Handbook of Literary Terms

Handbook of Literary Terms
C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Abstract Language—A term used to describe language that deals with generalities and intangible concepts. Allegory—A story or poem in which the characters, settings, and events stand for other people or events or for abstract ideas or qualities.

Alliteration—The repetition of the same or similar consonant sounds in words that are close together. Example Allusion—A reference to someone or something that is known from literature, history, religion, mythology, politics, sports, science, or some other branch of culture.

Alliteration > Example But the sea, the sea in darkness calls —Henry Wadsworth Longfellow from “The Tide Rises, the Tide Falls”

Ambiguity—A technique by which a writer deliberately suggests two or more different, and sometimes conflicting, meanings in a work. American Dream—A uniquely American vision of the country consisting of three central ideas. Analogy—A comparison made between two things to show how they are alike.

American Dream > Three Central Ideas The American dream consists of a belief in America as a new Eden—a land of beauty, bounty, and unlimited promise a feeling of optimism, created by ever expanding opportunity a confidence in the triumph of the individual

Anapest—A metrical foot that has two unstressed syllables followed by one stressed syllable. The word coexist (˘˘’) is an anapest. Anecdote—A very brief story, told to illustrate a point or to serve as an example of something. Antagonist—The opponent who struggles against or blocks the hero, or protagonist, in a story.

Anapest > Metrical Foot Meter is a pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in poetry. The meter of a poem is indicated by using the symbol (’) for stressed syllables and the symbol (˘) for unstressed syllables. A foot is a metrical unit of poetry that contains at least one stressed syllable and, usually, one or more unstressed syllables.

Anthropomorphism—Attributing human characteristics to an animal or inanimate object. Aphorism—A brief, cleverly worded statement that makes a wise observation about life. Archetype—A very old imaginative pattern that appears in literature across cultures and is repeated through the ages. An archetype can be a character, a plot, an image, a theme, or a setting.

Argument—A form of persuasion that appeals to reason, rather than emotion, to convince an audience to think or act in a certain way. Assonance—The repetition of similar vowel sounds followed by different consonant sounds, especially in words close together. Example

Assonance > Example The tide rises, the tide falls, The twilight darkens, the curlew calls —Henry Wadsworth Longfellow from “The Tide Rises, the Tide Falls”

Atmosphere—The mood or feeling created in a piece of writing. Autobiography—An account of the writer’s own life.

Ballad—A song or poem that tells a story. More about ballads Folk and literary ballads Biography—An account of someone’s life written by another person. Blank Verse—Poetry written in unrhymed iambic pentameter.

Ballad > More About Ballads The typical ballad tells a tragic story in the form of a monologue or dialogue. Ballads usually have a simple, steady rhythm; a simple rhyme pattern; and a refrain, all of which make them easy to memorize.

Ballad > Folk and Literary Ballads Two types of ballads are folk ballads and literary ballads. Folk ballads are composed by unknown singers and are passed on orally from one generation to the next. Literary ballads are written to imitate the sounds and subjects of folk ballads.

Blank Verse > Iambic Pentameter Iambic pentameter refers to a line of poetry that contains five iambs. An iamb is a metrical foot, or unit of measure, consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable (˘ ’). Pentameter comes from the Greek penta (five) and meter (measure).

Cadence—The natural, rhythmic rise and fall of a language as it is normally spoken. Caesura—A pause or break within a line of poetry. Some pauses are indicated by punctuation; others are suggested by phrasing or meaning. Example Catalog—A list of things, people, or events.

Caesura > Example Announced by all the trumpets of the sky, Arrives the snow, || and, || driving o’er the fields, Seems nowhere to alight: || the whited air Hides hills and woods.... —Ralph Waldo Emerson from “The Snow-Storm”

Character—An individual in a story or play. The process of revealing the personality of a character is called characterization. Direct and indirect characterization Static vs. dynamic character Flat vs. round character Cliché—A word or phrase, often a figure of speech, that has become lifeless because of overuse.

Character > Direct and Indirect Characterization A writer may tell us about a character through direct characterization—telling us directly what the character’s personality is like (cruel, kind, brave, and so on) indirect characterization—providing evidence from which we must judge for ourselves what a character is like

Character > Static vs. Dynamic Character Characters can be classified as static or dynamic. A static character is one who does not change much in the course of the story. A dynamic character changes in some important way as a result of the story’s action.

Character > Flat vs. Round Character Characters can be classified as flat or round. A flat character has few personality traits. This character can be summed up by a single phrase: the loyal sidekick, the buffoon, the nosy neighbor. A round character, like a real person, has many different personality traits.

Climax—The point in a plot that creates the greatest intensity, suspense, or interest. Comedy—In general, a story that ends with a happy resolution of the conflicts faced by the main character or characters. More about comedy

Comedy > More About Comedy In many comedies the conflict is provided when a young couple who wish to marry are blocked by adults. In many comedies the main character has moved, by the story’s end, into a world of greater freedom. In literature the word comedy is not synonymous with humor. Some comedies are humorous; some are not.

Conceit—An elaborate metaphor or other figure of speech that compares two things that are startlingly different. Concrete Language—A term for language that uses specific words and details to describe a particular subject.

Confessional School—A group of poets who wrote in the 1950s. The confessional poets wrote frank and sometimes brutal poems about their personal lives. Conflict—The struggle between opposing forces or characters in a story. Internal and external conflict

Conflict > Internal and External Conflict An internal conflict involves opposing forces within a person’s mind. An external conflict can exist between two people, between a person and a force of nature or a machine, or between a person and a whole society.

Connotation—The associations and emotional overtones that have become attached to a word or phrase, in addition to its strict dictionary definition, or denotation. Consonance—The repetition of the same or similar final consonant sounds on accented syllables or in important words.

Couplet—Two consecutive rhyming lines of poetry. Closed couplet

Couplet > Closed Couplet If two rhyming lines express a complete thought, they are called a closed couplet. If ever wife was happy in a man, Compare with me, ye women, if you can. —Anne Bradstreet from “To My Dear and Loving Husband”

Dactyl—A metrical foot of three syllables in which the first syllable is stressed and the next two are unstressed. The word tendency (’˘˘) is a dactyl. Dark Romantics—A group of nineteenth-century writers who explored the dark side of human nature. Deism—An eighteenth-century philosophy based on rationalism.

Dactyl > Metrical Foot Meter is a pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in poetry. The meter of a poem is indicated by using the symbol (’) for stressed syllables and the symbol (˘) for unstressed syllables. A foot is a metrical unit of poetry that contains at least one stressed syllable and, usually, one or more unstressed syllables.

Denouement—The conclusion (or resolution) of a story. Description—One of the four major forms of discourse, in which language is used to create a mood or an emotion. Description does this by using words that appeal to our senses: sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste.

Description > Forms of Discourse The four major forms of discourse are description exposition narration persuasion

Dialect—A way of speaking that is characteristic of a certain social group or the inhabitants of a certain geographical area. More about dialect Dialogue—The directly quoted words of people speaking to one another. Diction—A speaker’s or writer’s choice of words. More about diction

Dialect > More About Dialect Dialects may differ from one another in vocabulary, pronunciation, and grammar. The dialect that has become dominant in the United States is known as standard English. This is the dialect used most often on national radio news and television news broadcasts. Many writers try to capture dialects to give their stories local color, humor, or an air of authenticity.

Diction > More About Diction Diction can be formal, informal, colloquial, full of slang, poetic, ornate, plain, abstract, concrete, and so on. Diction depends on the writer’s subject, purpose, and audience. Some words, for example, are suited to informal conversation but are inappropriate in formal speech. Diction has a powerful effect on the tone, or attitude, of a piece of writing.

Dramatic Monologue—A poem in which a character speaks to one or more listeners, whose responses are not known.

Elegy—A poem of mourning, usually about someone who has died. Enjambment—The running on of sense from the end of one line of verse into the next, without a punctuated pause.

Epic—A long narrative poem, written in heightened language, that recounts the deeds of a heroic character who embodies the values of a particular society. Epithet—A descriptive word or phrase that is frequently used to characterize a person or a thing. For example, the epithet “the father of our country” is often used to characterize George Washington.

Essay—A short piece of nonfiction prose in which the writer discusses some aspect of a subject. Essays are sometimes classified as formal or informal (or personal). Exposition—One of the four major forms of discourse, in which something is explained or set forth.

Exposition > Forms of Discourse The four major forms of discourse are description exposition narration persuasion

Fable—A very short story told in prose or poetry that teaches a practical lesson about how to succeed in life. Farce—A type of comedy in which ridiculous and often stereotypical characters are involved in silly, far-fetched situations.

Figure of Speech—A word or phrase that describes one thing in terms of something else and that is not meant to be taken literally. The most common figures of speech are simile metaphor personification symbol

Figure of Speech > Simile A simile is a figure of speech that makes an explicit comparison between two unlike things, using a word of comparison, such as like, as, than, or resembles.

Figure of Speech > Metaphor A metaphor is a figure of speech that makes a comparison between two unlike things without the use of such specific words of comparison as like, as, than, or resembles.

Figure of Speech > Personification Personification is a figure of speech in which an object or animal is given human feelings, thoughts, or attitudes.

Figure of Speech > Symbol A symbol is a person, a place, a thing, or an event that has meaning in itself and that also stands for something more than itself.

Fireside Poets—A group of nineteenth-century poets from Boston including Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, John Greenleaf Whittier, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and James Russell Lowell. Flashback—A scene that interrupts the normal chronological sequence of events in a story to depict something that happened at an earlier time.

Foil—A character who acts as a contrast to another character. Foot—A metrical unit of poetry. An iamb is a common foot in English poetry. Meter Foreshadowing—The use of hints and clues to suggest what will happen later in a plot.

Foot > Meter Meter is a pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in poetry. The meter of a poem is indicated by using the symbol (’) for stressed syllables and the symbol (˘) for unstressed syllables.

Frame Story—A literary device in which a story is enclosed in another story, a tale within a tale. Free Enterprise—The practice of allowing private businesses to operate competitively for profit with little government regulation. Free Verse—Poetry that does not conform to a regular meter or rhyme scheme.

Haiku—A short, unrhymed poem developed in Japan in the fifteenth century. More about haiku Harlem Renaissance—A cultural movement of the early 1920s led by African American artists, writers, musicians, and performers, located in the Harlem neighborhood in New York City.

Haiku > More About Haiku A haiku consists of three unrhymed lines and a total of seventeen syllables. The first and third lines of a traditional haiku have five syllables each, and the middle line has seven syllables. Haiku often convey feelings through a descriptive snapshot of a natural object or scene.

Hyperbole—A figure of speech that uses an incredible exaggeration, or overstatement, for effect. Example

Hyperbole > Example I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world. —Walt Whitman from Song of Myself, 54

Iamb—A metrical foot in poetry that has an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable, as in the word protect. Iambic Pentameter—A line of poetry that contains five iambic feet. The iambic pentameter is most common in English and American poetry. Example

Iamb > Metrical Foot Meter is a pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in poetry. The meter of a poem is indicated by using the symbol (’) for stressed syllables and the symbol (˘) for unstressed syllables. A foot is a metrical unit of poetry that contains at least one stressed syllable and, usually, one or more unstressed syllables.

Iambic Pentameter > Example In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes —Ralph Waldo Emerson from “The Rhodora” ˘ ’ ˘ ’ ˘ ’ ˘ ’ ˘ ’

Idiom—An expression particular to a certain language that means something different from the literal definitions of its parts. “I lost my head” is an idiom of American English. Imagery—The use of language to evoke a picture or a concrete sensation of a person, a thing, a place, or an experience.

Imagism—A twentieth-century movement in European and American poetry that advocated the creation of hard, clear images, concisely expressed in everyday speech. Impressionism—A nineteenth-century movement in literature and art that advocated recording one’s personal impressions of the world, rather than attempting a strict representation of reality.

Incongruity—The deliberate joining of opposites or of elements that are not appropriate to each other. Interior Monologue—A narrative technique that records a character’s internal flow of thoughts, memories, and associations. Internal Rhyme—Rhyme that occurs within a line of poetry or within consecutive lines. Example

Internal Rhyme > Example And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride.... —Edgar Allan Poe from “Annabel Lee”

Inversion—The reversal of the normal word order in a sentence or phrase. Irony—In general, a discrepancy between appearance and reality. There are three main types of irony: verbal irony situational irony dramatic irony

Irony > Verbal Irony Verbal irony occurs when someone says one thing but really means something else. The first line of Stephen Crane’s poem “War Is Kind” is an example of verbal irony: “Do not weep, maiden, for war is kind.” The speaker really believes that war is not kind and warrants weeping.

Irony > Situational Irony Situational irony takes place when there is a discrepancy between what is expected to happen, or what would be appropriate to happen, and what really does happen.

Irony > Dramatic Irony Dramatic irony is so called because it is often used on stage. In this kind of irony a character in a play or story thinks one thing is true, but the audience or reader knows better.

Lyric Poem—A poem that does not tell a story but that expresses the personal feelings or thoughts of a speaker.

Magic Realism—A genre developed in Latin America that juxtaposes the everyday with the marvelous or magical. Marxism—The political and economic philosophy developed by Karl Marx and his followers in the mid-nineteenth century.

Memoir—A type of autobiography, or account of the writer’s own life, that often focuses on a specific time period or historical event.

Metaphor—A figure of speech that makes a comparison between two unlike things without the use of such specific words of comparison as like, as, than, or resembles. Directly stated metaphor Implied metaphor Extended metaphor Dead metaphor Mixed metaphor

Metaphor > Directly Stated Metaphor A directly stated metaphor states a comparison explicitly: “Fame is a bee” (Emily Dickinson).

Metaphor > Implied Metaphor An implied metaphor does not state explicitly the two terms of the comparison: “I like to see it lap the miles” (Emily Dickinson) contains an implied metaphor in which the verb lap implies a comparison between “it,” which is a train, and some animal that laps up water.

Metaphor > Extended Metaphor An extended metaphor is a metaphor that is extended or developed over a number of lines or with several examples.

Metaphor > Dead Metaphor A dead metaphor is a metaphor that has been used so often that the comparison is no longer vivid: “The head of the house,” “the seat of government,” and “a knotty problem” are all dead metaphors.

Metaphor > Mixed Metaphor A mixed metaphor is a metaphor that fails to make a logical comparison because its mixed terms are visually or imaginatively incompatible. If you say, “The president is a lame duck who is running out of gas,” you’ve lost control of your metaphor and have produced a statement that is ridiculous (ducks do not run out of gas).

Meter—A pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in poetry. More about meter Metonymy—A figure of speech in which a person, place, or thing is referred to by something closely associated with it. Referring to a car as “wheels” is an example of metonymy.

Meter > More About Meter The meter of a poem is indicated by using the symbol (’) for stressed syllables and the symbol (˘) for unstressed syllables. This is called scanning the poem.

Modernism—A term for the bold new experimental styles and forms that swept the arts during the first third of the twentieth century. Mood—The overall emotion created by a work of literature. Mood can usually be described in one or two adjectives, such as bittersweet, playful, or scary.

Motivation—The reasons for a character’s behavior. Myth—An anonymous traditional story that is basically religious in nature and that serves to explain a belief, ritual, or mysterious natural phenomenon.

Narrative—One of the four major forms of discourse in which a series of events is related. Narrative Poem—A poem that tells a story—a series of related events with a beginning, a middle, and an end. Narrator—In fiction the one who tells the story. Types of narrators

Narrative > Forms of Discourse The four major forms of discourse are description exposition narration persuasion

Narrator > Types of Narrators Omniscient narrators are all-knowing and outside the action. First-person narrators are either witnesses to or participants in the story. Third-person-limited narrators are omniscient but tell the story through one character’s perceptions.

Naturalism—A nineteenth-century literary movement that was an extension of realism and that claimed to portray life exactly as if it were being examined through a scientist’s microscope.

Octave—An eight-line poem, or the first eight lines of a Petrarchan, or Italian, sonnet. Ode—A lyric poem, usually long, on a serious subject and written in dignified language. Onomatopoeia—The use of a word whose sound imitates or suggests its meaning. The word buzz is onomatopoetic; it imitates the sound it names.

Oxymoron—A figure of speech that combines opposite or contradictory terms in a brief phrase. Sweet sorrow, deafening silence, and living death are common oxymorons.

Parable—A relatively short story that teaches a moral, or lesson, about how to lead a good life. Paradox—A statement that appears self-contradictory but that reveals a kind of truth. Parallel Structure—The repetition of words or phrases that have similar grammatical structures (also called parallelism).

Parody—A work that makes fun of another work by imitating some aspect of the writer’s style. Pastoral—A type of poem that depicts country life in idyllic, idealized terms. Personification—A figure of speech in which an object or animal is given human feelings, thoughts, or attitudes.

Persuasion—One of the four major forms of discourse in which reason and emotional appeals are used to convince a reader to think or act in a certain way. Plain Style—A way of writing that stresses simplicity and clarity of expression.

Persuasion > Forms of Discourse The four major forms of discourse are description exposition narration persuasion

Plot—The series of related events in a story or play; sometimes called the story line. Basic elements of plot Plot in dramas and novels

Plot > Basic Elements of Plot Exposition: introduction of the characters and their conflicts Complications Climax: most exciting or suspenseful moment Resolution or denouement: the end of the story, when we know the outcome of the characters’ struggles

Plot > Plot in Dramas and Novels The plots of dramas and novels are more complex than those of short stories, as shown below: Exposition (Rising Action) Complications Turning Point Falling Action Climax Denouement

Point of View—The vantage point from which the writer tells a story. In broad terms there are four main points of view: first person third person limited omniscient objective

Point of View > First Person In the first-person point of view, one of the characters tells the story, using first-person pronouns, such as I and we. With this point of view, we can know only what the narrator knows.

Point of View > Third Person Limited In the third-person-limited point of view, an unknown narrator (usually thought of as the author) tells the story, but this narrator zooms in to focus on the thoughts and feelings of only one character. Like first-person point of view, this point of view limits us to the perceptions of one character, but in this case the narrator can tell us many things that the character is unaware of.

Point of View > Omniscient In the omniscient point of view, an omniscient, or all-knowing, narrator tells the story, using third-person pronouns. However, this narrator, instead of focusing on one character only, often tells us everything about many characters. This narrator can also comment directly on the characters’ actions.

Point of View > Objective In the objective point of view, a narrator who is totally impersonal and objective tells the story, with no comment on any characters or events. The objective point of view is like the point of view of a movie camera: It is totally impersonal, and what we know is only what the camera might see.

Postmodernism—A term for the dominant trend in the arts since 1945 characterized by experiments with nontraditional forms and the acceptance of multiple meanings. Protagonist—The central character in a story, the one who initiates or drives the action. Proverb—A short, pithy statement that expresses a common truth or experience.

Psychoanalysis—A method of examining the unconscious mind, developed primarily by the Austrian physician Sigmund Freud (1865–1939). Pun—Play on the multiple meanings of a word or on two words that sound alike but that have different meanings.

Quatrain—A poem consisting of four lines, or four lines of a poem that can be considered a unit.

Rationalism—The belief that human beings can arrive at truth by using reason, rather than by relying on the authority of the past, on religious faith, or on intuition. Realism—A style of writing, developed in the nineteenth century, that attempts to depict life accurately, as it really is, without idealizing or romanticizing it.

Refrain—A word, phrase, line, or group of lines that is repeated, for effect, several times in a poem. Regionalism—Literature that emphasizes a specific geographic setting and that reproduces the speech, behavior, and attitudes of the people who live in that region.

Repetition—A unifying property of repeated words, sounds, syllables, or other elements that appear in a work. Resolution—The conclusion of a story, when all or most of the conflicts have been settled. Rhetorical Question—A question that is asked for effect and that does not actually require an answer. Such questions assume the audience agrees with the speaker on the answers.

Rhyme—The repetition of vowel sounds in accented syllables and all succeeding syllables. Example Types of rhyme Rhyme scheme Rhythm—The alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables in language. Meter

Rhyme > Example Tell me not, in mournful numbers, Life is but an empty dream! For the soul is dead that slumbers, And things are not what they seem. —Henry Wadsworth Longfellow from “A Psalm of Life”

Rhyme > Types of Rhyme End rhymes: rhyming words at the ends of lines Internal rhymes: rhymes within lines Approximate rhymes (or off rhymes, half rhymes, imperfect rhymes, or slant rhymes): words that have some correspondence in sound, but not an exact one

Rhyme > Rhyme Scheme The pattern of rhymes in a poem is called a rhyme scheme. Rhyme scheme is commonly indicated with letters of the alphabet, each rhyming sound represented by a different letter: for example, abab.

Rhythm > Meter The most obvious kind of rhythm is produced by meter, the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables found in some poetry.

Romance—In general, a story in which an idealized hero or heroine undertakes a quest and is successful. In a romance, beauty, innocence, and goodness usually prevail over evil. Romanticism—A revolt against rationalism that affected literature and the other arts, beginning in the late eighteenth century and remaining strong throughout most of the nineteenth century.

Romantic Novel—A novel with a happy ending that presents readers with characters engaged in adventures filled with courageous acts, daring chases, and exciting escapes.

Satire—A type of writing that ridicules the shortcomings of people or institutions in an attempt to bring about change. Scanning—The analysis of a poem to determine its meter. More about scanning Sestet—Six lines of poetry, especially the last six lines of a Petrarchan, or Italian, sonnet.

Scanning > More About Scanning When you scan a poem, you describe the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in each line. Stresses, or accents, are indicated by the symbol (’). Unstressed syllables are indicated by the symbol (˘).

Setting—The time and location in which a story takes place. More about setting Short Story—A brief work of prose fiction. More about the short story Simile—A figure of speech that makes an explicit comparison between two unlike things, using a word of comparison, such as like, as, than, or resembles.

Setting > More About Setting Setting is often used to create conflict. Setting helps create atmosphere or mood. Setting can create and delineate character.

Short Story > More About the Short Story A short story has a simpler plot than a novel does and is not long enough to be published as a volume of its own. Short stories usually focus on a few characters and one major event. Edgar Allan Poe often has been called one of the originators and masters of the modern short story.

Slant Rhyme—A rhyming sound that is not exact. Follow/fellow and mystery/mastery are examples of slant, or approximate, rhyme. Soliloquy—A long speech made by a character in a play while no other characters are onstage.

Sonnet—A fourteen-line poem, usually written in iambic pentameter, that has one of the two basic structures. Petrarchan sonnet Shakespearean sonnet Sound Effects—The use of sounds to create specific literary effects. More about sound effects

Sonnet > Iambic Pentameter Iambic pentameter refers to a line of poetry that contains five iambs. An iamb is a metrical foot, or unit of measure, consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable (˘ ’). Pentameter comes from the Greek penta (five) and meter (measure).

Sonnet > Petrarchan Sonnet The Petrarchan sonnet, also called the Italian sonnet, is named after the fourteenth-century Italian poet Petrarch. Its first eight lines, called the octave, ask a question or pose a problem. These lines have a rhyme scheme of abba, abba. The last six lines, called the sestet, respond to the question or problem. These lines have a rhyme scheme of cde, cde.

Sonnet > Shakespearean Sonnet The form used to perfection by William Shakespeare is known as the English, Elizabethan, or Shakespearean sonnet. It has three four-line units, or quatrains, and it concludes with a couplet. The most common rhyme scheme for the Shakespearean sonnet is abab, cdcd, efef, gg.

Sound Effects > More About Sound Effects Writers use devices such as rhythm, rhyme, meter, alliteration, onomatopoeia, assonance, consonance, and repetition to make the sounds of a work convey and enhance meaning.

Speaker—The voice that addresses the reader in a poem. Speech—A formal address delivered to an audience, or the printed version of the same address. Spondee—A metrical foot consisting of two syllables, both of which are stressed. The words true-blue and nineteen are made of spondees.

Spondee > Metrical Foot Meter is a pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in poetry. The meter of a poem is indicated by using the symbol (’) for stressed syllables and the symbol (˘) for unstressed syllables. A foot is a metrical unit of poetry that contains at least one stressed syllable and, usually, one or more unstressed syllables.

Stanza—A group of consecutive lines that forms a single structural unit in a poem. Stereotype—A fixed idea or conception of a character or a group of people that does not allow for any individuality and is often based on religious, social, or racial prejudice.

Stream of Consciousness—A style of writing that portrays the inner (and often chaotic) workings of a character’s mind. Style—The distinctive way in which a writer uses language. More about style

Style > More About Style Style can be plain, ornate, metaphorical, spare, descriptive, and so on. Style is determined by such factors as sentence length and complexity, syntax, use of figurative language and imagery, and diction.

Subjective and Objective Writing— Subjectivity, in terms of writing, suggests that the writer’s primary purpose is to express personal experiences, feelings, and ideas. Objectivity suggests that the writer’s purpose is to report facts, avoiding personal judgments and feelings.

Surrealism—A movement in art and literature that started in Europe during the 1920s. Surrealists wanted to replace conventional realism with the full expression of the unconscious mind, which they considered to be more real than the “real” world of appearances. Suspense—A feeling of uncertainty and curiosity about what will happen next in a story.

Symbol—A person, a place, a thing, or an event that has meaning in itself and that also stands for something more than itself. Types of symbols Symbolism—A literary movement that originated in late-nineteenth-century France, in which writers rearranged the world of appearances in order to reveal a more truthful version of reality.

Symbol > Types of Symbols We can distinguish between public and personal symbols. The dove, for example, is a public symbol of peace—that is, it is widely accepted the world over as such a symbol. Most symbols used in literature are personal symbols; even though a symbol may be widely used, a writer will usually adapt it in some imaginative, personal way so that it can suggest many different meanings.

Synecdoche—A figure of speech in which a part represents the whole. The capital of the nation, Washington, for example, is often spoken of as though it were the government: “Talks are now ongoing between Moscow and Washington.” Synesthesia—The juxtaposition of one sensory image with another image that appeals to an unrelated sense. In “sweet laughter” an image of sound is conveyed in terms of an image of taste.

Tall Tale—An outrageously exaggerated, humorous story that is obviously unbelievable. Theme—The insight about human life that is revealed in a literary work. More about theme

Theme > More About Theme Theme is different from subject. A story’s subject might be stated as “growing up,” “love,” “heroism,” or “fear.” The theme is the statement the writer wants to make about that subject: “For most young people, growing up is a process that involves the pain of achieving self-knowledge.” Theme must be stated in at least one sentence.

Tone—The attitude a writer takes toward the subject of a work, the characters in it, or the audience. Tone is conveyed through the writer’s choice of words and details. Tragedy—In general, a story in which a heroic character either dies or comes to some other unhappy end. More about tragedy

Tragedy > More About Tragedy In most tragedies the main character is in an enviable, even exalted, position when the story begins. The character’s downfall generally occurs because of some combination of fate, an error in judgment, and personality failure known as a tragic flaw. The tragic character has usually gained wisdom at the end of the story, despite suffering defeat or even death.

Transcendentalism—A nineteenth-century movement in the Romantic tradition, which held that every individual can reach ultimate truths through spiritual intuition, which transcends reason and sensory experience. Trochee—A metrical foot made up of an accented syllable followed by an unaccented syllable, as in the word taxi.

Trochee > Metrical Foot Meter is a pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in poetry. The meter of a poem is indicated by using the symbol (’) for stressed syllables and the symbol (˘) for unstressed syllables. A foot is a metrical unit of poetry that contains at least one stressed syllable and, usually, one or more unstressed syllables.

Understatement—A statement that says less than what is meant. Understatement, paradoxically, can make us recognize the truth of something by saying that just the opposite is true.

Vernacular—The language spoken by the people who live in a particular locality. Villanelle—A nineteen-line poem consisting of five tercets (three-line stanzas) with the rhyme scheme aba and with a final quatrain (four-line stanza) of abaa.

Handbook of Literary Terms

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Handbook of Literary Terms

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