| Analogy
|
A comparison of two things that systematically explores the similarities between them, generally so as to describe one of the terms in detail. |
| Apostrophe
|
A direct address to someone or something that
is not physically present within the text -- often, in poetry, an address
to an abstract idea. Insofar as that which is addressed is usually
not human, there is an implicit personification
in this figure of speech.
|
| Conceit
|
A conceit is a simile or
metaphor
that has been extended to more fully explore connections between the two
terms of the comparison; simplistically, it is the controlling idea of
a poem or an image. Donne and other metaphysical poets were particularly
known for their use of this figure, in the “metaphysical conceit.”
|
| Dramatic Irony
|
A feature of drama or narrative, in which the
audience/reader is aware of relevant information that the characters do
not know (and, generally, the knowledge of which would influence characters’
actions and/or their moral judgments).
|
| First Person
|
A point of view in which the story is told by
an identifiable “I” character. The narrator may be the protagonist (main
character) of the story, may play a minor role in the plot, or may be a
simple observer; however, his/her insight into the story’s action is limited
to what would be possible for an individual human being in a particular
situation. The first-person narrator may be an unreliable
narrator, as individual biases and limitations affect his or her ability
to interpret events.
|
| Flat Character
|
A character in a story who remains constant in
his/her attachment to a particular viewpoint or idea; “flat” characters
do not develop over the course of a narrative. Most (but not all)
minor characters are relatively flat, but sometimes a flat character may
have a significant role in a story, as Dr. Pangloss does in Voltaire’s
Candide.
Often, characters in allegory are also flat.
|
| Free Indirect
Discourse
|
A form of narration in which the story is told
in the third person, but the narrator conveys a sense of the internal thoughts
of a character, not by quoting thoughts or speech but by adopting that
character’s perspective into the narrator’s own voice. In other words,
it lies somewhere between first- and third-person narration. The
example Abrams gives in A Glossary of Literary Terms is “He thought,
‘I will see her home now, and may then stop at my mother’s’” becoming “He
would see her home then, and might afterward stop at his mother’s.”
That is, the thoughts of the character become externalized, presented in
an objective, conditional tense, rather than being clearly demarcated as
thoughts.
|
| Hyperbole
|
Literary overstatement, used, for example, in
extravagant metaphors in poetry, or to ironically poke fun at a character
or situation.
|
| Implied
Metaphor |
A metaphor in which one
thing is compared to another without the second term being explicitly identified;
the metaphor is understood because of terms of description or action associated
with the object.
|
| Irony
|
Any use of suggestive tone or circumstance to
convey more meaning than the literal significance of the language allows;
characterized by a superior stance of greater knowledge on the part of
the speaker or writer.
|
| Litotes
|
A double negative, used to convey the sense of
the positive but in an ironic sense. For example, to say “I am not
unsympathetic to your problem” suggests I am sympathetic, but that I am
nevertheless not going to help you.
|
| Metaphor
|
A comparison in which one thing is described
as sharing an identity with another: the fierce warrior becomes a tiger,
the gentle Savior is a lamb. The object of comparison thus takes
on many of the attributes of the thing with which it has been identified.
|
| Metonymy
|
Similar to synecdoche,
but in this figure the significant concept is represented by an object
that is associated with it. When Americans pledge allegiance to the
flag, they are really declaring their loyalty to the country itself; “flag”
here is an example of metonymy.
|
| Mock Epic
|
Narrative verse which adopts the tone and style
of epic poetry, but applies it to more ordinary objects and actions; typically
used to satirize a society or a class within society. It has affinities
to parody, except that it is usually not used to
mock the epic form itself, but to ironize the story being told.
|
| Ode
|
An ode is an elaborate lyric, dignified in tone
and serious in subject, historically developed from a Greek form which
was divided into three movements (strophes): strophe, antistrophe, and
epode. English poetry has 3 types of ode: Pindaric, which retains
the three-strophe division, with the strophe and antistrophe being identical
in form, and the epode different; Horatian, with only one stanza type (also
called a homostrophe); and irregular, with no repetitive stanzaic pattern,
thus allowing for maximum flexibility and poetic freedom.
|
| Oxymoron
|
The technical literary term for a paradox; a
yoking together of two terms that seem implicitly to be opposed to one
another. In Rumi’s “Dissolver of Sugar,” the final line (“the keeping
away is pulling me in”) is an example of an oxymoron. (Note also,
the term for a second-year student, “sophomore” is an oxymoron; in Greek,
its parts mean “wise fool.”)
|
| Parody
|
A literary work that imitates another work’s
style in order to mock the first work (or author).
|
| Personification
|
A special kind of implied
metaphor, in which something that is not human (an inanimate object,
an animal, an abstraction) is endowed with human attributes.
|
| Round Character
|
Generally a more lifelike, complex character,
capable of developing new aspects over the course of a narrative.
|
| Simile
|
A limited comparison of two things, in which
there is no assertion of identity, as in metaphor;
one thing is like another, but yet not the same as the other.
These comparisons can usually be recognized by the use of the prepositions
“like” or “as” but may also be seen in the use of comparative mode: “The
brain is wider than the sky.” (Note that not all uses of the comparative
create similes; to become figurative rather than literal, two different
senses of the comparative term [”wider than”] need to be evoked.)
|
| Sonnet
|
A fixed poetic form, typically a 14-line poem
in iambic pentameter, although there are exceptions (e.g., Wyatt wrote
18-line sonnets, Auden 21-line (expanded) sonnets, and Hopkins created
the curtal sonnet, with 10 ½ lines). All sonnets make use
of the unbalanced number of lines, requiring unequal divisions of the rhyme
scheme; structurally, a sonnet allows the poet to develop an image or concept
in the first, longer section, then to make a philosophical comment after
the turn (the shift from one pattern to the next). In English, there
are two kinds: Italian (8-6 split, abba abba cde cde), also called Petrarchan,
and English (4-4-4-2 split, abab cdcd efef gg), also called Shakespearean.
|
| Symbol
|
A symbol is something that represents something else (often an abstract idea) while retaining its own identity as an object. Unlike a metaphor, where the purpose may be to show unexpected relationships between two things, the symbolic object is subordinated to the (often unstated) term that it represents. |
| Synecdoche
|
A figure of speech in which a subordinate part
of a thing represents the whole. An example would be we speak of
so many “head” of cattle, or call for “all hands on deck”; typically, “head”
refers here to an entire cow, and “hands” to the sailors.
|
| Synesthesia
|
Another kind of implied metaphor,
in which an attribute associated with one of the physical senses (sight,
hearing, touch, taste, smell) is applied to a term associated with a different
sense: e.g., “hot pink.”
|
| Third Person
Limited |
A point of view in which the story is told using
“he” and “she,” but in which the narrator’s insight is limited to observations
of only one or a few characters.
|
| Third Person
Omniscient |
A point of view in which the story is told using
“he” and “she” and in which the narrator has access to the thoughts and
actions of all characters in the story, as well as to all relevant events.
|
| Unreliable Narrator
|
A first person narrator
who, because of specific biases and/or limitations in his/her ability to
understand what is being witnessed, presents an inaccurate account of the
events and/or characters of the story. The reader must decipher what
has really happened by understanding the limitations of the narrator, recognizing
narratorial unreliability from clues provided by the author.
|
| Verbal Irony
|
A form of irony in which
what the writer says appears to mean one thing, and may be understood as
meaning that thing by characters in the story or by unsophisticated readers,
but in fact (as revealed by tone and context) means something quite the
opposite of the surface meaning. (Things said “tongue in cheek” are
examples of verbal irony.)
|
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