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SOME COMMON LITERARY TERMS

Antagonist: The entity that frustrates the goals of the protagonist.

Protagonist: The main character of the story.

Antihero: A protagonist who is not admirable (at least not in the traditional sense).

Motif: A recurring idea, structure, contrast, or device that develops or informs the major themes of a work.

Repetition: Repeats something over and over. (Repetition repeats something over and over) Used to emphasize whatever is being repeated.

Hyperbole: Hype. Extreme Exaggeration. (You will fly if you wear Air Jordan sneakers). Often used in advertising to convince you to buy a product. Also used to create humor.

Irony: When the opposite of what is expected happens. (The man died of thirst on a raft in the middle of the ocean. The irony is that he was surrounded by water). Used to surprise the reader – often at the end of a story.

Foreshadowing: Giving the reader a hint of what is to come.

Flashback: Taking the reader back in time to an earlier event.

Simile: A comparison of two dissimilar things using “like” or “as” (The sun is like an orange in the sky) Used to suggest a likeness between two dissimilar things. SIMILES & METAPHORS ARE ALSO KNOWN AS “FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE.”

Metaphor: A comparison of two dissimilar things (without using “like” or “as”) (The sun is an orange in the sky).

Personification: Attaching human characteristics to non-human objects. (The knife hated only the jacket – not the young man wearing it who it just happened to slice through like warm butter).

Imagery: Descriptive language that creates an image for the reader.

Symbolism: A symbol is something that stands for something else. (The American flag is a symbol of liberty & freedom) Symbols are used to represent very complex ideas that would normally take many pages to explain.

Theme: The subject or topic of a work.

Conflict: A problem that arises. Conflict creates tension and suspense for the reader and is the essence of drama.

Characterization: Any description of a character that tells you something about him/her

Setting: Time & place. Setting is important because some stories need a certain setting or they cannot be told. (Star Wars is set in a technologically advanced galaxy far, far away. It could not be set in medieval times because the story would make no sense).

Mood: The atmosphere of a piece. Mood creates a feeling for the reader.

Tone: The author’s attitude toward the subject matter (sarcastic, indifferent)

Point of View: (First & Third person)

Who is telling the story. First person: you see the story through the eyes of a character. Third Person: you see the story from the point of view of a party outside of the story. FIRST PERSON POINT OF VIEW IS SUBJECTIVE BECAUSE YOU ARE SEEING THE STORY THROUGH THE EYES OF A CHARACTER WHO HAS HIS/HER BIASES AND PARTICULAR WAY OF LOOKING AT THE WORLD. THIRD PERSON POINT OF VIEW IS MORE OBJECTIVE BECAUSE YOU ARE SEEING THE EVENTS FROM AN UNBIASED, DISTANT PERSPECTIVE.

Plot Structure: Exposition, Rising Action, Climax, Falling Action, Resolution.

Allegory: A story where the characters and setting represent other people & settings or abstract ideas. This symbolic meaning is more important than the literal meaning. (Examples are Gulliver’s Travels and Aesop’s Fables)

Rhetorical Question: A question posed for the sake of asking the question (Was the war in Iraq worth it?)Type your paragraph here.