Literary Devices

A literary work is the writer's attitude toward his/her audience and subject

A speaker or character who tells a story

Writing or speech that appeals to one or more of the senses

Lesson taught by a literary work

The time and place of the action

Anything that stands for or represents something else

The use of words that imitate sounds

A conversation between characters

Brief work of fiction

Reason that explains why a character thinks, feels, acts, or behaves in a certain way

The imaginary voice assumed by the writer of a poem

A short speech delivered by an actor in a play, expressing the character's thoughts

A central message or insight into life revealed through the literary work

Use in a literary work of clues that suggest events that have yet to occur

General term for literary techniques that portray differences between appearance and reality

A brief story about an interesting, amusing, or strange event

Type of figurative language in which a nonhuman subject is given human characteristics

Prose writing that presents and explains ideas or that tells about real people

A category or type of literature

The high point of interest or suspense

The ordinary form of written language

A person or an animal who takes part in the action of a literary work

Writing or speech that attempts to convince the reader to adopt a particular opinion

Struggle between opposing forces

Form of language spoken by people in a particular region or group

Descriptive or figurative language used in literature to create word pictures for the reader

Sequence of events in a literary work

A long work of fiction

One of the three major types of literature, the others being prose and drama

The repetition of initial consonant sounds

Writing that tells a story

A figure of speech in which like or as is used to make a comparison between two unlike ideas

A feeling of curiosity or uncertainty about the outcome of events in a literary work

Speech by one character in a play, story, or poem

Figure of speech in which one thing is spoken of as though it were something else