Literary and Rhetorical Terms

1. Literary and Rhetorical Terms Add to your repertoire!

2. digression An interruption of the main action, accomplished by telling stories unrelated to the main plot. This serves to provide background information, explain character motivation, establish interest, build suspense, and inform the reader of the action to come.

3. meiosis Greek meaning �lessening� A figure of speech which contains an understatement for emphasis, often used ironically. You may consider it the opposite of hyperbole.

4. flashback A scene that interrupts the ongoing action in a story to show an event that happened earlier.

5. verisimilitude �veri� is Latin meaning truth �similis� is Latin meaning like or similar Likeness to the truth, and therefore the appearance of being true or real even when fantastic.

6. genre A term used to describe literary forms, such as novel, play, essay, and poem.

7. Bildungsroman A German word referring to a novel structured as a series of events that take place as the hero travels in quest of a goal. A rite of passage novel.

8. Interior monologue The technique of recording the continuum of impressions, thoughts and impulses either prompted by conscious experience or arising from the well of the subconscious. This phrase is often synonymous with �stream of consciousness�.

9. Stream of consciousness A style of writing in which the author tries to reproduce the random flow of thoughts in the human mind. It refers to an uninterrupted flow, in which logic, conventional syntax and even at times punctuation are abandoned.

10. motif A phrase, idea, or event that through repetition serves to unify or convey a theme in a work of literature. For example, Hemingway often uses rain to evoke feelings of death and despair.

11. Point of View Every piece of literature has a narrator or speaker. In non-fiction, it is the author�s voice you hear. In fiction and poetry, the identity of the narrator may not be so apparent.

12. First Person Narration When a story is told in first person (�I�), the narrator may or may not represent the author�s views. For example, Shakespeare�s sonnets are assumed to express the poet�s love for the so-called dark lady, but you can�t be sure.

13. Third Person Narration Third-person (�he/she�) narrators are sometimes trickier to pin down, for authors often invent voices completely different from their own. The narrator may be the author, but often is not, and there is danger of misinterpretation in ascribing to the author the views and attitudes of the narrator.

14. Omniscient Narration Omniscient narrators move in and out of characters� minds, know everything about everybody and may even pause occasionally to editorialize on the story.

15. euphemism A mild or less negative usage for a harsh or blunt term For example, pass away is a euphemism for die. Voluptuous is a euphemism for fat.