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Literary Terms

Literary Terms. Allegory: A story which has meaning on both the literal and figurative or moral level. e.g. Scarlet Letter Star Wars. Alliteration: The repetition of sounds in a group of words as in “Peter Piper Picked a Peck of Pickled Peppers.” .

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Literary Terms

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  1. Literary Terms

  2. Allegory:A story which has meaning on both the literal and figurative or moral level. e.g. Scarlet LetterStar Wars

  3. Alliteration:The repetition of sounds in a group of words as in “Peter Piper Picked a Peck of Pickled Peppers.”

  4. Allusion:A reference to a person, place, or thing--often literary, mythological, or historical. The infinitive of allusion is to allude.e.g. Romeo alludes to the mythological figure Diana in the balcony scene.

  5. Antagonist:A major character who opposes the protagonist in a story or play.

  6. Contrast:To explain how two things differ. To compare and contrast is to explain how two things are alike and how they are different.

  7. Diction 1)Word choice. 2) The author’s choice of words. An author has the option of choosing any word from our language, why does he/she choose to use certain words and not others? In order to create a certain tone.

  8. Figurative Language:Whenever you describe something by comparing it with something else, you are using figurative language. Any language that goes beyond the literal meaning of words in order to furnish new effects or fresh insights into an idea or a subject.e.g. Whenever you call something “cool,” you’re not talking about its temperature but referring to some other quality it possesses.

  9. Foreshadowing:A technique in which an author gives clues about something that will happen later in the story.

  10. Hyperbole:An extreme exaggeration. e.g. To say that it took you hours to walk home when in reality it was only 10 mins would be a hyperbole.

  11. Imagery:The use of description that helps the reader imagine how something looks, sounds, feels, smells, or tastes. Most of the time, it refers to appearance.e.g. “Tita was so sensitive to onions, any time they were being chopped, they say she would just cry and cry; when she was still in my great-grandmother’s belly her sobs were so loud that even Nacha, the cook, who was half-deaf, could hear them easily.”--Like Water for Chocolate

  12. Metaphor:A comparison of two unlike things using any form of the verb “to be”–-i.e. am, are, is, was, were. Ex: “This chair is a rock,” or “I am an island.”

  13. Mood:The feeling created in the reader by a literary work or passage.  The mood may be suggested by the writer's choice of words, by events in the work, or by the physical setting.  

  14. Motif:A recurrent image, word, phrase, or action that tends to unify the literary work or that forms the theme in a work of literature.

  15. Onomatopoeia:The use of words that sound like what they mean such as “buzz,” “bang,” or “tic-tock.”

  16. Paradox: a statement that is apparently self-contradictory or absurd but really contains a possible truth. e.g. Cowards die many times before their deaths.--Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar

  17. Parallelism: The use of similar grammatical structure for effect. e.g. I came, I saw, I conquered. Also, a requirement in grammar to use the same grammatical form for cojoined ideas. e.g. We went biking, sailing, and hiking on our trip, not We went biking, sailing, and hiked on our trip.

  18. Personification: Giving inanimate objects human characteristics. e.g. “The wind howled through the night.”

  19. Protagonist:The main character of a novel, play, or story.

  20. Pun:The use of a word in a way that plays on its different meanings. e.g. “Noticing the bunch of bananas, the hungry gorilla went ape.”

  21. Rhetorical Question:A question not meant to be answered but asked solely to produce an effect or to make a statement. The purpose to such a question, whose answer is obvious, is usually to make a deeper impression upon the hearer or reader than a direct statement would. Its effect is to make the reader stop and think about what is being asked.e.g. “How many times have I asked you to take out the trash?”

  22. Simile:Comparing two unlike things using “like” or “as.” e.g. “I’m as hungry as a pig,” or “Your eyes are like stars that brighten my night.”

  23. Symbolism:The use of one thing to represent another. Something that stands for something else. e.g. A dove is a symbol of peace.

  24. Tone:The author’s attitude toward the subject of the work. Usually positive or negative.e.g. The tone of a piece of literature could be pessimistic, optimistic, angry, or sarcastic.

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