1. Alliteration- repetition of initial consonant sounds (Examples: “Sally sells sea shells by the sea shore” or “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers”)

2. Ethos, or the ethical appeal, means to convince an audience of the author’s character. An author would use ethos to show to his audience that he is a credible source and is worth listening to. Ethos is the Greek word for “character.” The word “ethic” is derived from ethos.

3. Pathos, or the emotional appeal, means to persuade an audience by appealing to their emotions. A common use of pathos would be to draw pity from an audience. The word pathetic is derived from pathos.

4. Logos, or the appeal to logic, means to convince an audience by use of logic or reason.  The word “logic” is derived from logos.

5. Assonance- the repetition of middle vowel sounds (“How now brown cow”)

6. Examples: blank and think or strong and string
Consonance is the repetition of the final consonants at the ends of words
Examples: blank and think or strong and string

7. Denotation- the literal or dictionary definition of a word

8. Connotation- all the associations that have become attached to some words

9. Nonfiction- prose writing that deals with real people, things, events, and places; includes biographies and autobiographies

10. Theme-the central idea/ underlying message of a story; theme is not usually found within the text

11. Biography- an account of a person’s life, written or told by another person

12. Autobiography- an account of the writer’s own life

13. Genre- type; category; the 5 major genres in literature include nonfiction, fiction, poetry, drama, and myth

14. Dialogue- the conversation between characters in a story or play

15. Dialect- a way of speaking that is characteristic of a particular region or a particular group of people

16. Tone- The attitude a writer takes toward a subject, a character, or the audience

17. Mood- the feeling a story provokes to the READER

18. Diction- a writer’s or speaker’s choice of words

19. Style- the particular way in which a writer uses language; created mainly through diction

20. Allusion- a reference to a statement, a person, a place, or an event from history, literature, pop culture…(“If it keeps raining like this we may have to build an ark”)

21. Hyperbole- extreme exaggeration for emphasis; also called overstatement (“I thought of you a million times today”)

22. Flashback-a scene that interrupts the present action of the plot to tell what happened at an earlier time

23. Flash-forward- a scene that interrupts the present action of the plot to shift into the future

24. Pun- a play on the multiple meanings of a word or two words that sound alike but have different meanings (“I used to be a baker, but I didn't make enough dough”)

25. Suspense- the uncertainty or anxiety the reader feels about what is going to happen next

26. Anecdote- a very brief story, usually told to make a point

27. Allegory- a narrative in which characters and setting stand for abstract ideas or qualities; story that teaches a lesson

28. Analogy- a comparison made between two things to show how they are alike

29. Figure of speech or figurative language-a phrase that is not intended literally; includes similes, metaphors, paradox, and personification

30. Imagery/ Sensory imagery- language that appeals to the 5 senses (touch, taste, smell, sound, sight)

31. Simile- A figure of speech that makes a comparison between two unlike things, using a word such as like, as, than, or resembles (“hot as fire”)

32. Metaphor- A figure of speech that makes a comparison between two unlike things without using the words like, as, than, or resembles

33. Personification- A kind of metaphor in which a nonhuman thing is given human qualities

34. Paradox- a statement or situation that seems to be a contradiction but reveals a truth (“If you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love.“ Mother Theresa)

35. Onomatopoeia- The use of words to imitate sounds (“bang” or “boom”)

36. Ballad-a song that tells a story; uses simple language and much repetition; usually has a regular rhythm and rhyme scheme

37. Octet/Octave- a stanza containing 8 lines; used in Petrarchan/ Italian sonnets

38. Sestet- a stanza in a poem containing 6 lines; used in Petrarchan/ Italian sonnets

39. Haiku- a 3-line Japanese poem; has 17 syllables total (5,7,5); does NOT rhyme

40. Lyric Poetry- Poetry that expresses a speaker’s emotions or thoughts; NEVER tells a story

41. Refrain- a repeated word, phrase, line, or group of lines (in a song or poem)

42. Ode- a lyric poem with a serious subject, an elevated style, and an elaborate stanza pattern. The ode often praises people, the arts of music and poetry, natural scenes, or abstract concepts.

43. Invocation to the muse- a prayer by the teller of the story to one of the 9 muses (daughters of Zeus) to give them inspiration to tell/sing the story.

44. Epithet- an adjective or descriptive phrase that is regularly used to describe a noun (examples: “Honest Abe” or "The bewitching nymph" (Calypso)

45. Oral tradition- the manner in which information is passed from one generation to the next in the absence of writing; was a popular form of entertainment through story-telling

46. Arête- (Pronounced eh-rate)- Greek for "virtue“; "being the best you can be," or "reaching your highest human potential.” The man or woman of arête is a person of the highest effectiveness; they use all their faculties: strength, bravery, wit, and deceptiveness, to achieve real results. The concept implies a human-centered universe in which human actions are of paramount importance.

47. Epic- a long narrative poem that tells of the heroic journey of an individual

48. Archetype: very old pattern/image found again and again in literature—characters/events (damsel in distress)

49. Tragedy- a serious drama (play) featuring a main character, often of noble birth, who strives to achieve something is ultimately defeated. Often the main character’s downfall is due to his tragic flaw

50. Tragic flaw- an inborn character flaw or weakness that causes the downfall of the tragic hero

51. Blank Verse- Unrhymed iambic pentameter (10 syllable lines with an unstressed/ stressed pattern)

52. Comic relief- a comic scene or event that breaks up a serious play or narrative

53. Comedy- a story that ends happily; not necessarily meant to be funny

54. Prose- writing that is in complete sentences and paragraphs—not poetry or drama

55. Motif (pronounced moe-teef)- a recurring object, concept, or structure in a work of literature; allows one to see main points and themes that the author is trying to express

56. Dramatic Monologue- a poem in which a speaker addresses a silent listener; the readers “overhear” the speaker expressing inner thoughts and feelings (Example: Browning's "My Last Duchess“)

57. Context- anything beyond the specific words of a literary work that may be relevant to understanding the meaning. Contexts may be economic, social, cultural, historical, literary, biographical, etc.

58. Heroic couplet- two lines of verse that rhyme; consists of iambic pentameter, usually part of a series of rhyming pairs (aabbccdd…)

59. Idiom- expression found in a particular language that means something different than its literal meaning (“it’s raining cats and dogs”)

60. Satire-a way of criticizing something, such as a group of people or a system, in which you deliberately make them seem funny so that people will see their faults