French Literary Terms, Pt. 1

Front 1

agencement

Back 1

m. arrangement, fitting together, ordering

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ambiguïté

Back 2

f. vagueness in use of words; expression of multiple meanings by simple words or phrases

Front 3

archétype

Back 3

m. a collectively inherited unconscious idea, pattern of thought, image, etc., universally present in individual psyches

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cadre

Back 4

n. background

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milieu

Back 5

m. background

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décor

Back 6

m. background

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contexte

Back 7

m. the totality of which the text under examination is a part; by extension, the surrounding circumstances of all sorts

Front 8

dénouement

Back 8

m. resolution of a play, or, by extension, a story

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durée

Back 9

f. time, duration, sometimes used to mean subjectively significant time, as opposed to mere chronological or "clock" time

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écoulement

Back 10

m. flow, time concieved as a continuum

Front 11

chef-d'œvre

Back 11

m. (pl. chefs-d'œvre) masterpiece

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comparaison

Back 12

f. simile, the simplest of analogical constructions, always with two terms, and using a word like comme or tel

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lieu commun

Back 13

m. a commonplace, banality, platitude

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mœurs

Back 14

f. pl. manners, customs, as in a "novel of manners"; morals

Front 15

monologue intérieur

Back 15

m. the reproduction of a character's unspoken inner thoughts

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motif

Back 16

m. a type of character, verbal pattern, or situation that recurs regularly in literature, art, or folklore; motive

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point culminant

Back 17

m. climax

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nouvelle

Back 18

f. a fictional form of intermediate length, shorter than a novel, longer than a short story.

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œuvre

Back 19

m. works of a writer as a whole; f. a literary work; f. pl. works of a writer

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optique

Back 20

f. perspective or point of view

Front 21

ouvrage (littéraire)

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m. a piece of work

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stance

Back 22

f. stanza

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style indirect libre

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m. an internalization of the narrative, it approximates the point of view of a fictional character while retaining some of the detachment of the third person and avoiding the formality of indirect discourse

Front 24

synesthésie

Back 24

f. faculty of responding with two or more senses when only one sense is being stimulated; in literature the term is applied when one kind of sensation is described in terms of another, for example, odor is attributed to colors, sound to odors, etc.

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rapport

Back 25

m. relationship

Front 26

réalisme

Back 26

m. writing characerized by extremely faithful attention to familiar, everyday, unpicturesque physical detail rendered in a matter-of-fact and seemingly unselective way. Written as Réalisme it referes to a movement in the French novel, at its height between 1850 and 1865.

Front 27

retour en arrière

Back 27

m. flashback

Front 28

rime

Back 28

f. identity of sounds (of the vowel and of whatever consonants follow the vowel) in the final accented syllable of two or more words

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rime féminine

Back 29

f. a rhyme involving words ending in a mute e, -es, or the verbal ending -ent

Front 30

rime masculine

Back 30

f. a rhyme involving words with endings other than mute e, -es, or the verbal ending -ent

Front 31

romancier

Back 31

m. novelist

Front 32

romantisme

Back 32

m. term applied to the general disposition toward life and art of the Romantic school in the first half of the 19th century. Literature became a direct expression of man's senses and emotions, nature was seen as a reflection of man's inner world; the conventions governing classical literature were rejected as too rigid to allow the expression of fresh feelings and sensations, the exploration of new subject matter.