Mat Literary Terms

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allegory

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Written piece in which ideas or morals are represented by individual characters or things.

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allusion

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A reference within an artistic work to another artistic work.

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antagonist

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In a literary work, the character whose actions oppose those of the hero (protagonist).

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ballad

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A story-poem, often sung aloud.

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Beat movement

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A group of American poets and artists whose expressions of alienation in the 1950s became a calling card of the underground. (Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac)

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blank verse

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Non-rhyming verse consisting of 10-syllable lines.

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canto

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A subdivision of an epic poem.

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Classicism

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Artistic or literary movement that is aesthetically based on the Ancient Greeks or Romans.

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climax

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The point in any story at which the action reaches its zenith.

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couplet

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Two rhyming lines of poetry in succession, most often of a similar or like meter.

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denouement

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The conclusion or resolution following the climax of a story.

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elegy

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A poem of remembrance.

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Existenialism

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French philosophical idea that the individual lives in an indifferent world and must take responsibility for his or her own choices. (Sartre, Albert Camus)

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fable

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An allegorical story often employing animals as characters. (Aesop)

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genre

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A category of work within art or letters, usually of a distinctive style.

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haiku

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A Japanese poem containing 3 lines and 17 syllables in a structured order (5-7-5).

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irony

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A literary style in which a situation is shown with the intent of representing its opposite.

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lost generation

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A group of expatriate writers and artists in Paris in the 1920s centered around Gertrude Stein. (Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, T.S. Elliot)

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metaphor

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The comparison of two things in which one item represents another.

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Modernism

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High intellectual movement whose goal was the examination of pure art. (Ezra Pound, Gertrude Stein, Virginia Woolf)

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motif

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A recurring element or theme in an artistic work.

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ode

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A lyric poem of rigidly structured stanzas.

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parable

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A story depicting a message of a moral or religious nature.

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pathos

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Evoking pity in a literary work.

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Realism

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An artistic and literary style in which society and events are depicted as they appear in real life.

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Restoration

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The period of intensely active literary and artistic activity in England 1660-1688 when Charles II returned to the throne. (Dryden)

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Romantic movement

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Predominately English movement in the 19th century whose basic belief was that passion should supercede logic and whose main opposition was Classicism. (John Keats, William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Lord George Byron)

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satire

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A literary work in which, through the use or irony, sarcasm and wit, the absurd in humanity is brought to light. (Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal)

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sonnet

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A verse of 14 lines and written in one of several rhyme schemes. (William Shakespeare, Petrarch)

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stanza

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One division within a poem, usually of commonly metered verse.

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stream of consciousness

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A literary device in which a character's thoughts emerge on the page as they occur. (James Joyce, Virginia Woolf)

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Transcendentalism

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American movement in which insight and experience took precedence over logic and reason and that held the belief that all things coexist in nature. (Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson)

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Victorian Age

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19th century England, considered the height of the British industrial revolution and the apex of the British Empire. Characterized by rigid social manners and conservatism. (Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy)