Unit 3 Academic Vocabulary

Drama Definition: a composition in prose or verse presenting in dialogue or pantomime a story involving conflict or contrast of character, especially one intended to be acted on the stage; a play.

Aside Definition: a part of an actor's lines supposedly not heard by some or all others on the stage and intended for the audience. Example: Macbeth says in an aside to Banquo in Act I, scene iii, “Do you not hope your children shall be kings?”

Aside

Soliloquy Definition: the act of speaking alone or to oneself, especially as a theatrical device Example: Macbeth has a lengthy soliloquy about a dagger at the end of the first scene of Act II once his servant leaves him alone on stage.

Soliloquy

Monologue Definition: a long speech made by one actor in a play Example: The sergeant gives a lengthy, uninterrupted response to Duncan and others about the course of battle in Act I, scene ii.

Monologue

Blank Verse Definition: unrhymed verse, especially the unrhymed iambic pentameter most frequently used in English dramatic, epic, and reflective verse. Example: Macbeth, while written in iambic pentameter, does not include a pattern of end rhyme; however, occasionally a rhyming couplet is used at the end of an important speech.

Iambic Pentameter Definition: a common meter in poetry consisting of an unrhymed line with five feet or accents, each foot containing an unaccented syllable and an accented syllable Example: When Macbeth returns from killing Duncan, he tells his wife, “Methought I heard a voice cry, ‘sleep no more.’” The line has ten syllables that follow the unstressed-stressed pattern.

Stage Directions Definition: an instruction written into the script of a play, indicating stage actions, movements of performers, or production requirements. Example: At the beginning of Macbeth, the stage directions indicate that the opening scene takes place in a desert area.

Stage Directions

Tragedy Definition: a dramatic composition, often in verse, dealing with a serious or somber theme, typically that of a great person destined through a flaw of character or conflict with some overpowering force, as fate or society, to downfall or destruction Example: Macbeth is a tragedy because Macbeth is an important person whose unbridled ambition leads to his downfall.

Tragedy

Allusion Definition: in literature, an implied or indirect reference to a person, event, or thing or to a part of another text. Most allusions are based on the assumption that there is a body of knowledge that is shared by the author and the reader and that, therefore, the reader will understand the author's referent Example: When Macduff announces Duncan’s murder in Act II, scene iii, he says, “Approach the chamber, and destroy your sight with a new Gorgon,” a clear allusion to the story of Medusa’s ability to turn men to stone at one glance.

Imagery Definition: the "mental pictures" that readers experience with a passage of literature. It signifies all the sensory perceptions referred to in a poem, whether by literal description, allusion, simile, or metaphor. Imagery is not limited to visual imagery; it also includes auditory (sound), tactile (touch), thermal (heat and cold), olfactory (smell), gustatory (taste), and kinesthetic sensation (movement) Example: Images of darkness often appear in Macbeth during or in reference to deeds of evil or deception.

Imagery

Symbolism Definition: The use of a word, phrase, image, or the like having a complex of associated meanings and perceived as having inherent value separable from that which is symbolized to refer to and connect that complex of associations to something else Example: The repeated references to dead children throughout the play symbolizes the lineal disorder in the play caused by Macbeth’s murder of Duncan and his attacks against others’ children.

Symbolism

Foreshadowing Definition: the organization and presentation of events and scenes in a work of fiction or drama so that the reader or observer is prepared to some degree for what occurs later in the work Example: The witches’ prophesies refer to events that do eventually occur in the play.

Foreshadowing

Understatement Definition: A form of irony in which something is intentionally represented as less than it is Example: In Act II, scene iii, Macbeth remarks, “‘Twas a rough night,”after killing Duncan.

Understatement