws attention to Iago's self-involved nature (by which I mean that Iago is only concerned about himself and doesn't care who gets hurt as long as he gets his revenge on Othello). |
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Allusion
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A brief (and sometimes indirect) reference in a text to a person, place, or thing – fictitious or actual. An allusion may appear in a literary work as an initial quotation, a passing mention of a name, or as a phrase borrowed from another writer – often carrying the meanings and implications of the original. Allusions imply a common set of knowledge between reader and writer and operate as a literary shorthand to enrich the meaning of a text.
E:In this case, allusion to Martin Luther King’s “I have a Dream” speech enriches the meaning of the text and puts the poem in historical context. |
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Anaphora
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A rhetorical figure of repetition in which the same word or phrase is repeated in (and usually at the beginning of) successive lines, clauses, or sentences. Found very often in both verse and prose.
E: Emphasizes the questioning directed at the Creator when making the tiger – also emphasizes a fearful tone in the poem and a quickening pace. |
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Ballad
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Traditionally, a song that tells a story. The ballad was originally an oral verse form – sung or recited and transmitted from performer to performer without being written down. Ballads are characteristically compressed, dramatic, and objective in their narrative style. There are many variations to the ballad form, most consisting of quatrains (made up of lines of three or four metrical feet) in a simple rhyme scheme.
E; Ballad form allows for more emotional detailing in the poem. This particular example leaves parts of the story out thus putting responsibility on readers to imagine the scene, creating tension between the emotionally affective ballad form and the refusal of emotion. |
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Bildungsroman
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German for “novel of growth and development.” Sometimes called an apprenticeship novel, this genre depicts a youth who struggles toward maturity, forming a worldview or philosophy of life.
E:Allows readers to connect to character and watch him/her develop. |
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Biography
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Trethewey’s “White Lies” (429).
In this case, allows readers to make the connection between the poem’s content and the author’s life – if one reads this poem with Trethewey’s biography in mind, it can alter one’s understanding of the poem. |
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Blank verse
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Blank verse contains five iambic feet per line (iambic pentameter) and is not rhymed. (“Blank” means unrhymed.) It is the most common and well-known meter of unrhymed poetry in English. Most portions of Shakespeare’s plays are in blank verse.
E: The effect of blank verse is that it establishes rhythm so that the text is easier to follow and there is a sense of flow, which enhances the emotion within the piece. Within this example the rhythm that can be witnessed as a result of the use of blank verse creates a unique flow, as Iago speaks placing dramatic pauses and emphasis on particular words, which adds to his sinister tone. |
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Closed form
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A generic term that describes poetry written in some pre-existing pattern of meter, rhyme, line, or stanza.
E:Closed form offers structure to the poem. The speaker may organize his thoughts throughout and, therefore, bring about a planned argument and sense of planned eloquence to the work (beginning: state the problem > ending: offer solution). In this case, the closed form structure allows the speaker to deliberate with both the audience and himself as he sorts through his issue - the thought process revealed with each stanza. |
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Connotation
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An association or additional meaning that a word, image, or phrase may carry, apart from its literal denotation or dictionary definition. A word picks up connotations from all the uses to which it has been put in the past.
E: Connotations are prevalent throughout this poem. Words offered in each stanza can be often addressed in a variety of ways. Primarily, however, the connotation, or meaning, associated with each word (e.g., "etherized" [like a patient etherized upon a table]) can reveal the overwhelming question (or theme, mood, etc.) within the work.No matter the connotation that comes to mind, one knows that the patient is not well and, therefore, the poem to follow deals with an air of sadness/despair and difficulty. |
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Couplet
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A pair of rhyming verse lines, usually of the same length. A couplet may also stand alone as an epigram, or form part of a larger stanza, or (as in Shakespeare) round off a sonnet or a dramatic scene.
E: The rhyming of the last two lines of this scene emphasizes Iago’s determination to undermine Othello. It also uses contrasting light imagery, “night” and “light,” to evoke the evil nature of Iago’s character. |
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Crisis
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A decisive point in the plot of a play or story, upon which the outcome of the remaining action depends, and which ultimately precipitates the catastrophe or dénouement.
E: This crisis serves as a critical point before the catastrophe: Othello commits suicide, Emilia is murdered by Iago, Iago is injured. The outcome of this tragedy results from this murder. |
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Denotation
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The literal, dictionary meaning of a word
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Dénouement
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The resolution or conclusion of a literary work as plot complications are unravelled after the climax. In French, denouement means “unknotting” or “untying”
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Diction
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The manner in which anything is expressed in (spoken or written) words; choice or selection of words and phrases; wording, phrasing; verbal style.
There are two types of diction, Concrete Diction, where a highly specific word choice is used to describe something or someone, and there is Abstract Diction, where words that more generally express concepts or ideas are used. HMMM>>> Diction quite frankly applies to all writing – each and every word of it – no matter the form. However, Concrete Diction, for example, would be something like ‘English Lecture,’ whereas to describe the idea with Abstract Diction, I would use ‘room full of students.’ |
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Dramatic monologue
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A poem written as a speech made by a character at some decisive moment. The speaker is usually addressing a silent listener
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Elegy
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A lyric poem mourning a particular person’s death or reflecting on death in general.
Othello, Act V Scene II p. 999-1001 lines 1-23 This reflection reveals Othello’s true feelings on the significance of Desdemona’s death. It illustrates his confusion and uncertainty in deciding to kill her, and it demonstrates his affection for her. |
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Enjambment
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The continuation of the sense and grammatical structure from one line in a verse or couplet to the next. A run- on line does not complete a phrase, clause, or sentence until the following line.
E: This holds off on emphasizing the end of the line |
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Epiphany
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A moment of insight, discovery or revelation by which a character's life is greatly altered. An epiphany generally occurs near the end of a story. The term, which means "showing forth" in Greek, was first used in the Christian theology to signify the manifestation of God's presence in the world. This theological idea was first borrowed by James Joyce to refer to a heightened moment of secular revelation.
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Epitaph
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A short piece of writing, sometimes in the form of a poem, honouring someone who is dead
E: The use of the epitaph style poem allows for reflection on the life of the son as well as the speaker's feelings towards him. |
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Euphemism
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Substituting a more favourable term for a pejorative or socially delicate term.
E: The euphemism/metaphor reflects the sensitivity of this information about Desdemona to her father. It can also reflect the relationship between different charactersA euphemism can be indicative of the setting’s social atmosphereFinally, the euphemism can also signify the time that the piece was created in since blatantly saying sexual intercourse during Shakespeare’s period was considered taboo. |
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Exposition
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The setting forth of a systematic explanation of or argument about any subject; or the opening part of a play or story, in which we are introduced to the characters and their situation, often by reference to preceding events
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Fable
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Fables are light-hearted humorous tales that instil moral values to its readers. They typically depict animals or inanimate objects with humanistic traits. For example when we compare a lion as noble or an owl as wise.
E: Can instil moral values in its readers. It may be a stretch, but one could argue that Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” is a fable (the wallpaper is depicted with humanistic traits – and the story certainly instils a moral!) |
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Flashback
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A scene relived in a character’s memory. Flashbacks can be related by the narrator in a summary or they can be experienced by the characters themselves. Flashback allow the author to include events that occurred before the opening of the story, which may show the reader something significant that happened in the character’s past or give an indication of what kind of person the character used to be.
E: A better character understanding |
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Focalisation
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A term used to represent the kind of perspective from which the events of a story are witnessed. Events observed by a tradition omniscient narrator are said to be non-focalized, whereas events witnessed within the story’s world from the constrained perspective of a single character are “internally focalized.” The nature of a given narrative’s focalization is to be distinguished from its narrative ‘voice,’ as seeing is from speaking.
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Foreshadowing
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The presentation in a work of literature of hints and clues that tip the reader off to what is to come later in the work.
E: This creates a sense of foreboding within the play. |
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In medias res
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In Latin it literally means “in the midst of things.” It refers to the narrative device of beginning a literary work in the middle of action before explaining or introducing the context of the events occurring or the preceding action. It is usually at an exciting or significant moment.
E: The use of in medias res in a literary work grabs the readers’ attention and builds interest and suspense around the details leading up to the event that starts the work. |
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Interior monologue
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The extended presentation of a character’s thoughts in a narrative. It reads as if the character were speaking out loud to him or herself for readers to hear about their feelings, motives, desires, etc.
E: The interior monologue helps to give readers an idea of what a character in a literary work is thinking. Instead of inferring their motives from their actions and conversations with others, the interior monologue allows a first- hand explanation of the thoughts and emotions being experienced by a particular character |
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Intertextuality
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The allusive relationship between literary texts, and can refer to an author’s borrowing and transformation of a prior text or to readers’ referencing of one text in reading another. One can understand intertextuality as how texts speak through a culture.
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Irony
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A literary device in which a discrepancy of meaning is masked beneath the surface of the language. Irony is present when a writer says one thing but means something quite the opposite. There are many kinds of irony, but the two major ones are verbal irony (in which the discrepancy is contained in words) and situational irony (in which the discrepancy exists when something is about to happen to a character or characters who expect the opposite outcome).
E: |
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Lyric
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A brief poem that conveys the feelings and thoughts of a speaker.
E: Allows the speaker to convey his/her thoughts |
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Magical realism
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A style of fiction where magical/imaginary images or events are depicted within a realistic atmosphere
E: Can have a disturbing effect on readers, but more often than not, readers accept the marvellous as normal and common |
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Metafiction
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Fiction in which the author self-consciously alludes to the artificiality or literariness of a work by parodying or departing from novelistic conventions and narrative techniques.
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Metaphor
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A figure of speech in which a name or descriptive word or phrase is transferred to an object or action different from, but analogous to, that to which it is literally applicable. A comparison without use of the words "like" or "as" (ie. The exam was a breeze.)
E: The metaphor presents the idea that we must use our will to “tend” to our bodies-as-gardens and help our gardens/bodies grow. This metaphor may help develop the cause/effect theme of the play – when a character makes a choice, it has certain consequences. |
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Meter
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Poetic rhythm; a technique or arrangement by which this is achieved. It is any specific form of poetic rhythm, its kind being determined by the character and number of recurring units within the verse.
EL It is iambic tetrameter because it has four iambic feet in each line. This gives the poem a certain flow to the words. It creates a pattern for how the lines will go. |
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Metonymy
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A figure of speech characterized by the action of substituting for a word or phrase denoting an object, action, institution, etc., a word or phrase denoting a property or something associated with it. “I should have been a pair of ragged claws/scuttling across the floors of silent seas” (Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”). Draws attention to the poem as an extended exercise in metonymy, in which the whole (Prufrock’s life and consciousness) is carefully built up piece by piece.
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Modernism
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A general term applied retrospectively to the wide range of experimental and avant-garde trends in literature (and other arts) of the early 20th century. Modernist literature is characterized chiefly by a rejection of 19th century traditions and of their consensus between author and reader: the conventions of realism were abandoned, many poets rejected traditional metres in favour of free verse. Modernist writers tended to see themselves as disengaged from bourgeois values, and disturbed their readers by adopting complex and difficult new forms and styles. In fiction, many authors attempted new ways of tracing the flow of characters’ thoughts in their stream-of-consciousness styles. In poetry, some authors replaced the logical exposition of thoughts with collages of fragmentary images and complex allusions. Modernist writing is predominantly cosmopolitan, and often express a sense of urban cultural dislocation, along with an awareness of new anthropological and psychological theories
A trademark of stream of consciousness writing is the narrator’s seemingly random switching between disconnected topics, as a new thought enters their head and an old one exits. |
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First Person/Participant Narration
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First person, or participant, narration is when the narrator refers to themselves as “I,” “we” et cetera.
Eg. First person narration: Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” (325-336). |
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Second Person Narration
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Second person narration is when a main character is referred to as “you.”
Eg. not that common |
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- Third Person narration
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Third person narration is when the narrator refers to other characters as “he” or “she” et cetera, but never uses “I” or “you.”
Eg, Jorge Borge’s “The Gospel According to Mark” (312-316) |
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Observer
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An observer is a minor character who tells a story that focuses on events that involve other characters. Note that if the narrator has an observer it implies that the story is being told in first person, whereas the reverse relationship does not hold.
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Omniscient Narrator
Both all and limited. |
An omniscient narrator is all-knowing and can thus know the thoughts of all of the characters in the story.
Eg. - Jorge Borge’s “The Gospel According to Mark” is an example of limited omniscience. SUSPENSE. |
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Narrative
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A story or series of events or experiences, involving events, characters and what the characters say and do. It can be fiction or non-fiction. May be written in either prose or poetry. Narratives can include: memoirs, history, ballad, news article etc., but does not include essays.
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Onomatopoeia
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The formation of a word that sounds like its name or if it were describing an object, the sound the object would be known to make.
The significance of using onomatopoeia in this instance is to engage the readers of the story in the narrator’s experience of death and of how annoying it must have been to have a fly buzz as the last thing he heard before dying. Other examples may include words like: boom, crash, bang, meow, honk etc. |
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Parable
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A brief, usually allegorical narrative that teaches a moral. In parables, unlike fables (where the moral is explicitly stated within the narrative), the moral themes are implicit and can often be interpreted in several ways. Parables, unlike fables, usually possess a more plausible story and the characters are human rather than anthropomorphized animals.
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Paraphrase
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The restatement in one’s own words of what we understand a literary work to say. A paraphrase is similar to a summary, although it is not as brief or simple.
E: Paraphrases are done for the sake of the readers. Readers restate the original ideas of an author’s writings, keeping as close to the original meaning as possible and, in doing so, can help prove the readers understanding of the text. Paraphrasing can be a strong tool for readers to better understand passages that may initially be confusing in the author’s writing. |
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Parody
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A literary composition modelled on and imitating or mocking another work. A composition in which the characteristic style and themes of a particular author or genre are satirized by being applied to inappropriate or unlikely subjects, or are otherwise exaggerated for comic effect. A poor or feeble imitation of something.
E: Humourous |
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Persona
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Latin for “mask.” A fictitious character or role made up by an author in his or her writing to be the speaker of a poem, story or novel. The aspect of a person's character that is displayed to or perceived by others. A persona is always the narrator of the work and not merely a character.
E: Allows the poet to create a new identity in order to voice opinions/feelings that he/she may not be able to otherwise. |
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Personification
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The attribution of personal or human characteristics to something non-human, or the representation of an abstract quality in human form.
E; Inanimate objects given human attributes allows the readers to sympathise with the object because they can relate to its given human characteristics. |
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Poetic diction
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In the most general sense, the choice of words and figures in poetry. The term is more often used, however, to refer to that specialized language which is peculiar to poetry in that it employs words and figures not normally found in common speech or prose. The most elaborate system of poetic diction in English is found among poets of the 18th century, when “good taste” required the avoidance of naming “common” things. Fun fact: Wordsworth rejected poetic diction in favour of diction closer to “the real language of men”
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Postmodernism
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As applied to literature and other arts, the term is notoriously ambiguous, implying either that modernism has been superseded or that it has continued into a new phase. Postmodernism may be seen as a continuation of modernism's alienated mood and disorienting techniques and at the same time as an abandonment of its determined quest for artistic coherence in a fragmented world: in very crude terms, where a modernist artist or writer would try to wrest a meaning from the world through myth, symbol, or formal complexity, the postmodernist greets the absurd or meaningless confusion of contemporary existence with a certain numbed or flippant indifference
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Prose
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Language in the form in which it is typically written (or spoken), usually characterized as having no deliberate material structure, lacks a specific rhythm, (in contrast with verse or poetry).
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Protagonist
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Having the main character leads you through the story as the storyline is based on the protagonist. In most cases, readers create relationships with main characters of stories and without them readers won't connect with the context of the story.
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Quatrain
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A stanza consisting of four lines. Quatrains are the most common stanzas used in English-language poetry
E: Using quatrains allows a poet to give the writing structure and helps to dictate how the poem is read. |
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Resolution
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The final part of a narrative, the concluding action or actions that follow the climax.
E: The resolution, also called “conclusion,” unravels the ending and reveals what happens to the characters involved. Essentially, it is the untying of the knots that were created throughout the story as the plot progressed. Without a resolution, readers would have no answers to questions that have been raised and would not know how everything ends up. |
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Rhyme
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Two or more words that contain an identical or similar vowel sound, usually accented, with following consonant sounds (if any) identical as well. Or, the correspondence of sound between words or the endings of words, especially when these are used at the ends of lines of poetry
E: it draws greater attention to the two lines as a pair than lines that do not rhyme with their adjacent lines. Flow |
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Sestina
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A complex verse form (“song of sixes”) in which six end words are repeated in a prescribed order through six stanzas. A sestina ends with an envoy of three lines in which all six words appear—for a total of thirty-nine lines. Originally used by French and Italian poets, the sestina has become a popular modern form in English.
E: The effect of a sestina is that it is a complex form where a poet is challenged to use only a few words to say many things. It explores the limits of wordplay, alternate meanings and a poet’s creativity. |
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Slant rhyme
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A rhyme in which the final consonant sounds are the same but the vowel sounds are different, as in letter and litter, bone and bean. Slant rhyme may also be called near rhyme, off rhyme, or imperfect rhyme. By not satisfying the reader’s expectation of an exact chime, but instead giving a clunk, a slant rhyme can help a poet say something in a particular way. It works especially well for disappointed letdowns, negations, and denials. Consonance is a type of slant rhyme that occurs when the rhymed words or phrases have the same beginning and ending consonant sounds but a different vowel, as in chitter and chatter. Used mostly by modern poets, consonance often registers more subtly than exact rhyme, lending itself to special poetic effects
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Petrarchan Sonnett
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A form of verse used widely in poetry. Sonnets are made up of 14 lines and usually are written in iambic pentameter.
Starts with 8 (sets up the theme) and ends with a sestet (with the solution). The rhyme scheme for the octave is typically a b b a a b b a. Sestet is usually c d e c d e or c d c d c d for the sestet. |
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Shakespearean Sonnett
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Still 14 lines.
three four-line stanzas (called quatrains) and a final couplet composed in iambic pentameter usually ABABAB, then rhyming couplet |
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Speaker
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In poetry, the speaker is often explained as a character. The speaker is essentially telling you a story, but they are not necessarily the author who wrote the poem (PERSONA) .
A poem’s speaker may profess very different attitudes from the poet who wrote that speaker into existence |
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Stanza
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A group of verse lines forming a section of a poem. A stanza can have the same structure and/or rhyme scheme as all of or some of the other sections of the poem. Stanzas are usually separated by spaces in printed poems. The 4-line quatrain is the most common stanza to see.
Gives the verse lines form, allowing them (in some cases) to easily convey a rhyme scheme or meter. Helps to create rhythm and tone. |
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Stream of consciousness
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Type of modern narration that uses various literary devices, especially interior monologue, in an attempt to duplicate the subjective and associative nature of human consciousness.
E: The part where the Grandfather explains his betrayal of Herschel, and the narrative drops all punctuation. This creates the effect of a quickening pace/intensity, mirroring the content – once he begins telling the story, he cannot stop – the words begin to pour out. |
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Synecdoche
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The use of a significant part of a thing to stand for the whole of it or vice versa, closely related to metonymy!
Eg. The thick lips emphasizes one prominent characteristic that highlights Othello's foreign origins and black heritage, suggesting racial distrust of Othello based on his color. |
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Tale
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A story or narrative, true or fictitious, drawn up so as to interest or amuse, or to preserve the history of a fact or incident; a literary composition cast in narrative form.
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Tone
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A very vague critical term usually designating the mood or atmosphere of a work, although in some more restricted uses it refers to the author's attitude to the reader (e.g. formal, intimate, pompous) or to the subject-matter (e.g. ironic, light, solemn, satiric, sentimental).
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Verse
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From the Latin versum, “to turn.” Verse has two major meanings. First, it refers to any single line of poetry. Second, it refers to any composition in lines of more or less regular rhythm – in contrast to prose
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Villanelle
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A fixed form developed by French courtly poets of the Middle Ages in imitation of Italian folk song. A villanelle consists of six rhymed stanzas in which two lines are repeated in a prescribed pattern.
villanelle has only two rhyme sounds. The first and third lines of the first stanza are rhyming refrains that alternate as the third line in each successive stanza and form a couplet at the close. A villanelle is nineteen lines long, consisting of five tercets and one concluding quatrain.[3] Because of its non-linear structure, the villanelle resists narrative development. Villanelles do not tell a story or establish a conversational tone LOOK AT EX. Villanelle form is a very obsessive form |
