Wilde's Techniques - Key Terms

Question 1

Ambiguity

Answer 1

Where words have multiple or uncertain meanings.

Question 2

Affectation

Answer 2

Behaviour, speech or writing that is pretentious and designed to impress.

Question 3

Camp

Answer 3

In a literary sense the word refers to an attitude to life and the arts as ironic, stylised and distanced. Often relies on a comically exaggerated responses to inappropriate subjects.

Question 4

Characterisation

Answer 4

Manner in which a character is constructed and portrayed.

Question 5

Dandy

Answer 5

Attractive, witty and worldly man with a fixation on enjoyment.

Question 6

Denouement

Answer 6

The unfolding of the plot at the end of the play.

Question 7

Dramatic irony

Answer 7

The audience posses more information about what is happening or being said than the characters.

Question 8

Epigram

Answer 8

A pithy saying or remark expressing an idea in a clever and amusing manner.

Question 9

Euphemism

Answer 9

Unpleasant facts or words expressed more pleasantly.

Question 10

Exposition

Answer 10

The beginning of a play in which essential background information is established.

Question 11

Hyperbole

Answer 11

Exaggeration.

Question 12

Incongruity

Answer 12

Contrary to what is expected.

Question 13

Ingénue(e)

Answer 13

A stock character from the comedy of manners. Usually female, often from the country, she is innocent, naive, artless and easily manipulated.

Question 14

Innuendo

Answer 14

An allusive or oblique remark or hint, typically a suggestive one.

Question 15

Irony

Answer 15

Where something is said but something else is meant.

Question 16

Lexical sets

Answer 16

A group of words that share a similar meaning.

Question 17

Metaphor

Answer 17

A figure of speech in which a word or phrase is applied to an object or action to which it is not literally applicable.

Question 18

Motif

Answer 18

Recurring feature/theme.

Question 19

Neologism

Answer 19

An innovation in language - an invented word or phrase.

Question 20

Paradox

Answer 20

Self-contradictory statement or a statement that seems to conflict with logic.

Question 21

Periphrasis

Answer 21

An indirect manner of speech.

Question 22

Phatic language

Answer 22

Words or phrases used in social situations to establish a relationship between speakers but which have no real meaning.

Question 23

Pun

Answer 23

Word play. A joke that exploits the different possible meanings of a word.

Question 24

Repartee

Answer 24

A verbal ‘sword fight’, repartee indicates swift, witty replies, often mildly insulting.

Question 25

Reversal expectation / inversion

Answer 25

Inversion of the reader's expectations. Learned or so-called 'normal' behaviour or sayings are undermined.

Question 26

Simile

Answer 26

Where two things are likened.

Question 27

Solecism

Answer 27

Verban intervention which breaks the rules of normal or polite grammar and by extension refers to impolite or inappropriate actions.

Question 28

Stock character

Answer 28

Recognisable, stereotypical character.

Question 29

Symbolism

Answer 29

A symbol is a thing that represents or stands for something else, especially a material object representing something abstract.

Question 30

Wit

Answer 30

Intelligent humour relying on sophisticated use of language.