Short Story Unit Test Flashcards
(29 cards)
What is the short story term: The main character in a story, the one with whom the reader is meant to identify. The person is not necessarily ‘good’ by any conventional moral standard, but he/she is the person in whose plight the reader is most invested.
Protaganist
What is the short story term: The counterpart to the main character and source of a story’s main conflict. The person may not be “bad” or “evil” by any conventional moral standard, but he/she opposes the protagonist in a significant way.
Antagonist
What is the short story term: A major character in a work of fiction whose personality is fully developed and described, showing multiple character traits and depth.
Round character
What is the short story term: A minor character in a work of fiction who is often defined by one or two stereotypical trait (the jock, the brain, the sidekick, etc.) and plays a supporting role to the main characters.
Flat character
What is the short story term: A round character who experiences significant personality change over the course of a story, due to his/her experiences with conflict or plot events.
Dynamic character
What is the short story term: A character (usually a flat one) whose personality remains unchanged from the beginning to the end of the story’s plot.
Static character
What is the short story term: The method a writer uses to reveal the personality of a character in a literary work.
Characterization
What is the short story term: The perspective from which the story is told.
Point of view
What is the short story term: The sequence of events in a story.
Plot
What is the short story term: The TIME, PLACE and CIRUCUMSTANCES in which the story unfolds.
Setting
What is the short story term: The atmosphere or feeling created by a literary work, partly by a description of the objects or by the style of the descriptions.
Mood
What is the short story term: The problem the protagonist faces.
Conflict
What is the short story term: An ingredient of a literary work which gives the work unity. The theme provides an answer to the question “What is the author trying to say?” It is the main message or ‘moral of the story’.
Theme
What is the short story term: The author’s attitude toward his/her subject matter, as revealed by his/her creative choices.
Tone
What are the two methods of characterization?
DIRECT CHARACTERIZATION: Occurs when the writer makes direct statements about a character’s personality and tells the reader about what the character is like.
INDIRECT CHARACTERIZATION: Occurs when the writer reveals information about a character and his/her personality through that character’s thoughts, words, and actions, along with how other characters respond to that character, including what they think and say about him/her
What are the 4 types of point of view?
FIRST PERSON: Limits the matter of the narrative to what the first person narrator knows, experiences, infers, or can find out by talking to others. The use of ‘I’ is employed throughout.
SECOND PERSON: In this mode the story gets told primarily as an address by the narrator to someone he/she refers to as ‘you’.
THIRD PERSON OMNISCIENT: In this mode the narrator knows everything that needs to be known about the agents, actions and events, and has privileged access to the characters’ thoughts, feelings and motivates; also the narrator is free to move at will in time and place, and to shift from character to character.
THIRD PERSON LIMITED: The narrator tells the story in the third person but stays inside the confines of what is perceived, thought, remembered and felt by a single character (or at most by very few characters) within a story.
What are the 5 stages of plot?
EXPOSITION: The set-up of the story. The background information that is needed to understand the story is provided, such as the main character, the setting, the basic conflict and so forth.
RISING ACTION: Rising action is a series of events and actions that move the story to a climax. During rising action, the basic conflict is complicated by secondary conflicts, such as obstacles and challenges that frustrate the main character’s attempt to reach their goal.
CLIMAX: The climax is the peak of the action and the turning point in the story. After the climax, everything changes. Things will have gone badly for the main character up to this point; now, things will begin to go well for him or her. However, if the story is a tragedy, the opposite will happen.
FALLING ACTION: During the falling action, the conflict unravels with the main character either winning or losing. The falling action might contain a moment of final suspense,
during which the final outcome of the conflict is in doubt.
DENOUMENT (CONCLUSION): The story ends. The main character is better off than at the beginning of the story;
What are the 3 parts of setting?
TIME: Day, month, year, era, etc.
PLACE: Geographical location
CIRCUMSTANCE: What is going on leading up to the telling of the story?
What are the 6 main types of conflict?
The SIX main types of conflict are: Person vs. person Person vs. self Person vs. nature Person vs. society Person vs. technology Person vs. the supernatural
When do you use a period?
At the end of a sentence.
When do you use a exclaimation mark?
To show strong feeling.
When do you use a question mark?
To ask a question.
When do you use quotation marks?
- When someone is speaking
- When you are trying to say something untrue or sarcastic
- You are borrowing words that are not yours
When do you use parentheses?
- To make a comment inside a sentence that helps clairify information
- To separate letters or numbers in a list
