Literary Terms And Definitions

Question 1

Allegory

Answer 1

A story in which the characters, setting, and events represent certain other people or events or concepts. Nearly everything is symbolic.

Question 2

Allusion

Answer 2

A reference to a statement, person, place, event, or thing that is known from literature, history, religion, myth, science, etc.

Question 3

Antagonist

Answer 3

A character or entity that goes against the protagonist and what the protagonist wants to achieve.

Question 4

Characterization

Answer 4

Method for how a character is revealed to or understood by the audience

Question 5

Direct Characterization

Answer 5

When a 3rd-person narrator tells us directly what a character’s personality is like

Question 6

Indirect Characterization

Answer 6

Judgment to decide what a character is like based on how he looks, what he does, what others think of him, etc.

Question 7

Character Types

Answer 7

The complexity and changeability of characters

Question 8

Static Characters

Answer 8

One who does not change much—or in any significant way over the course of a story

Question 9

Dynamic Character

Answer 9

One who changes in a significant way as a result of the story’s events

Question 10

Flat Character

Answer 10

One-dimensional character who has only one or two character traits, can be described with few words

Question 11

Round Characters

Answer 11

A multi-dimensional character who has many different traits, sometimes contradicting ones

Question 12

Didactic/Didacticism

Answer 12

When a story or narrator becomes obvious in his/her message

Question 13

Epiphany

Answer 13

When a character has gained a new understanding that causes a dynamic, life-altering change—often, the character endures a near-death experience, but change in a way that they will be stronger off and better off from the experience

Question 14

Expository

Answer 14

A kind of non-fiction writing that explains, gives information, defines, or clarifies an idea

Question 15

Fiction

Answer 15

A make-believe story

Question 16

Foreshadowing

Answer 16

Hint/clue to events that will occur later in the plot

Question 17

Genre

Answer 17

A category for a specific type of novel, music, movie, etc.

Question 18

Hubris

Answer 18

Overbearing pride

Question 19

Hyperbole

Answer 19

Extreme exaggeration

Question 20

Irony

Answer 20

A contrast between expectation and reality—between what is said and what is really meant, expected to happen, what does happen, appears to be true and what is true

Question 21

Situational Irony

Answer 21

A situation is ironic

Question 22

Dramatic Irony

Answer 22

The audience knows something that is unknown to the characters

Question 23

Verbal Irony

Answer 23

A person says one thing, but means the opposite

Question 24

Non-fiction

Answer 24

A literary work that is true

Question 25

Paradox

Answer 25

A statement or situation that appears to be contradictory but upon closer examination proves to make sense

Question 26

Plot

Answer 26

Series of related events that tells a story, often following a pattern

Question 27

Exposition

Answer 27

Beginning of story, can include setting, tone, references, introduction to characters, etc.

Question 28

Conflict

Answer 28

The problem that drives the story (knot)

Question 29

Rising Action

Answer 29

The problem becomes more intense or further problems are introduced (knot tightens)

Question 30

Climax

Answer 30

The most intense moment, emotionally or on an action level, main conflict is addressed for the final time (will the knot be untied)

Question 31

Denouement/resolution

Answer 31

Ending of the story (untying of the knot)

Question 32

Poetry

Answer 32

Language that is more ornate and more condensed than prose by creating images

Question 33

Point of view

Answer 33

Vantage point from which the writer has chosen to tell the story

Question 34

1st Person

Answer 34

One of the characters is telling the story (I, we, our) only know what our character/narrator knows

Question 35

3rd Limited

Answer 35

The narrator (not a character in the story) focuses on thoughts and feelings of just 1 character

Question 36

3rd Omniscient

Answer 36

Narrator of the story seems to know everything about all characters and their problems. Can follow multiple characters and know the past, present and future

Question 37

Prose

Answer 37

Ordinary writing (not poetic)

Question 38

Protagonist

Answer 38

A main character (good or bad)

Question 39

Pun

Answer 39

A clever play on multiple meanings of a word, or on two words that sound alike but have different meanings

Question 40

Sarcasm

Answer 40

An insincere tone of voice (often used for verbal irony)

Question 41

Setting

Answer 41

Time and place (sometimes this is vital to the story)

Question 42

Subject

Answer 42

What a story is about

Question 43

Symbol

Answer 43

Person, place, thing, or event that stands for itself and for something beyond itself as well

Question 44

Theme

Answer 44

The central idea of a work of literature / insights gained about subject of story / meaning that the author reveals

Question 45

Tone

Answer 45

(As in a poem or story) An author’s attitude toward a subject, character, etc. in a work of literature

Question 46

Tragic flaw

Answer 46

A character trait that is taken to an extreme that dooms a character (usually not a necessarily bad trait)