Fiction Vocab Test Flashcards

1
Q

Allusion

A

A brief, often implicit and indirect reference within a literary text to something outside the text, whether another text (e.g. The Bible, a myth, another literary work, painting, or a piece of music) or any imaginary or historical person, place, or thing.

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2
Q

Ambiguity

A

When we are involved in interpretation—figuring out what different elements in a story “mean”—we are responding to a work’s ambiguity.

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3
Q

Antagonist

A

A character or a nonhuman force that opposes, or is in conflict with, the protagonist.

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4
Q

Antihero

A

A protagonist who is in one way or another the very opposite of a traditional hero. Instead of being courageous and determined, for instance, an antihero might be timid, hypersensitive, and indecisive to the point of paralysis.

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5
Q

Archetype

A

A character, ritual, symbol, or plot pattern that recurs in the myth and literature of many cultures; examples include the scapegoat or trickster (character type), the rite of passage (ritual), and the quest or descent into the underworld (plot pattern).

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6
Q

Characterization

A

The presentation or delineation of a fictional personage. Direct characterization or direct definition occurs when the narrator explicitly tells what a character is like.

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7
Q

Climax

A

The third part of plot (see Freytag’s pyramid), the point at which the action stops rising and begins falling or reversing; also called turning point.

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8
Q

Complication

A

In plot, an action or event that introduces a new conflict or intensifies the existing one, especially during the rising action phase of plot.

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9
Q

Conflict

A

A struggle between opposing forces that sets the action in motion.

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10
Q

Dénouement (French for “untying as of a knot)

A

A plot-related term used in three ways: (1) as a synonym for falling action, (2) as a synonym for conclusion or resolution, and (3) as the label for a phase following the conclusion in which any loose ends are tied up. See Freytag’s pyramid.

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11
Q

Epiphany

A

A sudden moment of illumination or revelation of truth, often inspired by a seemingly simple or commonplace event.

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12
Q

Exposition

A

The first phase or part of plot (see Freytag’s pyramid), which sets the scene, introduces and identifies characters, while establishing the situation at the beginning of a story. Additional information is often scattered throughout the work.

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13
Q

Flashback

A

A plot-structuring device inserting a scene from the fictional past into the fictional present.

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14
Q

Foreshadowing

A

A hint or clue about what will happen at a later moment in the plot.

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15
Q

Hero/Heroine

A

A character in a literary work, especially the leading male/female character, who is especially virtuous, usually larger than life, sometimes almost godlike.

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16
Q

An medias res (Latin for in the midst of things”)

A

Opening of the plot in the middle of the action, and then filling in past details by means of flashback.

17
Q

Image/Imagery

A

Broadly defined, imagery is any sensory detail or evocation in a work; more narrowly, the use of figurative language to evoke a feeling, to call to mind an idea, or to describe an object.

18
Q

Irony

A

A situation or statement characterized by a significant difference between what is expected and what actually happens, or between what is understood and what is meant.

19
Q

Metaphor

A

A general term for almost any figure of speech involving comparison; more commonly, a particular figure of speech in which two unlike things are compared implicitly—that is, without the use of a signal such as the word like or as—as in “Love is a rose, but you better not pick it”.

20
Q

Narrator

A

Someone who recounts a narrative or tells a story.

21
Q

Plot

A

The arrangement of the action. The five main parts or phases of plot are exposition, rising action, climax or turning point, falling action, and conclusion or resolution.

22
Q

Protagonist

A

The main character in a work, whether male or female, heroic or non-heroic.

23
Q

Rising action

A

The second of the five phases or parts of plot (see Freytag’s pyramid), in which events complicate the situation existing at the beginning of a work by intensifying the initial conflict or introducing a new one.

24
Q

Setting

A

The time and place of the action in a work of fiction.

25
Q

Stream of Consciousness

A

A type of third- or first-person narration that replicates the thought processes of a character without much or any intervention by a narrator.

26
Q

Symbol

A

A person, place, thing, or event that figuratively represents or stands for something else. Often the thing or idea represented is more abstract and general, and the symbol is more concrete and particular.

27
Q

Theme

A

1) Broadly and commonly, an idea explored in a literary work (e.g. “the value of all life”).

2) More narrowly, the insight about a topic communicated in a work (e.g. “All living things are equally precious”).

28
Q

Voice

A

The narrating instance, the verbal aspect of point of view, the acknowledged or unacknowledged source of a story’s words; the speaker; the “person” telling the story and that person’s particular qualities of insight, attitude, and verbal style.