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| a reference in a literary work to a person, place, or thing in history or another work of literature. Allusions are often indirect or brief references to well-known characters or events. Allusions serve an important function in writing in that they allow the reader to understand a difficult concept by relating to an already familiar story. |
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| a doubtfulness or uncertainty about the intention or meaning of something. It usually refers to a statement that is subject to more than one interpretation. |
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| the moment in a play, novel, short story, or narrative poem at which the crisis comes to its point of greatest intensity and is resolved. It is also the peak of emotional response from a reader or spectator, and it usually represents the turning point in the action. |
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Complication refers to the difficult circumstances that come about through the character's attempts to find solutions to his/her problem. ThAT IS B.S IT IS ANOTHER THING ADDED TO THE STORY |
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| two events are related as cause and effect when one event brings about or causes the other. The event that happens first is the cause; the one that follows is the effect. |
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| a figure of speech in which the truth is exaggerated for emphasis or humorous effect. |
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| Fully and clearly expressed or demonstrated; leaving nothing merely implied; unequivocal: explicit instructions; an explicit act of violence; explicit language. |
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| Exposition is that part of the story that helps the reader understand the background or situation in which the story is set. It is intended to make clear or explain something that might be difficult to understand. |
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| of the nature of or involving a figure of speech, esp. a metaphor; metaphorical; not literal: a figurative expression |
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| Foreshadowing is a suggestion or hint in a story. It is put there by the author to indicate an event to come. At times this “hint” may be so subtle that it is difficult to recognize until the “event” has occurred. |
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| a word or phrase in a literary text that appeals directly to the reader's taste, touch, hearing, sight, or smell. An image is thus any vivid or picturesque phrase that evokes a particular sensation in the reader's mind. Example: Whitman's "vapor-pennants" and evocations of "golden brass" and "silvery steel" in "To a Locomotive in Winter"; Bryant's "lone lakes" and "autumn blaze" in "To an American Painter. . . ." |
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| to derive as a conclusion from facts or premises |
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| This occurs when the audience or reader knows more than the characters know. |
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| This refers to a happening that is the opposite of what is expected or intended. |
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| The contrast between what is said and what is actually meant. |
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| Structural element of fictional texts, the opposite of solution or dénouement. In a story with an open ending the conflict is not solved: the final interpretation is left up to the reader or audience. |
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| The angle from which a story is told. For example, first-person: The narrator is a character in the story and refers to himself as “I.” Second person: The reader is the main character. Narrator uses the pronoun “you” when referring to the main character. |
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| (Denouement) Rounds out and concludes the action. |
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| A series of events that builds from the conflict. It begins with the inciting force and ends with the climax. |
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| a story in which characters and events have both a literal and a figurative meaning, standing for some larger idea as well as for themselves. |
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| the repetition of the same initial sound of two or more adjacent, or nearly adjacent, words. |
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| a brief comment made on stage, sometimes directed at the audience, that is assumed not to be heard by certain characters on stage. |
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| Saying the opposite of what you mean to pretend to praise someone. Designed to hurt. |
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a struggle between two forces, such as man vs. man, man vs. nature, man vs.
society, or man vs. himself. |
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| Suspense is the tension created in the reader by the action of the story. This is done when the author hints that something new is about to happen. |
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| Something in a story which stands for something else. A symbol usually is some real object that stands for an abstract meaning. In “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant, the diamond necklace is a symbol for the beauty and glamour of the world Madame yearns for. |
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| the positive or negative emotional associations a word may have beyond its dictionary definition |
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| the factual dictionary definition of a word, stripped of any emotional associations. |
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| the tying together of loose ends in the story after the climax; a near synonym for falling action and resolution |
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| a word or phrase that has two meanings, one of which is often risqué. |
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| the substitution of a non-offensive terms for plainer language that may be taken negatively, such as calling someone “vertically challenged” rather than saying he is short. |
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| the lessening of tension after the climax |
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| a brief tale, often using animal characters, that teaches an explicit moral lesson. |
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| exaggeration for emphasis |
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| the act of suggesting indirectly rather than coming out and saying something explicitly. |
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| a conclusion based on indirect evidence rather than direct statement. |
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| a type of situational irony in which the very factor that leads the reader to expect one thing actually causes the opposite outcome. |
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| narrowly factual or physical. |
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understatement used for emphasis, often involving the denial the contrary, i.e.
not unattractive used in place of beautiful |
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| an imaginative comparison in which two things are identified with each other without using like or as. |
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| use of the name of one thing for another thing with which it is usually associated, such as saying “The White House said...” rather than “The President said...” |
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| word or phrase that imitates the sound it describes. Form example, ping. |
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| a combination of contradictory terms. Jumbo Shrimp |
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| an apparent contradiction that points to a truth. |
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| the assigning of human characteristics to animals, objects, or idea. |
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| condensed, highly rhythmic language, usually employing more figurative language and techniques than prose. |
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| ordinary language, without rhyme or regularized rhythm. |
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| a humorous play on words in which a word is used to convey two meanings at the same time. In a double entendre, one of the meanings is sexual. |
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| the repetition of the same or similar sound or sounds at the end of words. |
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| the rise and fall of sounds; a regular accent or emphasis pattern. |
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| a work in which fictional characters and incidents are meant to correspond to specific real life people and events. |
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| an imaginative comparison using like or as to link things that are not usually thought of as similar. |
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| a sustained speech in which a character, usually alone on stage, speaks his thoughts out loud, often to the audience, without this being a sign of insanity. |
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the part of a script that describes the set and the physical appearance
or actions of the characters. |
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the unvoiced thoughts, feeling, meanings, and motives that underlie the words
that are actually spoken. |
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uncertainty about what will happen next in the plot or about the eventual
outcome of the conflict that builds tension and arouses curiosity within
the audience or reader |
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| the use of a part to represent the whole, as in bread standing for all food in “not by bread alone...” |
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| the use of qualities associated with one sense to describe another sense, as in using color to describe a sound |
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| the author’s apparent emotional attitude toward the characters and events he creates, ranging from kind and sympathetic to cruel and mocking, and from deadly serious to playfully humorous. |
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